AIFF 2016: Super Shorts In Competition - Matches, Magic, Weight Loss, And More

Super Shorts are under ten minutes.  Films in competition are those chosen by the original screeners to be eligible for awards.  Super Shorts are shown in programs so they can be hard to find in the program.  Below is

• a list of the super shorts in competition
• list of the programs where they appear and when
• description of each super short in competition in alphabetical order

I'd note that while these are the screeners picks, screeners don't always agree, so some would have chosen other super shorts as the best.  I often disagree with the screeners, but this is a good start.

Super Shorts in Competition	Director	Country	Length
20 Matches	Mark Tapio Kines	USA	10 min
Death$ in a $mall Town	Mark Jones	USA	7 min
How To Lose Weight in 4 Easy Steps	Benjamin Berman	USA	7 min
A Magician	Max Blustin	UK	3 min
On Time	Xavier Neal-Burgin	USA	8 min
A Reasonable Request	Andrew Laurich	USA	9  min

Program (right)   Film (below)	HARD KNOCKS Saturday - 1st Dec 3, 2016 11:30am -1 pm - AK Exper Small Thursday -2nd Dec. 8 5:30-7:30pm AK EX Large	MARTINI MATINEE Friday. Dec 9 2-4 PM BEAR TOOTH	LOVE AND PAIN Wed.  1st Dec. 7 5:30-7 pm BEAR TOOTH Sat 2nd Dec. 10 5:45-7:15pm AK Ex Small	GLOBAL VILLAGE Sunday, DEC. 13  1PM-2:45PM AK Exper Large
20 Matches			√  √
Death$ in a $mall Town		√
How To Lose Weight in 4 Easy Steps			√  √
A Magician				√
On Time	√  √
A Reasonable Request		√

As you can see, three of these films are only showing once, so you're going to have to work hard to see them.  In the past they've occasionally shown super shorts before features, so maybe they'll do that, though A Reasonable Request will need to be with a mature audience feature.  Fortunately you can see the whole film below.

202020202020202020202020202020202020202020202020

20 Matches

Mark Tapio Kines

USA

0:10:00

"A young woman (Nina Rausch) sits alone in a pitch black room and lights twenty matches, one at a time.
Her face illuminated only by the flame from each match, the woman tells the story of a Viennese serial killer who kidnapped and murdered twenty immigrant women – one per year."

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$


Death$ in a $mall Town
Mark Jones
USA
0:07:00


Can't find much about this one.  From IMDB page:

"A mayor has a unique way to revive the fortunes of his small town that had been losing citizens, businesses and tourist prior to his taking office."

Based on these first two pictures, the team that chose the super shorts in competition had a thing about matches and the dark.


4444444444444444444444444444444444444444444444

How To Lose Weight in 4 Easy Steps
Benjamin Berman
USA
0:07:00

Here's the guy whose story is told in the film writing on the film's Tumblr page:

“'How To Lose Weight in 4 Easy Steps' is a short film is based on a true story from my life: I went through a bad breakup, then hit the gym as a way to get over the heartbreak - and ended up losing 90 lbs in the process. Then I did what anyone else in this glorious age of the Internet we live in would do:
I wrote a blog post about it.
Published on my small personal Tumblr as just a cathartic way to somehow make sense of my heartbreak and what I had gone through, The Little Blog Post That Could surprisingly went massively viral and struck a chord around the world with millions of people: It turns out (unfortunately) that there are a lot of people out there who have gotten their hearts broken, and almost all of those people turned to the gym to get over it. I wasn’t alone.
One of those people who had gotten their heart broken and stumbled across the “4 Easy Steps” blog post was director Ben Berman, who contacted me through a friend. He said “let’s make a film!”. So we did. "

It continues, including how the actor suggested that he actually lose weight during the filming.

There's also an SNL connection.

Here's the whole movie.  It's got over 4 million hits already on Youtube.  Who needs film festivals anymore?  If a film was in every festival in the US, it wouldn't get 4 million viewers.







MAGICIANAICIGAMAGICIANAICIGAMAGICIANAICIGAMAGICIANAICIGAM





A Magician  Global Village*
Max Blustin
UK 0:03:00

Image and description from Agile Ticketing;

"After witnessing a man behave violently towards his girlfriend, someone decides to intervene."

⌚️ ⌚️ ⌚️ ⌚️ ⌚️ ⌚️ ⌚️ ⌚️ ⌚️ ⌚️

On Time
Xavier Neal-Burgin
USA
 0:08:00

Image and description from the Bureau of Creative Works:

"'On Time' is a short form adaption of the feature length script 'Rough Around the Edges' written by Xavier and Tiara Marshall. The script made it to the first round of the Sundance Screenwriter's Lab. We can't wait to see this story unfold into a feature length film."

