Jamais je n'ai

For a 20-minute short film, it packs a good punch.

It's disorienting - as disorienting for the viewer as it would be for the woman whose eyes we see through, it's oppressive, and it's gripping. There's little to no added sound used to heighten the atmosphere - it's all diegetic sound - and no audible dialogue, with everything that IS heard being too muffled to hear clearly, and it's all over almost as soon as it begins, but it hits pretty hard for a short film.

And if you don't understand the ending then you're not paying attention.

We only get half a story here. Sure, we get a good victim POV, and a set up for a terrible crime, but that's it. I just need more. Imagine you tell your friends you had a great joke about 2 guys in a bar, and you get to the part where you say "one of the guys turns to the other," and end the joke there.

That's this short movie.

There is no background information, no dialogue. It's just you, as the woman, waking up in a car bound and gagged, being brought to a strange house by some Ed Gein-looking creeper, and forced to experience what it must be like to be one of the very few real-life victims of history's known notorious and brutal serial killers (and probably even some of the unknown serial killers who have never been caught and may never be caught, if you'll excuse the dark thought).

To a hardcore horror veteran, for the most part, it's nothing new to be quite frank. We've seen this stuff often. It's not even all that disturbing. It might be more effective to someone who's not eyebrow-deep in the world of horror. But it's still pretty good. The filmmakers stepped away from the modern, ever-growing trend of "feeling the need to shock audiences as much as possible" in an attempt to bring something more thought-provoking and a bit different.

I think of a horror film from Belgium or at least inspired by Gaspard Noe's cinema. It is really shocking, disturbing, and I hardly believe that such a short feature could be made. I can't imagine it in a long length frame. I thought to IRREVERSIBLE (2002) all long the viewing. Using the subjective camera, the tale of a young woman who his already kidnapped, tied in a car rear seat, then dragged into an old house where she will be...But no, I prefer stopping here, not to spoil this tremendous but very special short film, which could have been shown - but after all, maybe it was shown - at the Paris L'ETRANGE FESTIVAL, which is held every September.