The one thing you can always count on in a Quentin Dupieux film is that it will rarely make sense. His previous works of Rubber, a film about a homicidal car tire, and Wrong, an absurd missing dog story that amounts to nothing, should serve as clear indications that Dupieux is a surrealist filmmaker who doesn’t care about logic. His work often divides audiences—you’re either a fan of his meta-narrative tendencies or you despise them—Reality is no exception.

Like past Dupieux’s films, describing the plot mechanics of Reality is challenging and mostly useless. Here each subplot weaves with another, but unlike most interlocking storyline films, they never actually form into a cohesive story. For example, the film begins with a character named Reality (Kyla Kenedy), a daughter of a taxidermist who finds a mysterious blue cassette tape in the innards of her father’s latest kill. She spends the rest of the film trying to play the tape (which she eventually accomplishes, though it doesn’t make sense, naturally). But one night when Reality begins to fall asleep, Dupieux takes us down the first of many rabbit holes. Suddenly, the image of Reality sleeping is projected on a movie screen in a private screening between a movie director named Zog (John Glover) and Bob the producer (Jonathan Lambert). Yet, Reality interacts with and weaves into other story threads, making it impossible to tell reality from dreams, or if any given scene is actually part of a movie-within-a-movie. Leos Carax, David Lynch, Luis Buñuel, and perhaps even Jacques Tati would be proud.

The closest to a lead in the film is Jason (Alain Chabat). He plays a cameraman for a cable access cooking show (hosted by Jon Heder (Napoleon Dynamite) who wears a giant rat suit and suffers from an invisible case of eczema) and an inspiring filmmaker who pitches his film idea to Bob (who insists the filmmaker capture the best groan in movie history if it’s to receive financing). Later on Jason finds out that his idea was already made into a movie by a different director. But maybe he was just dreaming it was? Or perhaps Jason is a lead in the movie about wanting to make a movie? Maybe both.

Is your head spinning yet?

One red herring after another, Dupieux throws ideas at the wall without any intention of anything actually sticking. Eric Wareheim cruises around in a military jeep dressed as a woman for no clear reason, but he also plays the superintendent of Reality’s school. Every storyline connects, but the collection of random ideas amount to very little. Dupieux presents “reality” in the form of nightmares and half-truths, but never in a way to be taken too seriously. In fact, Reality might be Dupieux’s funniest movie yet. When Jason shows up to watch the movie he hasn’t made yet, Rubber 2 is displayed on the marquee outside the theater, a subtle nod for fans of the filmmaker. More obvious humor is found when Jason obsesses over recording an “Oscar-worthy” groan for his movie or when Bob can’t make up his mind on having the meeting with Jason inside or outside, eventually moving his entire desk to the middle of the woods.

Trying to put all the pieces together is pointless. The sooner one can accept a character shooting a surfer with a sniper rifle from his patio, the sooner they may just find the film to be an enjoyable experience. Still, as creative and thought-out as the film may be, its empty absurdity is frustrating and often tedious to sit through. For one of cinema’s strangest filmmakers, Reality’s humor and brain-teasing is a step in the right direction, but will still leave most viewers in the middle of nowhere.

I arrived at the Roxie Theater on Saturday afternoon prepared for a huge day of films, and that’s exactly what my third day at SF Indiefest delivered. The first presentation of the day was a trio of shorts by newcomer Mary Helena Clark, paired with Desire Inc., a provocative short by Bay Area filmmaker Lynn Hershman. Next up, I shuffled over to the Roxie’s sister theater, Little Roxie, to watch Todd Looby’s charmingly honest Be Good. After filling my belly with delicious eats from the tapas place across the street (yum), I returned to the main Roxie theater to watch Quentin Dupieux’s playfully bizarre Wrong.
The night was capped off right around the corner from the Roxie at 518 Gallery with white Russians, mini-bowling, Dudes, Walters, and Jesuses, with SF Indiefest’s 10th annual Big Lebowski party, along with a 35mm screening of the film. The devoted Lebowski faithful came out in full force, and gathered to form a raucous orgy of Lebowski love. It was a memorable night that cemented for me that SF Indiefest is an absolute must-go event for any and all film enthusiasts.

The night was capped off right around the corner from the Roxie at 518 Gallery with white Russians, mini-bowling, Dudes, Walters, and Jesuses, with SF Indiefest’s 10th annual Big Lebowski party, along with a 35mm screening of the film. The devoted Lebowski faithful came out in full force, and gathered to form a raucous orgy of Lebowski love. It was a memorable night that cemented for me that SF Indiefest is an absolute must-go event for any and all film enthusiasts.

Three experimental shorts from Mary Helena Clark

Mary Helena Clark (who was in attendance) presented her experimental shorts And the Sun Flowers, Sound Over Water, and By Foot-Candle Light, all of which elicited long-forgotten memories and feelings from my childhood. Clark’s films linger on beautiful abstract images long enough for the hazy sights and sounds to transform in their meaning, cling to your mind, and become yours. Sound Over Water, the best of the trio, comforts with serene underwater images, while simultaneously creating a growing sense of claustrophobia.

