Short of the Week
Well, that’s a wrap on 2022. A year that will be remembered for many things, but for us here at S/W there were a lot of positives. We launched our brand new platform Shortverse, featured all three Oscar-winning shorts on our site, saw unprecedented alumni success and racked up over 46m views on our YouTube channel. If you want to know more about all we achieved in 2022, you can check out our end-of-year round-up.
With 2022 officially over, we’re now casting an eye to the year ahead with our calendar already full of world premieres, potential Oscar-winners, festival coverage and more. For now though, lets look back at our most recent coverage on S/W with our regular Best of the month playlist – Rob Munday, Managing Editor.
TEAM FAVORITES
December was a killer month on S/W. From the 21 films we featured throughout the 31 days, we showcased a number of Oscar hopefuls, an animated modern classic, an Annecy/César-winning doc, an existential exploration of reincarnation and a tale of how witnessing another’s orgasm gave a woman a new perspective on life.
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Night of the Living Dread by Ida Melum
Night of the Living Dread is such a fun and relatable short that it’s impossible not to succumb to its charms. Everything about the animation feels painstakingly precious and is clearly made with love – from the soft stop-motion textures to the lines under Ruby’s tired eyes, and the brilliant voice work from the stellar team of actors. The story itself pokes fun at a serious issue and teaches a valuable lesson about strength and vulnerability, eventually bringing the animation to its wonderfully heartwarming conclusion – Serafima Serafimova
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Long Line of Ladies by Shaandiin Tome and Rayka Zehtabchi
A surprise omission from the list of 15-titles in the running for the Best Documentary Short Film Oscar, Long Line of Ladies was a stand out in our December coverage and a film I’m sure we’ll be discussing when it comes to the Short Awards here on S/W . My favorite documentaries are those that provide an “experience”, those that immerse and invite you into their universe. Tome and Zehtabchi’s approach does just that! With a benevolent camera, they opted for a structure based around the emotional journey of its participants, rather than a pragmatic, step by step approach to documenting the organisation of the event and it makes for an insightful and fascinating watch – Céline Roustan
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Notice Me by Kurt Andrew Schneider
By now, the notion that technology, and particularly social media, has changed our lives isn’t even a storytelling trope anymore. It is a mere fact that has become an integral fabric of what constitutes being human. Bearing this in mind, Kurt Schneider’s Notice Me illustrates how its main character tries to make sense of unexpected news through the only way she seems to be able to cope: by translating her true feelings into performative sadness, she finds a form of validation to ground her in her forlorness. – Georg Csarmann
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Most Viewed
The Rock of Ages by Eron Sheean
One of the films I’d considered picking myself for this Best of the Month playlist, Eron Sheean’s fantasy short The Rock of Ages is one of the most unusual, and fun, films we’ve featured on S/W for some time. The story of a fleeing soldier and his encounter with a mysterious talking rock, this 16-minute short blends stunning scenery with some inventive FX work, including a giant puppet for the blabbering boulder. A surreal fable told with wit, intelligence and creativity, this is exactly the type of filmmaking I love to champion on S/W – Rob Munday