Awesome Short Films

Magali Barbe’s sci-fi short film masquerades as a crowdfunding pitch for an augmented reality system that the main character helped create. It’s a game that lets you create virtual pets and interact with them through a pair of displays embedded into your eyes.

“Use the word by its definition: reduced to a state of ruin.” An amateur short track racer receives an unnerving offer: an anonymous benefactor will give him a new car if he causes a wreck on the track. This well-shot short film builds up to an intense resolution.

(PG-13, Gross) An unaverage man as he goes about his daily routine. Spencer Higginson’s horror short film starts out cute, but quickly delves into Don’t Hug Me, I’m Scared territory. It seems like there’s a lot to digest here, but we’d rather not watch it again.

Morgan Miller’s award-winning animated film is simply described as “a short film about aggression and escalation.” While it has moments of dark humor, it’s also a metaphor for the way anger and hate can quickly get out of control.

Animator Eric Rothman of NewHappyStar presents a wonderful and whimsical short film about a man who really needs a good cup of coffee to get his day going. We’ve all had mornings like this.

In 2014, Abbas Alizada went viral after an image of him posing alongside his idol Bruce Lee was posted online. High Horse Studios talked to Abbas about his dreams of redeeming himself and his country through impersonation, performance and martial arts training.

“Time speeds up, it slows down, it melts. You may be out there for 3 hours at a time but you can’t recall any one particular moment.” Filmmaker Adrian Bonvento shares the thoughts of the Stevenson Motorsports team at the 2017 24 Hours of Daytona in this perfect short film.

Mixtape Club, author Adam Gidwitz, and illustrator R Kikuo Johnson created this beautifully animated short film inspired by ancient Japanese folklore, in which a young girl finds herself in unwelcoming surroundings after leaving behind a mysterious past.

(PG-13) A woman’s life unravels over Snapchat. Shot on the app itself, Trim Lamba’s powerful short is as innovative as it is timely. It’s easy to shine a spotlight on yourself these days, but you’ll quickly find out that there are many reasons why folks tune in.

(PG-13: Language) Will Sasso stars in this mockumentary about a stay-at-home dad who becomes obsessed with becoming a social media “celebrity,” ignoring the real world and preferring the digital one. It would be way more funny if we didn’t know people like this.

We have a while to wait for Blade Runner 2049, so in the meantime, sit back and drink in Christopher Grant Harvey’s outstanding fan film that does a great job capturing the tone of its source material, and is at once familiar and fresh. Amazing that they shot this for just $1500.

A wonderful – and far too brief – animated short film using a combination of real and CGI-modeled ferromagnetic iron filings to create the illusion of living creatures set in an all-metal universe. See how Norte Estudio created the clip here.

“The hardest thing that he’s gonna have to do is tell people, ‘No.'” Hank & Booth’s stellar documentary about promising college football player Brandon Jones, and the chaos surrounding the then 17-year-old in his final year in high school.

Yuval Hameiri’s autobiographical short film I Think This is the Closest to How the Footage Looked sees him recreating the final footage of his late mother through the use of household objects. A heartbreaking visualization of how jarring it is to lose someone.

Since he was a kid, Matt Gourley has been obsessed with practical visual effects and stunt work. While creating his 50th episode of his podcast I Was There Too, Matt lived out his dream of being “shot” with a machine gun and having fake blood spatter everywhere.

Much in the same vein as Preposterous and Unsatisfying, Mainframe (North)’s brief animated clip features objects behaving in unexpected and undesireable ways, wrapped up in the amusing idea that it’s a demo reel for a client to review.

A captivating and dark animated short created by students of Supinfocom Arles, in which an anthropomorphic rabbit and snake carry on an affair right under the nose of a distracted and abusive spouse – appropriately represented by a wild boar.

A pair of human explorers have mastered the alien flora and fauna on the planet that their team was supposed to colonize. But for what purpose? Joseph Bennett and Charles Huettner’s animated short is bursting with imagination and discovery. What a treat.

Not all stories are created equal. But some storytellers are so talented, it doesn’t matter what their story is. It’s all in how they tell it. Case in point, writer and director Trevor Anderson’s autobiographical short about a photo of him and his father.

A beautiful and mostly lighthearted two-part anime featuring Gravity Rush heroines Kat and Raven. Overture takes place between Gravity Rush and its upcoming sequel. If you’re not familiar with the series, all you need to know is that Kat and Raven can manipulate gravity.

(PG-13: Language) Pierre-Alexandre Chauvat follows up on his awesome Bruce Willis action flick with a sequel. And unlike Die Hard 2, this one is actually as good as the original. See if you can name all 53 movies, then watch with captions on to see if you’re right.

“Tasogare means twilight – a time of ambivalence…” Musician Lia Mice recently performed at Tasogare, a music festival held at Komyoji, a Buddhist temple in Tokyo. She spoke with Tasogare’s founders to find out the origins and ideas behind this unorthodox gathering.

“Are you hallucinating again?” Director Valère Amirault’s enthralling CGI animated short film pushes the envelope in terms of textures, materials, and lighting, as its protagonists struggle with the very idea of traditional animated genres and presentation styles.