And the Sun Flowers RATING: 6.8

Sound Over Water RATING: 8.9

By Foot-Canle Light RATING: 8

Desire Inc.

Experienced filmmaker Lynn Hershman (also in attendance) followed up with her thought-provoking look into technological fantasy Desire Inc. Filmed in 1985, before the internet had taken over the world, Hershman shares a set of ads she created and ran in the Bay Area, in which a seductive model urges viewers to call her. We are then shown footage of actual men who responded to the ads and the fascinating effects the ads had on their minds. It’s a deeply explorative work of art that contemplates the “phantom limb” we all utilize to reach into our television screens and interact with our most personal fantasies. When asked in the Q&A that followed the film if she would have made the film differently in the internet age, Hershman stressed that Desire Inc. and all films are portraits of their time and forever live just in that place.

RATING: 9.5

Be Good

Director Todd Looby’s Be Good follows independent filmmaker and stay-at-home dad Paul, his wife, Mary, who reluctantly returns to work but would much rather be at home with their newborn baby girl, Pearl. Paul wrestles with the reality that caring for the sleepless Pearl is stifling his filmmaking career, his friendships, and his marriage. Mary is frustrated with inhabiting the role of sole provider for the family and begins to resent Paul for not being able to contribute to the family financially and for being able to stay home with Pearl when she cannot. The rift between the couple grows as they use Pearl to escape one another, both emotionally and physically.

The situations Looby puts Paul and Mary in feel genuine, the pacing of the film hits the right rhythm, and Looby’s directing is tasteful. In scenes where Mary’s eye wanders to a male co-worker, Looby uses just the right amount of suggestion to where the situation doesn’t feel manufactured or contrived, but earnest and real. Neither parent is vilified, and their reactions to each other are completely understandable and believable thanks to sharp writing and two great performances. Thomas Madden and Amy Seimetz (as Paul and Mary, respectively) create a refined, naturalistic portrayal of a couple that is faced with the difficult juggling act that is parenthood.

Be Good is one of my favorite films of the festival so far. Looby is fair to his characters and treats them and their dilemma with respect. Their difficult situation is presented plainly and tastefully, and it’s clear that some of the scenes were plucked right out of Looby’s own life. He uses his own apartment, his own baby, and his own life experiences to inform the film, and what results is a deeply personal work. As a newlywed and future father, Be Good was a truly touching film.

RATING: 9.2

Wrong

Quentin Dupieux, director of the absurdist horror flick Rubber, delivers an equally nonsensical and wacky film with Wrong. We follow Dolph Springer, who wakes up to find that his beloved dog Paul is missing. In his search for his best friend, we are shown the wacky world Dolph lives in and the kooky eccentrics that inhabit it. As Dolph unravels the mystery behind Paul’s disappearance, his faith and connection with his pet are tested, and his problems begin to have damaging effects on the people surrounding him.

Dupieux’s film resembles a lighter, sillier version of a David Lynch dreamlike mind-bender, exchanging Lynch’s deep shadows and terror for bright, natural lighting and frivolous absurdity. Most of Wrong’s gags and wacky imagery are good for some laughs, but the effect comes and goes. We see things like a clock that strikes 7:60, a video of Paul’s shit’s memories (yep), and a man painting another man’s truck blue without permission. Unlike in Lynch’s films, none of the images stick and are soon forgotten, though they are fun in the moment.

What does stick are the great performances by the talented cast. Jack Plotnick plays Dolph with complete sincerity and dryness. While the film has a light, silly tone, Plotnick does a good job of reminding us of the true pain the absence of his Paul has caused Dolph. The rest of the cast do a good job as well, and deliver the dry dialogue with skillful comedic timing. William Fichtner is a standout as a spiritual guru who is an expert on making astral connections with other beings as is Regan Burns, who plays a jogger who will deny to the death that he is a jogger. Watching the characters’ hilarious conversations with each other is the main strength of the film. Wrong is a fun exercise in nonsensicality, but fails to resonate in any significant way.

RATING: 6.2

Wrong Cops: Chapter 1

Quentin Dupieux, who might be known to most people as Mr. Oizo, has definitely earned his place as one of the wackier directors working today. His directorial debut Rubber was a funny and surprisingly clever film that most people know as the movie with the killer tire. His follow-up, Wrong, went in even more out there directions than Rubber but was lacking a lot of humour. Now Dupieux returns with Wrong Cops, a series of interconnected short films he’s making as the funding comes in. Chapter 1, which premiered at Cannes’ 2012 Director’s Fortnight festival, is a welcome return to form for Dupieux.