NOTNOTNOTNOTNOTNOTNOT

A Reasonable Request
Andrew Laurich
USA
0:09:00

If you let your child watch this, you might have some explaining to do.  I'd suggest you watch this on your own first.  Below is the whole movie.

AIFF 2016: Shorts In Competition - Old Stars Dominate: Danny DeVito, Ed Asner, Valerie Harper

"In competition" means these films were selected by the screeners to be eligible for awards at the festival.  

"Features" are 'stories' that are 55 to  140 minutes. "Shorts" are stories that are 10-55 minutes.  Super shorts  are stories under 10 minutes.  'Stories' are fictional and distinguished from documentaries.  

This looks like a particularly strong group this year.  Danny DeVito is in one, Ed Asner in another, Valerie Harper in yet another.  Bruce Springsteen played a role in getting one to screen (because of issues over music rights.)  


Here's the list and below is a bit more about each.  

Shorts in Competition	Director	Country	Length
Curmudgeons	Jake DeVito	USA	17 min
Gorilla	Tibo Pinsard	France	14 min
Il Campione (The Champion )	Boming Jiang	Italy	12 min
Like A Butterfly	Eitan Pitigliani	United States	28 min
My Mom and the Girl	Susie Singer Carter	United States	20 min
Thunder Road	Jim Cummings	USA	13  min

 Since shorts are short, they are grouped into programs. These are the programs that the films are in and when those programs show:  Hard Knocks, Love and Pain, and Global Village.  The Martini Matinee is a regular AIFF event and takes a few shorts from different programs.  Also, there are some super shorts mixed in some of the programs.

This chart is my attempt to help you find which program each of the shorts in competition is in and when you can see them.  I'd note that those shorts not in competition can also be really good.  I often find films at the festival that are not in competition that I think should have been.  But seeing the ones in competition is a good bet.  And the others are mixed into the programs.

Program (right)   Film (below)	HARD KNOCKS Saturday - 1st Dec 3, 2016 11:30am -1 pm - AK Exper Small Thursday -2nd Dec. 8 5:30-7:30pm AK EX Large	MARTINI MATINEE Friday. Dec 9 2-4 PM BEAR TOOTH	LOVE AND PAIN Wed.  1st  Dec. 7 5:30-7 pm BEAR TOOTH Sat 2nd Dec. 10 5:45-7:15pm AK Ex Small	GLOBAL VILLAGE Sunday, DEC. 13  1PM-2:45PM AK Exper Large
Curmudgeons		√	√	√
Gorilla			√
Il Campione (The Champion )		√	√
Like A Butterfly			√	√
My Mom and the Girl	√			√
Thunder Road		√	√	√

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Curmudgeons
Jake DeVito
USA
0:17:00
✓
Danny DeVito is actually listed as the director and an actor in the film.  Jake is one of the producers and one of several other DeVito's in the credits.

This is the whole film*:

Curmudgeons from Jersey 2nd Avenue on Vimeo.


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Gorilla
Tibo Pinsard
France
0:14:00
 ✓

From Gorilla's Kickstarter page:

 "THE INSPIRATION. I love apes. Not you? I love real monkeys, but also "fake" apes, like the old King Kong, those played by actors in the original The Planet of the Apes, or the wonderfully created apes by makeup master artist Rick Baker for Greystoke, with Christopher Lambert and Ian Holm. All these films and these movie apes have profoundly marked my viewer's imagination, the universe they live in, the dangerous and fascinating jungle, but mainly because it talks to my "inner ape". We do not think enough about our "inner ape". Do we ?"







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Il Campione (The Champion )
Boming Jiang
Italy
0:12:00
 ✓
I'm having trouble finding much about this film, so I'll just leave you with the trailer for now.








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Like A Butterfly

Eitan Pitigliani

USA

0:28:00

"About a man who dreams he's a butterfly and he becomes so involved in this dream that he no longer knows if he's a man dreaming he's a butterfly, or if he's a butterfly dreaming he's a man."

From an Italoeurope  interview with Eitan Pitigliani

"the reason why I became a director, which is the need to capture the essence of life ­ and of what life could be ­ and then put it on screen, through a special medium: the film. What is great about films is that you make them together with other people, in my case with wonderful and special individuals that helped me take the idea I first had to the final stage. The story of the film came from a series of personal experiences that I have had over time, that I then jotted down in words together with the screenwriter Alessandro Regaldo. There were so many things that inspired me while I was writing the story."

------------------------------------------------------------------
My Mom and the Girl
Susie Singer Carter
USA
0:20:00


From Richard Rossi website which includes an interview with Susie Singer Carter.

"MY MOM AND THE GIRL is a true story based on an odd encounter my East Coast mother, who suffers with Alzheimer's, shared one evening on the streets of East L.A. The story takes off after dinner with family & friends takes a dark turn and my mother is led to a proverbial crossroads where 3 very disparate, desperate women are unpredictably pulled back into the light. It's a funny, poignant and surprisingly rich story where apparent disabilities can be seen as gifts."

