Pediculosis
2025 · 3m · España
Directed by Catxo López
Genres: experimental, satire
Tones: absurdist, provocative
Framed as a test rather than a short film, it asks whether your husband knows what pediculosis is — even though you certainly do.
Picked by Felix
The scouts
A three-minute trap disguised as a knowledge quiz—it's deliberately antagonistic in the best way, using medical terminology as a Trojan horse to expose the gap between assumed intimacy and actual attention. This is the kind of premise that makes you uncomfortable and then furious you didn't think of it first.
López deploys the test-format as a formal constraint that echoes conceptual art precedents, though the satire feels somewhat blunt in its execution; the framing device is clever enough to warrant discussion, but it doesn't quite achieve the rigor of truly considered experimental work.
The reversal—that the woman knows the medical term and the man doesn't—hinges entirely on one casting or performance choice that could either land as biting or land as obvious; if López committed fully to the discomfort of that asymmetry in the delivery, this becomes something sharp.