A Key for the Kid
2020 · 10m · USA
Directed by Thea Lorentzen
Genres: animation, experimental, sci-fi
Tones: contemplative, mythic, surreal
Set in 2100, a mother in a blue dress combs a forest for a hidden red key that will free her son. Built entirely from still photographs animated into kinetic motion.
Picked by Felix
The scouts
La Jetée nodded at out of stills, then dropped into a dystopian forest scavenger hunt. Lorentzen refuses to explain the mother's motives and that's exactly the move.
Thea Lorentzen builds an entire 2100 dystopia out of still photographs flipbooked into motion — La Jetée in the lineage, but with Jodie Mack's tactility. Lovely structural piece.
An entire film constructed from still photographs flipbooked into motion, set in a deliberately opaque dystopian 2100 — that's a hard formal commitment and a real craft statement if it sustains.
Reviews
A kinetic experimental film made entirely from still photographs — a small marvel in abstract ingenuity, an utterly unique piece of video art overflowing with vivid texture.