34th Philadelphia Film Festival: Animated Shorts Program
Natalia León, May Kindred-Boothby, Farnoosh Abedi-Negah Fardiar, Jan Saska, Calleen Koh, and 3 more
I was once again unable to make it to the animation festival in Ottawa this year, and the Philadelphia Film Festival once again filled some of that gap with a well-curated program of shorts. I’m feeling pretty raw lately about a variety of big things both personal and global, and several of these films collectively poked at all those things, so while I don’t regret attending, I did come away from the screening more emotionally queasy than I might have in better times.
This was also the first time in months I’ve biked through Center City on a Saturday night, and I was somehow stunned anew at how thoroughly it requires one to be at the very top of their urban cycling game. Philly has made progress with bikes, but it still has a long way to go.
My Wonderful Life
A woman is temporarily reprieved from her thankless existence as a put-upon wife, mother, and executive assistant when a germy subway interaction puts her in the hospital, where she refuses visitors and schemes to stay as long as possible, with increasingly drastic consequences. The superfluous narration gets in the way, but it’s otherwise funny stuff with a unique look, mining most of its power from just how grotesque it’s willing to get.
The Eating of an Orange
A lyrical expression of a woman finding her own way off the path of heteronormative conformity. It does a good job of saying its piece without dialogue, and the successful codependence of its understated chamber music and painterly visuals is a rare treat.
As If Swallowed by the Earth
Since funding seems to be pretty spread out these days, nationalities listed on independent films don’t always mean much, but I was still surprised to see this film labeled solely with France, considering how focused it is on Mexico. Its story of a woman returning home and reminiscing about losing her innocence culminates with a message about how over 100 Mexican women were murdered last year, and many more disappeared. While I come from a much bigger country, it was nevertheless depressing that those numbers didn’t seem that big to me.
Holy Heaviness
I couldn’t get onboard with this one. Its observations of generational role reversal felt shallow, its oversized score fit like a pair of clown shoes, and whether LLMs factored into its busy aesthetic or not, it had enough of a slop feel to give me the ick. I’m always curious to see what kind of art manages to thrive in spite of Iranian theocratic oppression, but this isn’t a compelling example.
TV or the Disturbance on Forest Hill Lane
I love this film’s palette, alternating between a monochromatic rust for the humdrum day-to-day and a blown-out white and magenta for the alluring TV glow, and the linework and design is distinct and wonderful. Its commentary on TV addiction is a little too familiar; it gets more original with a touch of magical realism, but its inconsistent internal logic makes for an uneven experience.
Winter in March
The true story of a troubled couple’s fraught emigration from Russia to Georgia in opposition to the invasion of Ukraine. Its stop-motion puppets, made of knitting and stitched fabric, carry the tension, humanity, and inhumanity of the moment. The fact that a story like this has never felt closer to home gives it extra weight.
Retirement Plan
A narrator, voiced by Domhnall Gleeson, outlines his grand plans for retirement, which include essentially everything none of us have gotten around to doing yet. A simple concept well executed, universally relatable, by turns wacky and poignant. In both mise en scène and design, it has shades of a less miserablist Chris Ware.
Hurikán
A 13-minute, street-level, grayscale, epic poem about a beer run. A great bit of visual storytelling with that rare alchemy of sharp, fresh, and crowd-pleasing. A perfect closer.
