Hello ladies and gentlemen, Muldoon here with this week's short film picks created and submitted by fellow AICN readers. Dear lord is today a geek's wetdream of genre love. Seriously, we've got some incredible horror flicks, giant monsters running amok, and a few things that are sure to tickle your nostalgic fancy. As we get closer and closer to Halloween, hopefully you guys and gals are loading up on excellent horror films. It's cool to know that some of the filmmakers who I've come to know through their shorts (short films that is) have gone on to do big features and get even larger platforms to show off their work with. I have no doubt some of today's filmmakers will continue on their path of creating things that will cinematically haunt the rest of us, so it's an honor and a privilege to get to show off their stuff. At any rate, I believe in the shorts this week and sadly had to skip last weekend due to a lovely laptop "being dead" scare while leaving LAX... (Fun times when your tools give out!) So my apologies to the folks who were looking forward to SS last weekend - trust me, this week's selection will make up for it! Now let's drop the chit chat and start watching some kickass movies, eh?

Go grab yourself some popcorn, lock your kids in a closet, kill the lights, relax and check out this little weekly film fest we've got ourselves here:

Hot damn! Let's kick this week off right with an incredible film from Ethan Shaftel. Despite the fact that Ethan opened the film up about a week ago online, it's already been featured on numerous sites, and rightfully so. Had my computer been fully functional last saturday, you folks would have seen it then - good thing for Ethan and co - the film's set fire to the online movie blog community and is even a "Vimeo Staff Pick." It's full of insane imagery that is as beautiful as it is disturbing. "FLESH COMPUTER is set in a derelict future city, where a weary handyman cares for a cybernetic “pet project” made of live flesh and mechanical parts.  But when a pair of thuggish bullies threaten the contraption, the line between human and machine becomes blurred." The thing's a real treat and something you should definitely "full screen" and give your undivided attention to. I see big things in Shaftel's future, but in the mean time - be sure to go hit up his website if you feel so inclined!

Anyone in the house like a small film called BACK TO THE FUTURE? I kid... I kid... Clearly we all love the hell out of that film and franchise for that matter, but Erik A. Candiani and the gang at KARE 11 took that love a step further and created their own piece of BTTF lore. The folks created this seven minutes of nostalci love for the Minneapolis 48 Hour Film Project, so they didn't have much time to crank it out.

The gang at A:Sixty have a fun new sixty second horror film for us this month. "A young nurse is terrorized by a paranormal monster in this scary horror thriller short film." If you like what you see, then follow the guys on Twitter for any news/fun announcements they've got: Joseph Bearor - http://twitter.com/joebearor, Danny Donahue - http://twitter.com/dannyfdonahue, Courtney Henderson - http://twitter.com/couhen, Michael Matzur - http://twitter.com/michaelmatzur.

Our next film is just pure fun and comes to us from director Joe Kramer. Who doesn't love giant monster movies? "RUNNING THE GAMMATAR is a comedy about a group of self-centered 20-somethings trying to navigate their way through relationships in a city that's under constant attack from a giant, fire-breathing Japanese monster."

Last up is a pretty quirky music video from Stephen Vitale featuring some familiar extraterrestrials all wrapped around the new STAR WARS film's producer, Kathleen Kennedy.

The idea came about when one of my friends and co-writers made a joke on facebook after Oscar Isaac and Adam Driver (both in Inside Llewyn Davis) were cast in the new Star Wars. I told my friend it was too crazy and out there of an idea not to be made so we came up with "Please Kathleen Kennedy."

 

The basic setup is the Cantina Band is in the recording studio still playing that same old song. Until they try something different and they start playing "Please Kathleen Kennedy." The lyrics are from the perspective of C3PO pleading (because he isn't a huge fan of space travel) not to jump to hyper space to now head of Lucasfilm Kathleen Kennedy. 

 

Because Adam Driver had such a memorably weird part vocally in that song we wanted to do something special so we had a custom prop built called the "Artoo Harmonicoo" and instead of hearing Adam Driver's vocals of "Uh-oh" etc. you hear similarly emotive R2D2 beeps and whistles. 

 

All the music was created and recorded for this short, even the folksy John Williams end credits. Hopefully Star Wars fans pick up on all the references both in the scenes and in the lyrics. If you've seen Inside Llewyn Davis, even better!

 

This was made by a small group of huge Star Wars fans in a one day shoot with a lot of love for Star Wars and the notion of mixing universes with a Coen Brothers film. Hope you enjoy. I've listed a few of the credits below, the rest are listed beneath the youtube video.

I just think it's pretty funny and if you do too, then be sure to hit up his website for more goodies!

Okay, ladies and gents. I'll see you all in a week. Have a great week and a safe/happy Halloween!

If you have a short and think it belongs here or are on the fence about whether to send it in, please do send it in - I'd love to see what you've put together. I've already seen hundreds of fresh new filmmakers' shorts and like any good addict, I need more!

Shoot me an email at "Mike@aintitcool.com"

In the subject line include:

“SHORTS” + “Your film’s name” + “The film’s genre”

Then, in the body of the email, please include a synopsis of the film and any contact information you might think I need or would want published. The more info you send my way, the more info there is to put with your short.

Please don’t feel the need to submit multiple times. 

Remember, the filmmakers might still be in the audience, so feel free to share your thoughts in Talkbacks below. (JUST DON'T BE AN ASSHOLE). I picked them, so you know I think highly of all of these, but how about you fine folks? How'd you like 'em?

BY THE WAY: If you've had a short featured here, that means that I personally am a fan of your work, so feel free to shoot me any kind of news on new projects/films/whatever. I can't say I'll be able to help or in what capacity, but I'm interested in your work and am always down to see more! (Keep making cool stuff, everyone!)

- Mike McCutchen

"Muldoon"

Mike@aintitcool.com