Bliss
2024 · 28m · USA
Directed by Dwight Mathis II
Tones: dark, provocative, tense
A mysterious woman suddenly appears on every phone in the world delivering a cryptic message that holds the key to humanity's destiny. Four close friends grapple with the reality of this worldwide phenomenon that threatens to separate and abduct them.
Picked by Margot
The scouts
Mystery woman commandeers every phone on Earth and only the chosen can hear her — a Twilight Zone logline padded out to twenty-eight minutes on a micro budget. I bailed in my head at minute four.
Global-broadcast-only-chosen-can-see is The Signal territory and the micro-budget intimate-friendship pivot is a sensible move, but twenty-eight minutes of mystery-broadcast is a tall order. Earnest if familiar.
Global phone broadcast that only certain viewers can comprehend is a clean sci-fi conceit on micro-budget, and 28 min lets the friend-group dynamics breathe. Without seeing the cuts and sound design, I can't gauge how the abduction tension actually lands.