Review - Muddy Shorts

Review by Iain Finlayson

If Muddy Shorts is the “flagship” event of Mudfest, as its website proclaims, it would be easy to think the festival might be sinking. I’m a fan of short work in any art form. I like the way in can spark something in your imagination and leave it there, without feeling the need to draw a conclusion. Or alternatively the way it can punch you in the face with its snappy message. The success of events such as Short and Sweet and the increasing popularity of short fiction and poetry, shows that I’m not alone in my appreciation of short bursts of art. But I would be lying if I said that Muddy Shorts didn’t leave me slightly underwhelmed.

My main disappointment was the attendance numbers. Last Mudfest, Muddy Shorts played to packed houses over two nights in the Carlton Courthouse. As a one night only event in the Mudfest Club, I was sure this was going to be a sell out. In fact there was only a handful of people in the audience, many of them Muddy Shorts performers or Mudfest volunteers themselves. Thankfully the audience swelled later in the night when cast and audience members came in after Hangman and Into the Unknown.

I was surprised when the short film Adam, David and Daniel go to Europe, which had already featured as part of Mudfest two years ago, was trotted out again. While the film has some amusing dialogue, it is little more then your average holiday camcorder video with a voice over. It certainly made me think the organisers had struggled for content, whether this was the case or not.

That said Muddy Shorts still managed to showcase some of the rich artistic talent that exists on campus. Sherwin Akbarzadeh’s short film I Had A Dream I Went To Coney Island, created a surreal and elegant dreamscape out of Coney Islands amusement rides, sideshows and burger joints. Marisabel Bonet’s poetry was earnest and sincere. Although her work may have lent itself more to reading then to performance, it was interesting to hear Marisable talk about the various people and experiences in her life that had inspired her. Paige Marshall’s one women retelling of Rapunzel was a very polished performance in which Paige seamlessly embodied the various characters in the story. However it was Biddy O’Loughlan’s monologue, The Girl Who Thought She Was Irish, that was the stand out performance of the night. Clever and irreverent, Biddy had most of the audience laughing out loud.

Muddy Shorts played for one night at the Mudfest Club on Saturday August 22.

Review - Shifting Patterns of Light and Shade

Review by Hagan Mathews

Candlelight, a whirring projector and fuzzy images tripping over themselves on a rolling canvas. That’s what waited in Brooklyn Project Café on Wednesday night. Super 8 film creates an unavoidably nostalgic ambience that, if used with restraint, makes for simple and effective short films. And the stuff on show here was certainly short. None longer than five minutes, most less than three, Shifting Patterns of Light and Shade collected ten surprisingly engaging works as a follow-up to a the Inaugural Super 8 Backyard Film Festival held in April this year. All shot using black and white film, a couple of films contained more shifting patterns of shade rather than light. But these were firmly in the minority. The stuff on show was best when shot in full sunlight, the warmth of the images contrasting with a slight draught trickling through the café. I was disappointed that nobody used colour film. It would have been interesting to see modern scenarios shot in the fuzzy sepia of seventies newsreel footage. Black and white created an almost imposing artiness that detracted from the simple fun of most of the work. But that’s something to look forward to next time.

Shifting Patterns of Light and Shade was held in The Brooklyn Project, 18 & 19 August.