Every year, there's a theme us programmers don't realise is there, but everyone else catches onto. This year, after we put it together and set it aside for a few days, I figured out what the under-current theme of Something Funny, our comedy shorts program was - adult situations. 

This is not entirely new, but there are four shorts that certainly fall into this realm, The  first of which is the incredibly awesome The Spectacular Summer of Weredog and Amy. 

Amy just got divorced, so she gets a dog. Turns out, on the full moon, the dog turns into a man, making him a wereman, technically, but let's not argue semantics. The film then follows their exploits, which feature plenty of adult situations. 

This isn't funny because of the adult situations; it's funny because of the reactions to the natural progression of a relationship between two individuals of different worlds, neither of whom should be having this relationship. She's too raw; he's a fucking dog. The film explores their time to together and how the limitation of the once ina full moon situation amplifies things, leading the relationship to accelerate. That's bad for both of them. She's trying to find a connection that leads to her pain shifting, sliding away, perhaps replacing the pain of her divorce with the thumping drive of sex with absolutely no strings attached while still having her unquestioning dog buddy the rest of the month, and in doing so becoming detached from the rest of the world, from human relationships, and again, he's a fucking dog. 

The acting here is so solid. It's always fun to see actors bringing animal traits to their human characters, and there's a great moment where Amy points out the inherent stupidity of the idea that screenwriters have often fallen back on where animals-made-human have the vocabulary of a Yale English 103 TA while calling every day objects by stupid names. Eric Aragon, which might be the sexiest name in history, is perfect embodying the weredog (and again, technically, he's a wereman) and give the enjoy short a joyous feel that drew me in. Sylvian Batey Alcalá is an excellent genre actor. She knows how to present the "What the Fuck is Happening?" while also driving things forward in a way that makes the short more than an emotionally empty shell filled with dogs-wearing clothes jokes and dog-sexy bits. She brings a beauty to the role that is smart, sexy, and honest. Here, she's Peter Cushing in the Hammer films, or Sigourney Weaver in Alien - she's a human in extraordinary circumstances, and she does not ignore the strangeness, but embraces it, tries to run it into her favor. 

The ending is awesome, a totally perfect climax for such a strange, funny, and free-flowing film. I've seen it a half-dozen times now and there are still moments where the comedy hits me as if I'm seeing it for the first. The Spectacular Summer of Weredog and Amy is a smart film about a sweird concept, that somehow manages to be both utterly sick, and totally charming. 

You can see The Spectacular Summer of Weredog and Amy as a part of the Something Funny series of shorts showing at Hammer Theatre SJ in Beautiful Downtown San Jose on Sat, Mar 3 11:15 AM, Sun, Mar 4 8:30 PM and Sun, Mar 11 10:15 AM, plus Century 20 Redwood City - Screen 10 Sat, Mar 3 9:30 PM and Sat, Mar 10 7:50 PM
​

If you want to see a documentary that is the film equivilent of a Wayne Thiebaud painting, sumptuous and colorful like icing on a cupcake, then you must see Free Fall. It is a gorgeous documentary about Bouncy Houses/Bouncy Castles that is 100% marvelous. 

The connection between Bounce Houses and birthdays is undeniable. It would also explain the incredible colors, the brightness, the sharpness, the saturation. It's an incredibly beautiful film, but it says a lot about a lot of things. It talks about what birthdays mean, about the idea of symbols of wealth and prosperity, about the idea of fun, really. 

It's a light doc, but also one that gets into identity questions that are kinda heavy. The interviews are well-done, and dissect the ideas with absolute precision. You don't have to be a documentarian to see that the editing and interviewing was incredibly smart, and that there are pieces of influence flying in from all over the world of film, from Chick Strand to Errol Morris, David Lynch to David Fincher. It's in all here, and it's pretty as a picture to boot. 

You can watch this amazing short as a part of the DocuNation series, showing at 3 Below in Beautiful Downtown San Jose on Fri, Mar 2 1:45 PM and Tue, Mar 6 6:00 PM, as well as at Century 20 Redwood City - Screen 10  on Sun, Mar 4 12:50 PM and Sun, Mar 11 3:15 PM

Eventually, we're going to meet someone. Eventually, we're going to lose someone. Eventually the relationships we create are going to break down. Eventually, the systems we design are going to break down... or be broken down. 

