20th Century Faux Presents: 16 Comedy Shorts About Loneliness

Worldwide VOD launch Feb 26

20th Century Faux is a short film series created by Will Blank & Jake Bradbury.

Jake and Will moved to Los Angeles with the dream of making feature films. They made award-winning shorts and worked on other people’s features and television projects. But then, like so many others, they found themselves bogged down in the never-ending development process. 20th Century Faux is their antidote. Instead of waiting for permission to make films, or trying to organize a massive crew and financing, with 20th Century Faux, Jake and Will opted for a minimalist approach. Their plan was to come up with – and execute – 16 short films that could be conceptualized, written and shot in a single day (one short per day), working with friends, and using whatever resources were available.

The result is a series of surprisingly empathetic, funny, and oftentimes absurdist short takes (1-4 minutes) by and about millennials. Distinct themes emerge; one that dominates is the experience of living in a time of dislocated hyper-modernity, and the self-help channels and techniques designed to combat the isolation of living through screens. In the films of 20th Century Faux, everything and everyone is a bit sad and desperate… so you might as well laugh at it. 

Others present more light-hearted takes on the daily grind, the search for love and self-knowledge. Sex is explored in… surprising ways. The idea of escape is seen in the forms of drugs, VR, and quality time spent with oneself in nature. Blank, Bradbury and co., explore these “heavy” topics with a funny and ultimately empathetic take on the millennial experience.

Blank’s previous short film, LIMBO, starred Raul Castillo opposite Sam Elliott as the voice of an animatronic dog. Shot on 35mm film, it is a stark but moving adaptation of a graphic novella by comic book artist Marian Churchland. After a successful run of North America’s top genre festivals, including Fantasia, Fantastic, and Toronto After Dark, during which it garnered several awards, the film won the prestigious CineGear Independent Short Film Competition.

What carries over from LIMBO to this new group of shorts, is a grounded yet fantastical tone, best described by Scott Beggs at Nerdist as “just a hint of absurdity, winked at by the filmmakers, even as both Castillo and Elliott offer arid deadpan.”

Release Schedule/platforms:

The 16 films will be released over the course of one month, four films each week, beginning Feb 26, on Facebook, Vimeo, and Youtube. Each week’s drop of new films will be accompanied by a podcast with series creators Will Blank and Jake Bradbury, where they will give insight into the films, their influences and aims, and the production process that went into that week’s films. The podcasts will be available on iTunes.

Worldwide VOD launch February 26, Noon EST, on Facebook, Vimeo and YouTube.

LINKS: Website – Vimeo – Youtube – Facebook 

Series Creators:

Will Blank, Director/Co-Writer/Actor: Will Blank is a director best known for his work with Academy Award Nominee Sam Elliott and Independent Spirit Award Nominee Raul Castillo on “Limbo,” earning fans the likes of Guillermo del Toro who described it as an “excellent” short film. After a successful run of the largest genre film festivals in North America, Limbo won the prestigious 2017 CineGear Expo Grand Prize for Best Independent Short. As an editor and assistant editor, Blank has also worked on hit TV shows such as Preacher (AMC), Sneaky Pete (Amazon), Counterpart (Starz) and the upcoming Spielberg-helmed reboot of Amazing Stories (Apple). Blank’s comedy Youtube page with collaborator Jake Bradbury has accumulated millions of views.

Jake Bradbury, Director/Co-Writer/Actor: Jake Bradbury is a director and producer, who has recently worked with Netflix, Maxim, and CBS as Senior Content Producer. Bradbury has received numerous awards for his short films including best thriller for Darknet from the IFS film festival and premiered his sci-fi short, Metal Tears, at the World Science Fiction Convention in Boston. Bradbury has also directed over fifty short films, which have amassed more than 6.1 million views on Youtube.

Feb 26 Films: (TRT of the four all together is 7:36)

The Wizard

TRT: 1:32

A man tries VR for the first time and instead of completing a side quest ends up punching an NPC in the face repeatedly.

Director: Jake Bradbury & Will Blank

Cinematographer: Alejandro Wilkins

Actors: Will Blank, Jake Bradbury

Sound design: Will Blank

Colorist: Jerimiah Morey

The Unbearable Lightness of Being

TRT: 1:34

A moment of hope for a desperate man living in a desperately lonely world. A sad man sees an attractive young woman waving at him but it turns out she’s waving at someone behind him.

Directors: Jake Bradbury & Will Blank

Cinematographer: Jonathan Hlutke

Actors: Will Blank, Traci Doering, Jake Bradbury

Sound design: Will Blank

Colorist: Jerimiah Morey

How High

TRT: 1:57

How much weed is too much weed? Despite the sage advice of a more experienced smoker, a man takes a bong rip that does him in.

Directors: Jake Bradbury & Will Blank

Cinematographer: Alejandro Wilkins

Actors: Will Blank, Veronica Kemp, Kamryn Alyse

Sound design: Will Blank

Sound mixing: Brandon Griffith

Colorist: Jerimiah Morey

Girl, Interrupted

TRT: 2:33

A girl, a phone and a gentleman caller. A young woman gets ready for a booty call.

Director: Jake Bradbury & Will Blank

Cinematographer: Jake Bradbury

Actors: Traci Doering

Super PA: Kevin

Sound design: Will Blank

Colorist: Jerimiah Morey

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