School / Academy

CalArts – California Institute of the Arts

  • Soup

    2025 Adults 3 min

    by Ava Azarmi

    God makes soup. The soup is (somewhat) intelligent life. Existential chaos ensues.

    • Drama
  • Orbit

    2023 All audiences 3 min

    by Michelle (MIV) Choi

    My thesis film from CalArts, which revolves around a romance between theme park co-workers whose mutual crushes put them in a constant push and pull of emotions.

    • Comedy
    • Fantasy
  • Birdsong

    2022 Adults 3 min

    by Michelle Cheng

    My second-year film at CalArts. Based on late field biologist John Sincock’s experiences in Kauai. A process video is in the works! It’s gonna take a while, but I’ll link it [here] once I’m done.

    • Drama
  • Little Dan

    2020 13+ 5 min

    by Yingdan Lai

    There is an amusement park standing beneath my heart, which fulls with excitement, happiness, leisure and mystery. It walks from irreproducible 1990s, and accompanies me through every night.

    • Drama
    • Experimental
    • Non-narrative
  • Hungry

    2019 4+ 3 min

    by Yaou Chen

    T-rex is starving in the desert and looking for food. It is a film about his adventure with meeting with other wild animals.

    • Comedy
    • Fantasy
  • Spell of the West

    2018 16+ 7 min

    by Sam Lane

    On an isolated cacti farm, three stressed out birds ask a cowgirl to help put a stop to the elusive Ax-Man.

    • Drama
    • Fantasy
    • Abstract
    • Experimental
  • Left Right Left

    2018 16+ 4 min

    by Louise Pau

    The film is about the process of unlearning, an act to detach from a system which has formed the basis of the one’s reality for so long. The director, though right-handed, engages both of her hands in the production of this animated film. The learned hand and the other sets out to capture the rhythms of traditional schooling, and in the process breaks free from it. It is a return to the corporeal, to carefully consider each motion in time and its consequence.

    • Experimental
    • Non-narrative
  • Hedge

    2018 Adults 6 min

    by Amanda Bonaiuto

    A family visits a funeral home.

    • Drama
    • Experimental
  • Winston

    2017 Adults 6 min

    by Aram Sarkisian

    Through series of letters written to his younger brother Marcus, we get inside the mind of a man (Winston), who slowly falls into his own hell, by his own means.

    • Drama
    • Tragedy
    • Experimental
  • The Northeast Kingdom

    2017 16+ 8 min

    by Alan Jennings

    A small tight knit New England community is shaken by the arrival of a newcomer. Meanwhile, a mystical creature quietly affects the lives of the locals.

    • Drama
    • Comedy
    • Tragicomedy
    • Abstract
    • Experimental
  • Nueva Vida

    2017 Adults 7 min

    by Jonathan Seligson

    A ball, some brains, and a lot of fluids trigger a black comedy of sickness and mania in this true story as told by Kenneth Seligson.

    • Drama
    • Documentary
    • Tragicomedy
    • Experimental
  • by Annapurna Kumar

    Small pieces of information can be stored separately within a shared container. The most efficient containers can house multiple pieces of information in the same location, intersecting from different angles.

    • Experimental
    • Non-narrative
  • Heart Chakra

    2017 16+ 7 min

    by Angela Stempel

    Mae’s life is routinely disrupted by the advice from her online crystal healer and her devotion to horoscopes. Armed with healing crystals and numerology, Mae is ready to follow the predictions on an unexpected path to find her soulmate.

    • Comedy
    • Fantasy
    • Romance
    • Experimental
  • Burn Out

    2017 13+ 4 min

    by Cécile Carre

    Stella, a space mechanic, has crashed on a desert planet. While she is in despair, a little girl appears out of nowhere. Following the child into a tunnel, into the depths of the planet, she discovers a big cave full of objects that belonged to her, reminding her of the dreams she has left behind.

    • Drama
    • Coming-of-Age
    • Sci-Fi
    • Adventure
  • Batfish Soup

    2017 Adults 5 min

    by Amanda Bonaiuto

    Wacky relatives give way to mounting tensions with broken dolls, boiling stew and a bang.

    • Drama
    • Experimental
    • Tragicomedy
  • Utilities Included

    2016 Adults 3 min

    by Noah Malone

    A loaded dishwasher and a clean conscience. – Noah Malone

    • Comedy
    • Experimental
    • Tragicomedy
  • Roommates

    2016 Adults 3 min

    by Jamie Wolfe

    Roommates is the chronicle of four city dwellers pushed to the breaking point. On a day hot enough to liquidise an orange twinsicle, the inhabitants of apartment 6B bash their heads on the kitchen table and tie their necks in knots, driven psychotic by the heat.

    • Experimental
    • Comedy
  • Lazy Daze

    2016 16+ 4 min

    by Brian Smee

    Dog in the land where the good life takes you. – Brian Smee

    • Experimental
    • Non-narrative
  • It’s a Date

    2016 16+ 7 min

    by Zachary Zezima

    Everyone is an alien at first.

    • Drama
    • Coming-of-Age
    • Romance
    • Experimental
  • Boulder Ranch

    2016 Adults 2 min

    by Kevin Eskew

    He thinks, “My capacities are better than my wildest fantasies.”