------------------------------------------------------------------


Thunder Road
Jim Cummings
USA
0:13:00
 ✓

"As Cummings tells it, the film very unexpectedly got into Sundance, where it then won the Grand Jury Prize for Best Short Film. Of course, this brought some heat to the short and Cummings, which meant attention was also paid to a major question from the film: If he’d secured the rights to Bruce Springsteen’s “Thunder Road,” which plays during a pivotal scene.  After paying $7,000 for the rights to the song so it could travel the festival circuit, Cummings was faced with a $40,000 to 50,000 licensing fee to put his short online. This prompted Cummings to take his case to Springsteen in the form of an open letter he posted on the internet."

This is the whole film*:

Thunder Road from Jim Cummings on Vimeo.




*When I first starting blogging the film festival, films that were available online were not eligible for most festivals and there was some concern when I would find the whole film somewhere.  But online video has gone from the dark ages to the present in just a few years.  If a film is good, you should want to see it several times, and on the big screen as well as on your computer.

AIFF 2016: What's In A Name? Anchorage International Film Festival Films Selected - The First Look

[UPDATE Nov 27, 2016:  I've posted the films in competition on the AIFF2016 page.  I have detailed pages for the Shorts in Competition and the Super Shorts in competition and working on the others.]

Looking at the lists of films selected in the various categories for the first time each year is always exciting.  There's not much to go by - film titles, names of directors, countries.  It's like being in a big room with strangers many of whom you will soon get to know.  Some will become great friends, others nodding acquaintances, others you'll never connect with.

But for now all you've got are appearances and stereotypes.  Does a film title catch your fancy?  Intrigue you enough to want to know more?  Maybe you have a connection to particular country that's represented by a film or two.  And perhaps there are some interesting or even familiar names.

That's where we are now as the 2016 films selected for this year's festival have been posted on the AIFF2016 website.  At this point I'm just going to give a brief overview and comment briefly on some of the names and titles that caught my attention.

From the poster for Attila Szász' Demimonde

The background for the Features list isImage .  Szász is a Hungarian film maker whose The Ambassador To Bern won the Best Feature at AIFF in 2014.  You can see a Skype interview I did with Szász back then.  There's also transcript.  Part 8 talks about the film (Demimonde) he was starting to work on (which was why none of the film crew could make it to Anchorage that year).

Screenshot from the trailer of Karan Ananth's Indian film The Blind Side.

The background is a  

Here's some dialogue I created from three other titles from the documentary list.

A:  Goodbye Darling, I'm Off To Fight 

B:  I'll Wait Here 

A:  Walk With Me

As you can see, at this point, these are just words on a page that have whatever meaning you might invest in them.  But before long, as we learn more about the films and, hopefully, see them, they will show us who they really are.

 Image from the trailer of Richard Harper 's Evil's Evil Cousin.

Some of the shorts titles that seemed to have some superficial connection at this point:

Black Cat Gorilla Like a Butterfly	Row 1,	Sing For Your Supper No Touching Virgin Territory	Row 1,	This Path Thunder Road	Row 1,

Background is screenshot from A Reasonable Request 

You can't help but assume that a title like A Reasonable Request will be anything but reasonable.

Some other titles:

There were the titles with numbers:

• 20 Matches
• How To Lose Weight in 4 Easy Steps

But maybe the second one should have been paired with

• Fresh Chocolate Bar

And there are time related titles:

• On Time
• Late Night Drama

ANIMATION, which was a little thin last year, has a robust roster of films this year.

Image from  Elif Boyacioglu's The Teacup

And there's lots of mischief we can do grouping some of the titles

Food	Puns	Colors	Time
Notorious Corn	Pug of War	Red	Just Like It Used to Be
The Old Man and the Pear	No Touching	Green Light	A Space In Time
Under the Apple Tree	Virgin Territory		The Land Before Time Machines Time Chicken

Image screenshot from Daven Hafey's We Eat Fish

Some Intriguing Titles:

The Girl Who Spoke Cat

You bruise, You lose

GlaswAsian Tales

Welcome to the Last Bookstore

At this point I know next to nothing about these films, though finding pictures for this post gave me a bit more information.  We have titles (and you can see all the titles and names of directors and countries and lengths of most of the films at the AIFF2016 website.  Soon we'll know a little more, and eventually, we'll be able to see many of these films and meet some of the filmmakers.

Note:  Since the Alaska films didn't have countries listed (last year all but one was a US filmmaker), I've listed the titles.

Note 2:  HTML Table Generator has revamped its page and I'm having a bit of trouble making the tables work here in blogger.  I can't see the final table when I'm composing or in Preview which means I have to post it to see if I got it right.  So forgive the different kinds of tables.  I'll get this eventually.