The Hollyshorts program for rom-coms is about relationships more than romance, but that works out fine for short films. Some of the films in this section were films that were by or about people with disabilities.
Audio Description (5 minutes, US, directed by Luke J. Salewsky) is perhaps best seen as the start of a bromance. You may know of audio description as a way for visually impaired people to know what is happening on screen. This film has audio description, but one of the characters begins hearing this disembodied voice describing everything he is doing. In time, he begins a dialog with the voice, at first trying to get him to stop but, by the end, there is the hope of friendship.
The Case of the Obsidian Muskrat (6 minutes, US, directed by Chase Chambers) is a noir detective tale. The twist is that the detective is deaf, so he has an interpreter partner that is his ears and voice. It is a fun play on the genre.
Emergency Contact (4 minutes, US, directed by Riley Madincea) is a story of BFFs who have drifted apart. We hear one side of a phone conversation outside of a bank being robbed. A young woman has been called in by the FBI because she is the emergency contact for the bank robber. The FBI hopes she can defuse the hostage situation. But instead we hear the history of the relationship and how it went wrong. But maybe they can rekindle their friendship.
Call the A.D.A. (6 minutes, US, directed by Nicholas Paul Ybarra) is a mini police procedural. It focuses on a pair of agents who enforce the Americans with Disabilities Act. One is in a wheelchair, the other has a prosthetic hand (which I covet). But they learn they aren’t really supposed to do their job. The relationship between the man and woman is a bit of rom-com with him wondering “will they or won’t they?”, to which she always responds, “They won’t.”
Bill (11 minutes, UK, directed by Emily Dhue) is a tale of domestic life turned sour. Lillith is a plus-sized woman whose husband Bill is constantly talking about all the things she needs to change. He has a whole plastic surgery regime planned for her. She reaches her breaking point and kills him. Then she makes him into her own puppet of the ideal husband.
Special Delivery (10 minutes, US, directed by Emily Rose Everhard) is the most like a real rom-com in this group. Sandy is a foley artist putting sounds into a porn film. She struggles to find a realistic sound for kissing. She uses all kinds of foods to make her sounds. But when Tad shows up to put in some dialogue, there may be a way to perfectly capture that kissing sound.
