And Then! He Kissed Me
2021 · 14m
Directed by Aaron Cohen
Genres: comedy, horror, thriller
Tones: absurdist, darkly comic, surreal
The inner turmoil of a first date explodes into genre-hopping comedy — psychological thriller, body horror and slasher tropes collide in one surreal romantic evening.
Picked by Felix
The scouts
Finally—a first-date film that treats psychological collapse like a playground instead of a punchline, genre-shifting so hard it becomes its own thing. This is exactly the kind of "wait, WHAT?" premise everyone else walks past because it sounds too weird to land, and Cohen absolutely nails it.
Cohen understands the architectural scaffolding of genre—how to stack thriller, body horror, and comedy into a coherent formal structure that respects each tradition while dismantling it. The editing alone shows a filmmaker conscious of pacing within constraint.
The choice to literalize internal monologue through genre rupture—to let tone *become* the character's panic rather than just represent it—is what transforms a high-concept joke into something that actually works at 14 minutes and 0 dollars.
Reviews
Cohen uses genre and comedy to recreate the inner turmoil of this very relatable moment, playing with the tropes of both to deliver an entertaining and oddly emotionally accurate film that might not be for those faint of heart.
And Then! He Kissed Me proves that Aaron Cohen knows how to use genre to cleverly enhance his narrative and give it a fresh twist. His ability to successfully juggle a coming-of-age narrative, through a lens that combines horror and comedy, means we're already impatiently awaiting his next project.