4v291o

Shout to the dude with the sports cars and bikini babes cycling on his desktop wallpaper throughout his interview.

Saw this at Tallgrass Film Festival 2024.

This is just exquisite. Emotionally resonate and deep without tipping over into schmaltz. Achingly lived-in, vulnerable, and true in all the best ways. The ending is clever and powerful without falling into the cliche trappings of other lesser short films. The 16mm cinematography is about as good as 16mm is capabale of looking, the DP/Director Dice is just an ace with the medium. Choosing to shoot celluloid gave the film a dreamy warmth that sets it apart from so many other shorts I saw and just exudes a vibe of “this filmmaker cares”.

Skip Shea's "Florence" is an artful and avant-garde exploration of some challenging subject matter that draws deeply from his personal life as well as his deep knowledge of the humanities. Rather than lay out all of the plot beats in a typical linear narrative (and thereby fall into the regular trappings of a mystery slasher/giallo film), director Shea crafts a puzzle with this story. To quote Paul Thomas Anderson, "sometimes it's better to confuse them for five minutes than let them get ahead of you for 10 seconds."

The ingenuity with storytelling is really the star of this film. We dance between the inner self, the "real" world, and fever-dream murder sequences that keep the viewer unable to fully grasp anything that resembles convention or solid ground. These remarks sound like faults, but they are not. These choices are an earnest and irable attempt at trying something new and deeply personal. Granted this film won't be for everyone, but good art rarely is.

Kudos to this lo-fi film and its creators for taking big swings. It really transcends a star-based rating and giving it one would be a disservice, so I'm writing a review instead. If you're someone who needs to see a certain amount of stars or tomatoes to decide if a film is for you, then this one probably isn't. If you want to be challenged and see something incredibly unique made with obvious ion, seek it out!

I love this film.

Excellent story economy that feels truly fresh and dangerous. I had the pleasure of seeing this at Amazing Fantasy Fest in Buffalo with the director Scooter McCrae in attendance. It will go down as one of my favorite theater experiences of all time.

The 16mm cinematography was exquisite.

People throw around the term "Cronenbergian" a lot, but this feels tonally comparable to Cronenberg's best output. In many ways it outdoes those films. McCrae brings an intense focus on the subject matter that never relents. I honestly can't say enough good things about this dark, challenging, and vital movie.

Solid performances from literally every cast member (it's not a deep bench, but everyone brings the heat). Fabbio Frizzi's score is felt more than noticed, which I say as a compliment. That is what great scores do. When the score DOES indulge itself and grabs a bit of spotlight, it is truly lovely.

I'm going to be buying a copy as soon as it is available, I know that much. Criticisms I've read of this film seem to be missing the point entirely or are simply demanding a different film have been made, which is shit film criticism.

Short films really don't get much better than this. I'd list off all the things that were well done, but it would essentially be a recreation of the credit scroll. Everything was executed pretty perfectly. These filmmakers have a future. It would be a disservice to us all if these people didn't swing for making a feature someday. This film proves they have the chops to take that plunge.