This is the idea behind Contact, that moments of joy will eventually break down when exterior forces exert themselves. In this case, a couple are having a lovely day out in the gently rolling hills, well in a simulcrum of gorgeous gently rolling hills, and then one blinks out of scene. This is the beginning of a cataclysm, it appears. A cataclysm that is befalling the group of pods that are heading out to a new world. 

Let's not beat around the bush, this is a science fiction story about first contact. It's a science fiction story about first contact where the contact is only a tiny part of the story. The real story is what matters in those moments, what we want to know, how we process the existential threats and the little things that we need to know, what to discover, wish we could have more of. That's Contact, a film about the end of the world, for varying values of the World, that deals with the immediate, the small, the emotional, the moment of watching a massive disaster that we never see, that we don't need to see. 

The script here is ideal for the kind of acting we get. There's the couple, loving men who manage to make us care about them with so little time together, who have a layered interaction which makes the rest of the short that much more painful. There's the computer voice, and it's incredible voice-acting. She manages to infuse the film with a sort of painfully cold, calculation that makes the emotional responses, nuanced and at times perfectly measured, all the more impressive. 

A wonderful film, one with so much power in all the details, as well as the absolute chutzpah it takes to make a film about first contact where we never see the contact, but we realise that this sort of event is not merely the massive effect on the pods, but on those who live, love, and lose along the path. 

You can see Contact as a part of the Mindbenders showing at 3Below on FRI 3/2; 11:30PM and FRI 3/9; 9:00PM, and at the Century Redwood City on  MON 3/5; 5:30PM and SAT 3/10; 10:20PM (RWC 10)

Look at that title. It's perfect! You're going to want to see that film, no? You know exactly what it is! If you're from my generation, or older, you are drawn in by two things - the Velvet Underground's undeniable coolness, and memories of high school that are growing hazier and hazier every day. 

The Velvet Underground Played at My High School is exactly what it says it was! It's an animated documentary about the Velvet Underground's first gig, at a New Jersey high school. Our narrator tells the story, and the animation shows us the story, at times with a hint of surreality edging its way in. 

The art here is what's 100% pitch perfect. It is not overly flashy, but at the same time, it is not overly plain. It has the feeling of those mid-to-late 1990s greyscale comics that shifted between realism and surrealism without a single seam. The way the characters are designed, especially the representation of the Velvets, amp up the impact of each. The representatin of Anthony Jannelli, who narrated and directed the film, is so dead-on, a character face that could have stared out from behind a shadow on an old EC cover. The entire sensation of the animation is incredible. 

And then there's the story. 

It is the story of what happens when something is ahead of its time, or at leasat completely mistimed for its audience. The Velvet Underground did not yet represent the 1960s, they were an avant garde act thrust into the middle of a pop music show. Wrong place, wrong time, wrong audience. That's almost always what happens with firsts, but here, it is so hilariously mistimed. 

This is a great film, and an absolute highlight of the DocuNation series, showing at 3 Below in Beautiful Downtown San Jose on Fri, Mar 2 1:45 PM and Tue, Mar 6 6:00 PM, as well as at Century 20 Redwood City - Screen 10  on Sun, Mar 4 12:50 PM and Sun, Mar 11 3:15 PM

What if you knew all along? What if they didn't? What if you got wiser throughout the course of a moment? What if they didn't? 

This is the central idea for one of the finest fantasy or science fiction shorts I've ever seen - Multiverse Dating for Beginners.

If I were to simply recount the story, it might seem familiar; a woman and a man walk and talk and are obviously interested in one another, and when the moment they share has come to an end, it starts over, but she knows what's happened, he does not. She explores the possibilities of the night through repetition, trying this, and trying that, but as the interactions continue, she begins looking just as hard at who she is, and who he could be, and that leads to an impressive degree of self-awareness, not to mention pathos. 

