Live Action Category

Live Action, Premiere

Emily Lucienne’s ‘Immaculate Deception’ Explores the Desperate Actions a Woman Takes As Her Options Narrow

Emily Lucienne details building the cloistered claustrophobic atmosphere of her short exploring the desperate measures dwindling options can push us to.

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Live Action, Premiere

Tim Ewalts’ Primal Woodland Drama ‘Undergrowth’ Finds Two Brothers in an Escalating Struggle for Power

Tim Ewalts breaks down the fluid, improvisational approach to shooting that he utilised for his foreboding 16mm familial drama about warring siblings.

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Live Action

An Actor Auditions for a Secretive Project in Hugo De Sousa’s Satire ‘Je Ne Suis Pas Une Star de

Hugo De Sousa returns to DN and tells us how he recreated the claustrophobic, exploitative atmosphere of an audition for his uncomfortable satirical short.

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Live Action, Premiere

Chaconne Martin-Berkowicz Explores the Nuanced Complexity of Female Group Power Dynamics in ‘Scotty’s Vag’

Chaconne Martin-Berkowicz discusses capturing the subtleties of shifting female power dynamics within a college sorority in her gritty veracious short.

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Live Action, Premiere

A Strange Noise in the Night Leads to a Spooky Encounter in Ben S. Hyland’s Comedy Horror ‘Bleep’

Ben S. Hyland reveals how he used misdirection to great comic effect in his short about a bickering couple investigating a strange unidentifiable noise.

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Live Action, Premiere

A Mother’s Love for Her Son Is Tested by Radicalisation in Robin Summon’s Unsettling Drama ‘Victim’

Robin Summons talks to DN about portraying the worrying pernicious mundanity of Incel radicalisation on young men in his unsettling drama short.

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Live Action, Premiere

Mass Panic Erupts When a Series of Strange Events Occur in Tom Salvaggio’s News Serial Homage ‘Bellingham’s Belief’

Tom Salvaggio reflects on how the rise of conspiratorial thinking inspired his uncanny Twilight Zone-esque short about a seemingly unexplainable mystery.

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Live Action

A Young Man Grapples With His Newly Found Independence in Sam Davis’ ‘You Know Where to Find Me’

Sam Davis discusses his naturalistic use of documentary filming techniques in the making of his slice-of-life drama about a young man flying the nest.

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Live Action, Premiere

Tamsin Topolski Lays Bare the Dire Consequences of Toxic Positivity in Satirical Short ‘I’m a Good Person’

Tamsin Topolski details how she represented her protagonist's mental and physical demise through all aspects of her darkly comic satire's colour palette.

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Live Action, Premiere

Max Lincoln’s Comedy-Horror ‘Rhyme or Die’ Subversively Critiques the Merciless Nature of the Creative Industries

Director Max Lincoln talks about devising imaginative kills and being inspired by the ruthless nature of the creative industries for his bloody comedy-horror.

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Live Action

Yanghuixiao Gao’s ‘What If’ Delicately Explores Notions of Motherhood From an Intergenerational Vantage

Yanghuixiao Gao describes using natural light to ground her drama short exploration of the complexities of mother-daughter relationships in authentic realism.

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Live Action

A Dangerous Hazing Ritual Tests a Friendship in Sam & David Cutler-Kreutz’ Intense Drama ‘Flounder’

Sam & David Cutler-Kreutz detail how they adapted to the challenge of shooting the pivotal murky underwater sequence for their tense toxic masculinity drama.

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