Our stunning 11 1/2″ 24K custom gold statuette is manufactured by R.S. Owens, the same company that manufactures the Oscar. The winner of our Best Short Film category will receive this award at no cost to them, while winners in other categories will be given the option to acquire it. Additional awards and prizes may be Read More ...
Title: Uprooted
Runtime: 6 min
Country: Netherlands
Director: Elwin Rijken
Placement: Award of Merit
Competition: December, 2020
Synopsis: A married couple with relationship problems are going to a couples therapist for a deep session.
OR: What was the inspiration for your film?
ER: My movie was grounded in two train of thoughts.
One was, can I make a movie that abandons continuity, creating mistakes in continuity in every single new shot. And to what effect?
The second one was, can I make a movie that picks a dramatic story arc to incorporate my editing experiment with.
With the pandemic times there are a lot of sad and tragic stories in the (local) news about domestic violence. This inspired me to make a small scale intimate shortfilm about this subject.
I am very much inspired by surrealist filmmakers like Luis Bunuel, Michel Gondry, Charlie Kaufman and love to work in the surrealistic genre and magic realistic genre. But I always want to keep the dramatic core grounded in reality.
The movie was made within the 48 Hour Film Project and our team picked the (psychological) horror genre.
OR: When did you conceive the idea for your film and how long did it take before it was realized?
ER: I had 48 hours to make the movie, so after I new I had to write a horror story, I thought of dramatic storylines and came up with the domestic abuse, because I think it’s a delicate and important tragic topic.
My idea for making a movie that plays with continuity could be incorporated in this story to show the disorientation and shocking nature of such a violent and broken relationship that you witness collapsing.
OR: What was the most challenging aspect of working in a short film format?
ER: For myself: to write, produce, direct and edit in 48 hours. I had little sleep haha. But luckily I also had a very nice team of 14 people (production and post production) to help me with all the other work and they did a great job. I am especially proud of the actors who did such emotional empathetic acting in such a short time. It was some intense acting work by Ineke, Frank and Askr and I am very happy with the result.
OR: What was the most challenging aspect of your production?
ER: To have made this movie within all the COVID restrictions, wearing masks on the set, keeping social distance. That made it extra difficult.
OR: Do you have any advice for first-time filmmakers?
ER: Yes, keep making short films and do it for the passion of it. Learn while playing.