A cop (Mark Burnham) goes around town dealing drugs on the side when he decides to take a teenager (Marilyn Manson) hostage to show the kid what ‘real music’ is. Burnham and Manson fully commit to their roles, and the absurdist tone works wonders. Dupieux, shooting for the first time in Scope, shows how much his skills behind the camera have improved since Rubber. So far two other chapters have been finished, with the intention of compiling 7 chapters into a feature-length film by the summer. I personally can’t wait to get back into Dupieux’s weird little universe again, and hope the rest of Wrong Cops lives up to the same quality as Chapter 1.

The Way The World Ends

I have become very fond of short films, and this year I have had the opportunity to see a number of magnificently shot, exciting visual stories condensed into a mere 10 minutes, if that – and The Way the World Ends is no exception. With wonderful imagery, impressive special effects and a deep storyline, director Matthew B. Wolff captures the essence perfectly, of a man’s inner pain.

Dave (Joseph Buttler) wakes to find his wife not beside him in bed and instead she is stood at the window peering out onto the street. She looks to her husband and says “The sun is gone – it didn’t rise” to which Dave shrugs off and heads back to sleep not wanting to believe what his wife had just said. These shots are placed together alongside a scene where Dave is stood right in front of the camera with sweat dripping from his forehead – he is talking to a psychiatrist; we do not know why.

When both stand at the window the streets are empty, Dave’s wife describes the texture and colour as identical to “a dolphin’s skin” – the world is simply grey. With fourteen minutes of footage this short does extremely well to portray everything it needs to. Each scene and each moment is not wasted; they describe exactly everything the director wants them to – emotion, loneliness, confusion, colourless and empty. Dave continues his day as normal but is confused by how everyone else at his work refuses to acknowledge that the world has ended. Still intercutting with the scene where Dave is sat with his psychiatrist, we’re developing a sense of what’s happening. In the last few minutes colour is introduced and this takes shape through nature and through children innocently playing on a trampoline; defining the purity of life. This last moment of the film can be perceived as when Dave has finally found closure.

There are several moments in The Way the World Ends where scenes may seem familiar in style as the opening sequence for example is very Alfred Hitchcock, and the snap shot when the alarm goes off is the same as that from American Beauty. I loved this short film; it really was special, beautifully crafted and brilliantly edited together.

Elevated

Before he exploded onto the movie scene with his groundbreaking feature debut with Cube, Canadian filmmaker Vincenzo Natali made the 17 minute short film entitled, Elevated. The most impressive feat here is that it accomplishes more in its short runtime than most full-length films tend to do. Using creative filmmaking techniques, it is successful in creating suspense with just three characters that are contained in an elevator nearly the entire time. Elevated is so efficient that it even has time for a nice plot twist, resulting in a bone-chilling ending.

The film begins with two strangers, Ellen (Vickie Papavs) and Ben (Bruce McFee), riding an elevator down a large story building. The elevator stops before their destined floor, but the doors open to reveal no one outside the elevator. Just before the doors close a security guard named Hank bursts into the elevator in extreme panic. Hank explains that they must go up to the top floor immediately as there are dangerous creatures lurking in the building. The two become suspicious as Hank is covered in blood, which he admits is not his.

Elevated and Cube both share a lot of similarities; they feature a small group of people confined in a limited space with an unknown villain at work. Both films are as enthralling as they are thrilling and make you question what exactly is happening. Being that this was his first film, Elevated was naturally less polished in some areas, most noticeably in the editing, but was an impressive debut nonetheless.

If I Am Your Mirror

If I Am Your Mirror, inspired by Edgar Allen Poe’s horror classic, The Tell-Tale Heart, is a twisted, bloody interpretation of the original horror classic. Director Garrett DeHart employs a rich, painterly visual style to tell his unique version of the tale. Whether you are familiar with the source material or not (you should be, as it is a haunting 10 minute read that will stay with you forever), it’s a mesmerizing watch from beginning to end.

In the original short, an unnamed narrator tries desperately to convince the reader of his sanity, while simultaneously recounting an unsettling murder he’s committed. DeHart sets the tale in post-civil war America and expands on Poe’s story by chronicling key events that led to the unnamed man’s descent into madness, and the fatal consequences of his actions. DeHart uses dialog sparingly and fastidiously, utilizing pure cinematic storytelling which acts as an amusing juxtaposition to the penned source material.

The arresting visuals (animated environments, live-action actors) channel the deep, rich tones and grim sense of terror of paintings from the romantic period and complement the macabre tone of the story perfectly. The animated sets are rendered well and appear dirty, murky and soiled (in the best way.) When the camera moves, the various elements that make up the environment shift and slide like a demented pop-up book. The actors are treated with an interesting effect that could be described as a painterly form of rotoscoping. Though the effect can be occasionally jarring (especially in long shots), it is mostly effective and helps to marry the actors with their animated surroundings.

Larry Holden stars as the unnamed man and puts on a heart-wrenching performance. If I Am Your Mirror is a chilling and emotional take on Poe’s classic, though it can certainly stand on its own legs as a work of art.

If you’re a filmmaker with a short you’d like us to consider for a review in our feature, you can submit your film here. Be sure to include a synopsis, promotional materials (preferably a photo or poster) and a link to your short film