For the February 25th edition of “Shorts Round Up of the Week” there are reviews for a hilarious comedy, a zombie thriller, and a trio of foreign Supernatural chillers, two of which are becoming feature film productions.
If you’d like to submit your short film for review consideration, submissions are always opened to filmmakers and producers.
I kind of see what Aaron K. Carter is going for with “An Hour to Kill.” What his film tries to be is a basic meshing of the gangster politics of “Pulp Fiction” with the horror tales of “Creepshow.” I don’t begrudge him for trying something completely different and unique, it’s just sad that “An Hour to Kill” never comes together as a coherent or even entertaining horror comedy anthology. Even taken as a silly horror comedy, it’s tough to find any real redeeming aspects here, as Carter seems to work hard in keeping his film together as it falls apart from minute one.
It’s pretty disappointing that the Academy almost cut out the entire Live Action short category this year for the Oscars, as there are so many wonderful short films nominated. There are five pretty fantastic short films with strong messages about childhood and loss of innocence, and I hope now that they’re back in the broadcast, that audiences get a chance to watch and celebrate them.
When I was a kid I was heavy in to the mythology of Arthurian lore. Everything about King Arthur and the knights of Camelot drew my immediate attention and fascination. I spent a great three years learning everything that I could about that era. As a kid if I’d have seen Joe Cornish’s “The Kid Who Would Be King,” I’d have left the theater with a humongous smile on my face and anxious to learn a lot more that was available in the libraries. Joe Cornish has a particular love for making heroes out of underdogs and the least suspecting people you’d come across, and he carries that trademark in to his newest film.
“Instant Family” was one of the biggest surprises of 2018 for me. It seemed like a goofy vehicle for Mark Wahlberg to soften his image at the time, but it surprisingly ends up being one of the best drama comedies of the year. It’s not only such a funny and sweet film, but it’s also a remarkable testament to how much society under values and under appreciates foster parents, and the good they can do for children. While imperfect at times, director Sean Anders approaches the tale of the foster family with immense respect, and delivers a film that really did have me laughing, crying, and ultimately satisfied.
Undercrank Productions deserves a ton of credit as they are releasing films and silent cinema that no one else has even approached yet. While boutique studios are dabbling in eighties and seventies obscure gems, Undercrank and Ben Model are back in the early 1900’s restoring the short films of Alice Howell, a silent cinema comedic actress who was once compared to her contemporaries Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton. Thanks to a successful Kickstarter campaign, folks that want to bone up on the history of women in comedy cinema, this is a great place to continue your education on how much they’ve contributed, and the unsung voices of comedy.
When it originally premiered at Fantasia I was very anxious to check out Johnny Kevorkian’s science fiction horror film, and I’m glad I was finally able to view it. “Await Further Instructions” is one of those horror tales in the vein of “They Live” or “V” where it’s a tale about humanity, civilization, and way we can be led like sheep in the face of chaos. While “Await Further Instructions” is a very sharply written and vicious look at a dysfunctional family stuck together in a house, it packs in so many more relevant overtones that ring true in a day where everything on the internet is taken as gospel.