A couple plays a question and answer game while walking a picturesque Los Angeles street. Hypothetically, which would you choose—having to poop 10 times a day, or never pooping again for the rest of your life? Would you be a pine cone or a cactus? It’s cute and breezy and funny—right up until it isn’t. 

With a Harvard degree in Physics, a role as President of a celebrated non-profit, and an enviable commercial and music video portfolio, it’s clear writer/director Isaac Ravishankara is a deep fellow concerned with the big questions in life (cactus for me too). But when he went through a breakup last year it lead to introspection about relationships which naturally lead to this new film. The characters in Hypothetically are having fun until a new, more serious question pops up. What if—hypothetically—we didn’t move in to this place together. What if we broke up? 

At 7 minutes, the film is svelte, and despite Ravishankara’s visual media background (most prominently on display here in a somewhat excessive use of rainbow-colored lens flares) it hinges on its strong dialogue and performances. It has a looseness and relatability reminiscent of great conversational indies of the past, particularly in the form of Morgan Krantz’ performance as Shmook, whose digressive, bumbling treatment of serious relationship matters humorously plays like that of a young Adam Scott. 

This is in contrast to Ellington Wells’ character, Charlie, who is forthright and direct in holding Shmook to account for his not-so-innocent question. She is a familiar archetype in some sense, the strong, no-nonsense female who grapples with her indecisive man-child, and this dynamic is maybe the the most obvious, and therefore weakest part of the film. Still the fission is tense, and humorously awkward all the same.

It is also enlightening to the particularity of the characters and their relationship, and I found it hopelessly endearing. The biggest challenge in shorts is how to end them, and it is very easy to imagine Ravishankara writing himself into a a corner in this will-they or won’t-they moment. The ending to Hypothetically is subtly brilliant however. If you made it this far without watching the film yet, do so now. 

What I love most about the film’s resolution is not only its surprise, but how it strengthens and completes the portrait of these characters. Charlie is hurt of course, but she gets Shmook. She knows what he’s like—his indecisiveness, his fear of taking charge of his own life. It’s probably part of what she likes about him. Defusing his bullshit so gruffly is a sweet peek into the dysfunctional but kinda functional peculiarity of their relationship, the sort of weird-from-the-outside feature that really all relationships have. The fact that Ravishankara is able to empathetically portray this richly drawn of a relationship in the short amount of time he alots is, in the words of Shmook, “kinda awesome”.