Awesome Short Films

Alan Becker’s sentient stick figures accidentally discover Minecraft. Will the game’s limitless potential free them from their domain, or will it bring about their ruin? Part Minecraft tutorial, part adventure film, this work of art deserves all the awards that it’s inevitably going to get.

This student film by Dorian & Daniel is an unofficial commercial for Johnnie Walker about the bond between brothers. While it doesn’t do much to sell scotch whisky, it will give you the feels something awful.

(PG-13: Language) A New Place 2 Drown is the title for several artworks all made by or with the trip hop phenom Archy Marshall aka King Krule. It’s the name of his new album, the poetry and art book he made with his brother Jack and Topsafe’s short film about him.

A few years ago, Andrew Mc Murry made a short film about being a real life Roller Coaster Tycoon. His newest short revisits the classic theme park simulator, this time from the perspective of a customer.

(PG-13: Language) Part The Matrix, part Shadowrun, this short film is set in a war-torn future. Each side uses shamans – powerful beings that are both priests and hackers. A shaman can destroy or convert both humans and machines at the expense of his sanity.

(PG-13 Language) Alexander Engel’s amusing short film tells the story of a man who loses the last two digits of a girl’s phone number, and tries to call every permutation of the number in order to find her. Will his persistence pay off, or will his efforts be for naught?

(Gore) A rich man exacts revenge on the people who betrayed him. Brian Petsos’ short film is ultimately not much more than eye candy, but if Oscar Isaac and Julian Shatkin are the ones fanning their tails, it would be a crime to turn away from the spectacle.

“Gameplay is… it’s just simpler. There’s no people. Just targets.” Federico Heller’s impressive dystopian short film is about a future where virtual reality video games have become extremely addictive. One junkie stumbles onto the chilling conspiracy behind it.

Korean animator Kang SuHyun’s short science fiction film requires no dialogue to tell its story, a haunting tale of a man who looks back on the events leading to the loss of his partner after a long and mentally grueling mission in space.

The Dark Side of the Force meets the crazy side of Los Santos as Michael and Trevor duke it out Star Wars-style. Sadly this wasn’t made with a Grand Theft Auto V mod. YouTuber Boris the Blade spent a month and a half with After Effects to add the lightsabers.

(PG-13: Language) Line 22 is the only 24-hour bus line in California’s pricy Santa Clara Valley. As a result, homeless people take its 1.5 hour route to and fro at night to sleep in relative safety. Elizabeth Lo filmed the night crowd for a week to make her revealing short film.

In his final days, an old man teaches his grandson how to gather and cook a rare mushroom. Åsa Blanck and Johan Palmgren’s simple but powerful documentary reminds us to maintain and strengthen our bonds with the people we love.

(Gore) Captain America fends off the Red Skull and his army of Nazi zombies. And then it gets much worse. YouTuber forrestfire101’s short film is one of the most complex and well-shot LEGO stop-motion animations you’ll ever see.

In writer/director Åsa Lucander’s charming animated short, an elderly woman goes to the lost and found office on a quest for her missing items, but can only seem to find others’ possessions and not hers. Along the way, she finds something much more special.

Movie characters run as their world – the film itself – burns and melts. The Mill made this clever short film for the British Film Institute, a charity that restores British movie reels and archives them on discs and digital files.

As part of their war against humans, sentient androids attacked and pinned down the President of the United States. A team of Delta Force operators is sent to rescue their leader. The Bicycle Monarchy’s action short film cuts straight to the point.

(PG-13) Terry Ziegelman’s short film takes us inside the world of a man with a mundane desk job who meets with an untimely end, yet nobody seems to notice. We’re a little concerned about the “Inspired by Actual Events” title at the beginning though.

Quentin Haberham’s charming short animated film follows a funny little fellow guy who finds himself wandering alone in a junkyard, when he realizes what he really needs is not just a replacement part, but a companion to spend his life with.

Before Scary Movie and Scream, there was There’s Nothing Out There. Rolfe Kanefsky’s 1991 horror comedy copied horror movies to poke fun at them. But as Charlie Lyne notes in this documentary, Rolfe’s life took a bizarre turn when another movie seemingly copied his.

A woman who’s sick of being single tries out speed dating. But her desperation may have led her to a symposium of stereotypical jerks and freaks in Meghann Artes’ slapstick stop-motion short film.

(PG-13) A young man’s realization that he’s with the wrong crowd comes just a bit late. Robbie Barclay’s short film barely has any narrative, but his world building is impeccable. Dope City is a vivid snapshot of life in his hometown of Huntingdon, Pennsylvania.

Temujin Doran’s short film is based on an excerpt from David Eagleman’s book Sum: Forty Tales from the Afterlives, which presents interesting concepts of what life after death might be like.

In this beautifully illustrated graduation short from students of Moscow’s Vgik Film School, a young prince heads out of his palace, excited for his first hunt, but is lead on a mystical journey in which he comes to realize the precious value of every life.