Benny
2026 · 14m
Directed by Andy Ayer
Genres: drama, fantasy, mystery
Tones: contemplative, melancholic, surreal
A widow who lives alone maintains a daily routine of making tea and conversation for Benny, a mysterious presence in her home. When a visitor finally sees what she sees, the line between companionship, grief and delusion begins to dissolve.
Picked by Zoe
The scouts
Everyone's going to read this as a precious grief parable, but Ayer's actually playing something weirder—the film refuses to arbitrate reality, which means it refuses the comfort of a verdict, and that's genuinely unsettling in a way most 'haunted' shorts aren't.
The tea ritual recalls Bresson's economy of gesture, and the compositional restraint keeps us locked in ambiguity without ever feeling like the film is hiding behind it—this is formally deliberate in the way that rewards a second viewing.
The decision to keep Benny completely off-screen until that final moment of witness shifts the entire weight onto the widow's performance and the sound design of absence; it's a constraint that transforms what could've been maudlin into something genuinely uncanny.