This is a film where two characters, Ivy and Dave, go through a series of emotions, where each is so perfectly encapsulated in a moment. In a way, it is Ivy over-thinking at every turn, and Dave living in what always seems to be a moment of incredible promise. In that way, Ivy is the villain, but at the same time, in her eyes (and likely the eyes of anyone who hasever been in that moment where you're not the you you're sure you need to be to make a serious connection) she's desperately trying to NOT be the villain. To her, at least as time/space/universes go on, she is looking through the moment to the future, never quite connecting with the idea that all there is, all there can be, is the present. 

Multiverse Dating for Beginners is a marvelous film, full of comedy, tragedy, and most of all, character work. These two are perfect at exploring. The direction and writing of Kelly Tatham is absolutely perfect, making the most of every nuance in a story that easily could have abandoned nuance for bombast. The way it was edited, and especially the titles, only makes the entire film feel like it is a unit moviing with full purpose towards a goal - to get the audience to realise that "There is only now... and maybe before." 

You can see Multiverse Dating for Beginners as a part of the Something Funny series of shorts showing at Hammer Theatre SJ in Beautiful Downtown San Jose on Sat, Mar 3 11:15 AM, Sun, Mar 4 8:30 PM and Sun, Mar 11 10:15 AM, plus Century 20 Redwood City - Screen 10 Sat, Mar 3 9:30 PM and Sat, Mar 10 7:50 PM

Which is the truth - what happens to us in reality, or what happens when we playact our realities? This is a tough question, believe it or not, even if you don't start to think about Plato's Cave. The worlds we build are, often, far more true, more honest, than anything that we walk through in this waking life, even if we open ourselves up to the possibilities of our own failings. 

This is question that is partly answered by the amazing short film Imaginary Circumstances. 

Two friends, both recently dumped, meet for donuts, where they discuss their problems with dating, and then come up with an idea - pre-breaking-up. They decide that it is too difficult and painful to go through the break-up at the end of a relationship, so they must do it at the beginning. 

And thus, after a change of location, they have it out; two people, with different experiences, interact with one another, breaking up before they had even begun, relieving their own emotional pains. 

This is one of those shorts with a turn, when you find yourself looking at the characters, listening to their words, and realizing that these are things you've said, or more often, thought. These are real issues that are brought up, and the script is insanely perfect in the ways that it makes the characters walk up to what we know is a cliff, and the truths of our feelings in relationships, the ones that we keep locked away, are nothing if not a massive granite cliff, and then jump. 

Only, the stakes are incredibly low. These two are not in a real relationship. They are talking about feelings that apply to their other relationships, not to the one that they are pretending to be striving for. The person on which they are charging on steeds of former heartbreak is not the one sitting next to them. The anger, the hurt, is being dumped, but not without reciprication. This is, perhaps, the single most healthy thing that these two could possibly do; they are unpacking, unloading, and providing comfort by not denying that the past didn't happen, that they aren't whole, that what they went through wasn't real. These two are being thoroughly honest by playing out their hurts. 

At 11 minutes, this is perfectly paced, well-structured, incredibly well-written, and brilliantly acted. Director Emma Koenig seems to have given the actors enough room to explore their characters, and the shooting feels less cinematic than immediate, as if they are shooting a raging fire that threatens not only the camera, but also the viewer. This is a film where the extremity of emotional outpouring is damn-near infectuous. It can not be over-stated how excellent actors Maya Eskrine and Jeff Ward are at not only embodying their characters, but playing the shift between thought experiment and rage therapy session. 

When I was putting together the theming for Shorts Program 3, I had just re-watched Imaginary Circumstances for the fifth or sixth time. I knew that this would be a film that would make an impact crater on the minds of every viewer. I looked over my notes, and found a phrase I had written down about the short that I knew was the perfect tagline for the program - Nothing is as it appears, but the shadows may be the truth.

You can see Imaginary Circumstances as a part of Shorts Program 3 - The Reality of Illusion shouwing WED 2/28 at 2:15PM at 3Below in beautiful Downtown San Jose,  THU 3/1 at 6:00PM in Redwood City, on FRI 3/2 at 5:15PM in Redwood City, and SUN 3/4 at 8:45PM at 3Below.

