Quiet Carriage
2019 · 5m · UK
Directed by Ben S. Hyland
Genres: comedy
Tones: absurdist, humorous, whimsical
A passive commuter named Derek agonizes over whether to confront an obnoxious woman loudly chatting on her phone in the quiet carriage of a train, his overactive imagination spiraling through increasingly absurd scenarios of what might happen if he speaks up.
Picked by Zoe
The scouts
Five-minute commuter-confrontation fantasy spiral — perfectly scaled to its premise, no pretensions, just a tight bit. I'd watch this twice before I finished any of the grief-astronaut films above.
A Walter Mitty for the British rail commuter — externalizing confrontation-anxiety into escalating fantasy is reliable comic territory, and Short of the Week curation suggests it lands the gag. Modest but well-tuned.
Five minutes of escalating fantasy scenarios externalizing commuter anxiety is a clean premise with a built-in comic engine — Short of the Week distribution suggests the execution justifies the concept. Universal anxiety + visual escalation is a reliable short-film recipe.
Reviews
Hyland takes the initial fun premise and pushes it to the next level by subverting the audience's expectations and rapidly escalating the predicament in a witty and delightful way.
A very basic concept making fun of the madness of the daily commute turned into an amusing short.
Festivals
- The People's Film Festival 2020, Audience Award
- The People's Film Festival 2020, Best Performance in a Comedy (Amit Shah)
- Aspen ShortsFest
- Encounters Film Festival
- LA Shorts International Film Festival
- Aesthetica Short Film Festival
- LOCO London Comedy Film Festival
- Norwich Film Festival 2019
- London Short Film Festival
- Rhode Island International Film Festival