Waddle On
2017 · 7m · USA
Directed by Zachary Loren Jones, Ben Kitnick
Genres: comedy, documentary
Tones: contemplative, humorous, melancholic
A documentary short capturing the final weeks of Club Penguin — the Disney-owned children's social network — before its shutdown on March 29, 2017; the filmmakers play as their penguin character 'WowItsDan235,' documenting the community's genuine grief before cutting to a real-world scene of processing loss in a Target.
Picked by Felix
The scouts
Club Penguin closes. Two filmmakers play their penguin one last time and document the grief of an entire community of cartoon animals preparing to die. Then one of them goes to a Target. I cried a little. I don't want to talk about it.
Documenting the final weeks of Club Penguin with earnest mourning, the filmmakers playing as their penguin character WowItsDan235 before cutting to grief in a Target — treating virtual-world loss as worthy of natural-disaster register is the move only the sincere can land.
Documenting the final weeks of Club Penguin as genuine virtual-world mourning, then cutting to a real-world Target scene of processing the loss. Treating cartoon-penguin grief with earnestness is the trick — and the page sells that it earns it.
Festivals
- Film Festival Cologne 2017