I love a good emotional turn-on-a-dime. It's a feat that few manage to pull off, making a feeling take hold so deeply that when you throw the switch, head in a completely different direction, it doesn't turn you off. There's an episode of GLEE where Finn sings Quinn "She's Having My Baby" that is light and love and everything good, that is then darkened by her father's response. Of course, there's last year's absolutely phenomenal short Your Day. Watching the brilliant New Zealand feature film Status Pending , I was hit by the fact that this is all too real an happening.

​Lizzy and Ryan are involved in a thing. It's not 100% clear what it is at first, other than there's sex involved. This started as a Tindr hook-up, but became something... more. What unfolds throughout the film is an idea that these two are in a relationship, but only parts of each of them are. There are, as always, secrets and lies, and more importantly, there are heavy truths disguised as lies, and vice-versa. While it's clear they both really care for each other, it's also clear that there are layers to the two of them that are not present in the relationship between them. That, more than anything, comes out as the two confront a deadline. They slowly allow those portions of themselves come to the light, and that not only exposes them, but shows exactly why they have the relationship they have, In essence, they are having the perfect relationship for the parts of themselves they are allowing to see the light of day, but as whole people, as real people, beyond the Social Media people, people, they may be poisonous to one another. 

The acting here is so tricky, but the writing, the wisdom shown in revealing the pieces slowly, in allowing each new character these two become along the way to come fully to form with adequate amounts of time, makes their job a little easier. 

The fact that the entire film is more-or-less confined to a single house is tough, but it allows the setting to expand and contract. For a film that is so much about release, revelation, and getting away from it all, setting it in a single location (more or less) is so smart because what it does is forces the viewer to dig, to look for the kinks in the armor of the tank they're traveling in. The place is only an aspect of their relationship, but it is so very perfect in how it presents the issues. 

Status Pending is the kind of movie you watch when you want to discover your characters, and maybe find out where you fall along their path. 

The film is playing with Man With Beard, a phenomenal short I'll talk about later, and you can see it at Century 20 Redwood City Sat, Mar 3 5:10 PM, Century 20 Redwood City Mon, Mar 5 7:05 PM, Century 20 Redwood City Wed, Mar 7 2:45 PM, and Hammer Theatre SJ Sat, Mar 10 8:45 PM

I have noticed, in my recent years programming film festival shorts programs, that a kind of film has emerged. It is the fast comedy, the short, usually 5 minutes or less, that takes you on a strange trip, playing up the surreality of the scenario with a joyful dallop of weird. This year, there are a few shorts we programmed in Cinequest that display just this concept, and the one I really want you to think about, one that is a deep dive into the world of the weird, is Bigfoot's Love Slave. 

What it starts as is a scene of a woman walking through a dense wood. Something joins her, rushing through the trees, the brush. What it turns into is an R 'n B ballad dedicated to the way that Sasquatch fills her... heart. 

This is a fun comedy, a REALLY fun comedy, and I'm not just saying that because I'm a BIG fan of Bigfoot (and really, the Patterson-Gimlin film should be on the National Film Registry) and have visited the Bigfoot Museum in Felton several times! It's not only because it's a great Bigfoot short, but the job is done so perfectly. The Sasquatch outfit is well done (and unlike a lot of them these days, allows for full dancing movement, ie. Beyonce moves) and the send-up of the love song is flat out dope. Really smart, and perfectly pitched to the concept. 

In all, Bigfoot's Love Slave is a brilliant send-up, and moreso, it's an infectuous song! 

You can see Bigfoot's Love Slave by director Heather Tom as a part of Shorts Program 7 - Something Funny on SAT 3/3 at 11:15AM at the Hammer Theatre in Downtown San Jose, on SAT 3/3 at 9:30PM in Redwood City, on SUN 3/4 at 8:30PM at the Hammer theare and SAT 3/10 at 7:50PM in Redwood City, and SUN 3/11 and 10:15AM at the Hammer

A look at one of the most significant documentary shorts of the early 20th century.