Weirdness After Dark with SXSW's 'Midnight Shorts'
The local motto around here is "Keep Austin Weird." Last night, SXSW added to the collective weirdness with the 2011 edition of Midnight Shorts - a collection of strange, dark and absurd short films. I was lucky enough to get one of the last seats at the sold-out Alamo Ritz screening, and here's a bit of what I saw.
Comedy had a strong showing at midnight. Andrew Putschoegl's "Hello Caller" featured Tom Lenk (of Buffy and the forthcoming The Cabin in the Woods) as a suicide hotline operator with an unorthodox technique.
In Thomas Wohlford's "Billy's Birthday," Sam Eidson offers up a portrait of a loser dad pushed to the brink, blending an angry Chris Farley with "Milton" from Office Space. I look forward to seeing what Eidson delivers in the SXSW feature My Sucky Teen Romance.
"Special Needs" pushes the bounds of one couple's politically incorrect fetishes, capped off with a hilarious sight gag.
On the scary side, I really enjoyed Todd Cobery's accomplished "Good Morning, Beautiful." David Tufford is moving as a lumpy shell of a man who crosses over to a Lynchian waking nightmare after the death of his infant daughter.
It wouldn't be Midnight Shorts without a few WTF entries. Top of that list is PJ Raval and Christeene's "Bustin' Brown," a music video celebrating gay anal sex with a level on enthusiasm that would make The Village People blush, and Brandon LaGanke's creepy "Bunny Boy" (man in bunny suit + boy + gun).
The program concluded with "Canary Suicides," directed by Natalia Provatas and Valerian Zamel, based on the work of Catherine Coan. A sad, sweet, giddy memorial to five little yellow birds who just couldn't face another day behind bars.
