Short Films

Have you ever watched a short?

A short is a short film about any number of things. This most often depends on what the creator is trying to express in the short amount of time that they are given. There are actually a couple rules to actually be considered short film. Anything that runs shorter than forty minutes with the credits included is viable for being known as a short. Featurettes get a similar treatment but they are usually between twenty to forty-four minutes and tied into movies most often, but because of their length they are not exactly a short and not exactly a feature film entirely. The last of shorts is the smallest variety and are called short-shorts, they are films that are under three minutes in length.

I went on a little shortscapade this weekend with a friend, leaving some of the short-shorts out of the list since they are just too short to be considered worth labeling for myself. With this little journey though I got to see that once you dip outside the realm of the Disney or Pixar inspired works you soon come across a variety that look very different in comparison to the picturesque dreamy realms that are usually painted up by the animated featurettes. Disney and Pixar usually try to give some moral to their stories, like don’t give up and true love can be found, or even you can choose the outcome of your own life if things are trying to say different.

When you visit other kinds of shorts you get to see a grim side to reality at times since they are packing so much into such a small time frame. A good example of this is two of the new recent shorts.

Disney’s Paperman:

Stanley Pickle:

From the very beginning of Paperman you know it is going to be about a pair of individuals that are somehow destined to be together and you are swept up in this whirlwind of chance happenings. On the other hand you have Stanley Pickle, he is a the quintessential form of a Neil Gaiman short practically. Lonely and spending his time with wind up people and animals that he created from living things that once were alive in his house. Not that I am knocking either of the two types, it just goes to show that there is more outside of the cute little animated world of shorts that most movie goers are typically introduced to. Have fun looking at some of the shorts this year when the Oscars air. ♥