Motion for Pictures Screening Series

×

Expand

Photo courtesy of the filmmaker

Caitlin Wells in Gill

There’s plenty to catch your eye at this showcase of local and international shorts, but we’re especially interested in Gill, a new film by Kieran Moreira. The sci-fi short stars Caitlin Wells, who left Durham for New York City a year or two ago but is well-remembered in the area for her stage work as a director (Yes to Nothing) and an actor (Orlando). It begins like a simple adventure, with Wells’s astronaut character testing out a teleportation device on an irradiated desert planet. But something more contemporary and socially charged soon emerges in her communication with the man at the other end of her headset. We got an early look, and the film shines with strong production values, satire and suspense, and a typically charismatic performance from Wells. Seven other shorts round out the evening, leaping from sci-fi to drama to romance to thriller with the free-spirited energy typical of independent cinema. —Brian Howe