The 5th Short Film Hall of Fame

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THE HOUSE IS BLACK
(1963, Farrokhzad)



"There is no shortage of ugliness in the world, but by closing our eyes on ugliness, we will intensify it."

Written and directed by Forugh Farrokhzad, The House Is Black is a documentary that follows life at a leper colony in rural Iran. It features footage of various residents going on about their daily routines while contrasting it with frequent narration of quotes from the Bible or the Qur'an by Farrokhzad herself; quotes that often, like the one above, clash with the visuals of the film.

The visuals are tough, especially when seeing the toll that leprosy has taken on the children. However, Farrokhzad makes a point of showing us the casualness of life in the colony, men playing board games or talking, the happiness of children while playing ball, or women putting on makeup and brushing their hair.

When I watched this a couple of weeks ago, I had no idea what it was about; didn't even know it was a documentary, so it caught me by surprise. But then again, I suppose that's the intention. Per the opening quote, it's obvious that Farrokhzad's intention was to open our eyes to this "ugliness", and let us know that there are ways to remedy it, but moreover, that there is still beauty in it.

Grade:
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SEVEN
Visually this felt like a miniature A24 film. I was pleased to read in the Vimeo bio of the director that he is working on a feature version of this. His short Sea Dragon also sounds intriguing but it seems he hasn't posted it online yet. Looking forward to both.

I spoil the story here so don't read if you haven't watched it yet.
 

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Captain's Log
My Collection





Seven
(2018)

An interesting little film. I see it as "An Eye for An Eye". I loved the scenery and of course, it's Nordic, which is always a plus for me.





Now
(2003)

I picked this film because I am a huge fan of Mads Mikkelsen. He's a great actor and I found this when exploring his filmography. Everyone seems to have an opinion of the story but I just found it quietly beautiful.

I think to me, the film talks about a normal, man marrying a woman and creating a family, but the real desire he has is for another man, with who he remains in a relationship until death.

Mads went on to work with Mikael Persbrandt in "The Salvation" and the director, Simon Staho, seems to have some more interesting works under his belt.



I think I'm the only HoF host who ever asked people not to send in their ballots until I've finalized my own ballot.
That's why I asked because I figured that was the norm.



Jesus H. Christ, even with short films, I can't catch a break. When's the deadline for this? I'm more or less halfway through, but I've been busy editing the podcast. Anyway, I'm sure I can knock a couple before the deadline, but the writing is that's been a problem lately.



Let the night air cool you off
Jesus H. Christ, even with short films, I can't catch a break. When's the deadline for this? I'm more or less halfway through, but I've been busy editing the podcast. Anyway, I'm sure I can knock a couple before the deadline, but the writing is that's been a problem lately.
Current deadline is July 9. I've been ridiculously busy myself, which was all unforeseen before we started, but I've pretty much watched everything that I haven't seen before. I just need to watch one more and then write everything up.



THE HOUSE IS BLACK

I was looking forward to this one, as Leper Colonies are something I often heard about when I was young but didn't know much about. Didn't know much about leprosy in general, as a matter of fact. So I was ready for some learnin'.

Going into it with that attitude, I found myself wishing there was less poetry and more footage of the residents. Don't get me wrong, the shots of the leaves on the water were gorgeous, it just wasn't what I was here for, and that's more my fault than the film's. Also I've since learned that the filmmaker's main gig was poet, so....I get it.

But still, I feel like I learned a good bit. I was never quite sure if there was a medical reason to quarantine the afflicted or if these were just ghettos to keep them away from "normal" folks. I suspect it was a bit of both, but I was relieved, if that's the word, to learn that it is indeed contagious so there's at least that justification. Never really knew what the symptoms looked like either, so that's something else I learned. One of us expressed a concern that the film was somewhat exploitative. I didn't feel that way, but I also didn't find it as emotionally affecting as others seem to either. I'm an unabashed movie-crier so I was expecting to be a wreck but that wasn't the case.

This kind of sounds like a lukewarm review, but this is going to be pretty high in my rankings.



NIGHT AND FOG

I've seen a lot of this footage elsewhere over the years. (The bulldozer is and always has been the worst of it for me.) So it was not so much a shock for me, but I kept thinking about what Crumbs said a while back, about audiences in '56 being confronted with this. I can't imagine that this footage was shown on newsreels at the cinema in the 40s after the camps were liberated (maybe I'm wrong), so I don't know how the average citizen would have found access to it at the time. For that matter, I'm not aware of how or where the average person would have seen Resnais' film.

But in 1956 we still weren't showing fake gore in horror films so what could possibly prepare you for this?? Holy cow.

But yeah, once again I'm bringing my 2022 American experience to a film and it was thoroughly depressing to watch this and know that some of my fellow countrymen are using these people's names and iconography as we speak. And the amount of hand-wringing going on right now about folks who aren't like other folks. Am I concerned that we're on the verge of shipping certain segments of our population to concentration camps? I'd like to think that's too far-fetched to believe, but how many German citizens expected things to escalate to this level back in '33? The fact remains that 80 years later we're still fighting over which god we believe in, or who we're sleeping with or what color our skin is.



Let the night air cool you off
The film selection in this hall is one of the best ever. Imagine how sick this hof would have been with a good host. Just something to think about for the good hosts out there. You know, we don't have to wait years for another shorts hof. So hopefully a good host will take up the mantle for the next one.



The film selection in this hall is one of the best ever. Imagine how sick this hof would have been with a good host. Just something to think about for the good hosts out there. You know, we don't have to wait years for another shorts hof. So hopefully a good host will take up the mantle for the next one.
For what it's worth, I think you've been a great host



Just tackled three of these, back-to-back-to-back: Seven (my pick), Hedgehog in the Fog, and Shell All.

Just have three to finish: Nu, Night and Fog, and Goodnight Mommy... and write all damn reviews



The film selection in this hall is one of the best ever. Imagine how sick this hof would have been with a good host. Just something to think about for the good hosts out there. You know, we don't have to wait years for another shorts hof. So hopefully a good host will take up the mantle for the next one.
This is the first Hall I've joined, but I don't know what a "good" host would have done that you're not doing. I have not found you lacking as a host, is what I'm saying.

But I agree about the quality of the selections. If I'm ranking a Laurel and Hardy film this low on my ballot that means everything else is pretty great.



NU

Despite its qualities, the short is a bit too cold and obtuse for me to fully embrace. While I expect a bit of iciness in Scandinavian art, it's perhaps too icy for my liking. Also - and despite what I like about its style - it often borders on parody of the stereotypical black and white European art movie and perfume commercials from the '80s and '90s.
Stealing this because it was my exact reaction as well.

The stylized nature of the acting (and script I guess) made it hard for me to connect with anything. I'm ok with that if the images are strong enough, but that was not the case here. The cinematography was fine, but not striking enough to make me overlook my lack of interest in the other aspects.

I know a guy who found himself in this situation and it's definitely a story worth telling, but the treatment they gave it here just didn't make an impression on me.

On the plus side, Mads is always solid and I'm using this for one of my B&W films in the 2022 Challenge, so I'm killing two birds with one stone here.