The 2023 Manhattan Short Film Festival

Manhattan Travels to Meadville

The 2023 Manhattan Short Film Festival Appears at Meadville Cinema LP

A Review

Recently–for one night only–Meadville Cinema LP hosted the Manhattan Short Film Festival. Established in 1998, this annual worldwide competition showcases 10 short films”with audiences getting to vote for their favorite film and actor. Meadville has had the distinct honor of hosting this event in Northwest Pennsylvania for over the past decade.

Short films don’t get the respect they deserve. Maybe it’s because they don’t have the star power or special effects that big-budget movies have. Maybe it’s because cinemas aren’t willing to show them–which damns them to film festivals at art houses, colleges or even libraries.

Too bad. A good lineup of short films can offer a smorgasbord of people, places and situations. And, if there’s a film you don’t like, you don’t have to walk out; just wait several minutes until the next movie is screened.

Don’t be misguided: thinking that just because these films are short, they don’t pack a punch. Though brief (the longest film within the showcase was only 17-minutes long), the action, suspense and empathy for these fictional characters can run deep. Take Sunless, for example, {SPOILER ALERTS AHEAD} an 8-minute

American film entry of two men whose goal is to submerge their submarine to the lowest depth within the ocean that mankind has ever reached. With the immense water pressure causing their vehicle to creak, one man begins to seriously panic”until they reach the bottom. Joy and kudos are brief when they throw the switch to begin to resurface”and it fails. Then water begins seeping in. Eerily echoing the Oceangate submersible tragedy from earlier this year, one finds oneself literally holding their breath as the film concludes as the screen goes black.

Yellow a UK/Afghanistan entry, relates the story of a young innocent girl living in the ultra-constrictive, Taliban-controlled Afghanistan, buying her first full-body veil. The garment, though loose-fitting is life-constrictive, even her vision through her tiny veil is minimized and suppressed, as if almost imprisoning this beautiful young woman for life.

Snail, from Iran relates the unceasing love of a mother for her child. Selling some of her precious items to gain an entrance fee for her young son to enter a singing contest, the woman is oblivious to her son’s lack of talent. Blinded by love? Hardly, the audience learns in the end that the woman is deaf.

From the United Kingdom, The Stupid Boy concerns a chance meeting between a mentally-challenged youth and a beaten-down world-weary terrorist that in its conclusion illustrates that love conquers hate.

A comedy-drama, Voice Activated is an Australian entry that tells of a young florist who stutters attempting to make a delivery to a wedding using a voice-activated vehicle. When you’re not empathizing with the man’s plight, you’re laughing at his predicament and finally cheering when his goal is reached and his stutter is temporarily conquered.

A comedy, The Family Circus, is an American selection that demonstrates how a simple white lie to save a relative can eventually drag the entire family into a maelstrom of deceit.

Tuulikki, from Finland presents the tale of an overly protective mother and her daughter, who’s being stifled by her parent. With the subject of mental illness being inferred, the daughter is locked in her house and unable to even bathe in private, one begins to wonder who’s truly unstable within the family: the daughter or the mother? Or both? Its confusing ending didn’t answer these questions.

My favorite? Career Day. From the USA, it tells the sweet story of a man’s mid-life crisis: he just quit his accounting job that his wife got for him and he’s at loose ends. And his daughter wants him to speak at her career day at school. However, rather than talk about his former boring job, he surprises his daughter with his prior gig: the lead singer of a 1990’s boy band. Reuniting with his former bandmates who’ve also moved onto other jobs (a baker, a barista, even a medical doctor), they perform for his daughter, his excited daughter’s teacher (still bearing the band’s name as her tramp stamp), and just maybe…for himself? It made this reviewer laugh, smile and even applaud. Do yourself a favor and find the Jason Robinson and Chris Hooper film somehow on the internet.

Something different from the usual Hollywood drivel of shoot-em ups, car crashes, kiddies movies or another comic-book-cum-movie blockbuster, the Manhattan Short Film Festival was a worthwhile viewing.

Too bad it was only for a single night.

See you there next year?

For more information about the Manhattan Short Film Festival visit manhattanshort.com. To nominate a venue (Maybe Erie?) visit manhattanshort.com/nominate-a-venue.html

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