Saturday 4 April 2020 – 13:00
97 mins
Certificate: DFF 15
Venue: Dorking Halls
The Dorking Film Festival asked filmmakers in Surrey, the South-East and the rest of the UK to send us their short films. Here are eleven of the best by adult filmmakers aged nineteen years or more. Hope and despair abound as a women waits to find out if she is pregnant, two puppets visit the bed and breakfast from hell and an operatic legend proves surprising when a school girl arrives for an audition. A prize will be awarded to the best film in this group at the end of the session.
Adult Short Film Programme
16 Days
Director: Justin Shevlin. UK, 2019, 14 mins.
Hope and Rick are happily married and trying for a baby. Hope checks daily for the tiny changes in her body that could suggest she might be pregnant. Is now her time?
An Actor’s Life ForMe
Director: Ed Hartland. UK, 2019, 5 mins.
An aspiring actor’s dreams of success clash with her day-to-day reality of an inept agent and work to pay the bills.
Bone
Director: Rica Sweeney. UK, 2019, 15 mins.
When a homeless puppy starts running deliveries for a drug dealer her dreams of bones becomes real. Unfortunately, the hand that feeds can also be the one that takes bones away in this juicy bone-dry comedy drama. What’s a dog to do?
Missing a Note
Director: Beth Moran. UK, 2019, 15 mins.
Schoolgirl and aspiring singer, Molly, performs before retired opera legend, John O’Connell, in hope for a good scholarship report. But John’s failing memory means Molly is in for a few puzzling surprises. Watch out for Ian McElhinney and Elaine Paige in this short from Horsham’s Fact Not Fiction Films.
Needletail
Director: Alice Hamilton. UK, 2019, 10 mins.
A poignant not-quite-love story about three birdwatchers who cross the country in search of something extraordinary.
Organic Reach
Director: Tom Diffenthal. UK, 2019, 8 mins.
Social media obsessive Poppy is put through her paces as her popularity blooms. But how far is she prepared to go for the likes of strangers?
Plonker Man
Director: Sam Casserly. UK, 2019, 7 mins.
Becoming an internet meme has its advantages in this Lovely Jubbly mockumentary when Johnny Bonnar becomes associated with a certain character from Only Fools and Horses. But like another 1980s throwback might say, “Life moves pretty fast.”
Quiet Carriage
Director: Ben S Hyland. UK, 2019, 5 mins.
A man must decide whether to intervene and stop a casual commuting rule breaker, or live with a lifetime of consequences. Amit Shah and Emma Sidi star in this comedy about a passive man with an overactive imagination.
Snake Charmer
Director: Molly Brown. UK, 2019, 4 mins.
A cobra with a moustache and a monocle hitting the metropolitan dating scene can only mean one thing! It’s the latest animation from Croydon-based animator and filmmaker Molly Brown.
Snore
Director: Luther Bhogal-Jones. UK, 2019, 10 mins.
If the words ‘splatstick puppet’ film don’t fire you up then you MUST watch this! When a couple in financial difficulties stay at a guesthouse their rest is upset by something in the walls. Deliriously madcap pandemonium follows in this (slightly) grown-up version of the Muppets.
Workplace Safety
Director: Ben Couzens. UK, 2019, 2 mins.
Workplace safety instructional films go to ‘nutsville’ in this animation exploring the dangers of trip hazards and the consequences of ignoring them in a high-risk work environment.
Image from Needletail showing in Adult Short Films.