Would You Like To Try Again?
2019 · 10m · USA
Directed by Michael Felker
Tones: contemplative, melancholic, tender
A teenager who has run away from home stumbles on an arcade machine that lets her replay her deepest regret. Each new credit asks her whether she'd really make a different choice.
Picked by Zoe
The scouts
The arcade-cabinet-as-regret-engine is clever enough, but it leans too hard into earnestness; the premise wants to subvert the 'try again' myth and mostly just validates it instead of actually breaking it open.
Felker understands the lineage he's working in—the sci-fi thought experiment, the melancholic tone poem—and executes with formal discipline, though the conceit sits a touch too neatly within its own frame.
The genius move is treating each credit not as a reset but as a confession; the way the film lets silence and the *physical* act of inserting coins do the psychological work means every detail—the cabinet's worn edges, the teenager's hesitation—becomes the whole story.
Reviews
He presents a little Twilight Zone story with a sweet and hopeful ending... with the moral of doing right for others, rather than selfishly taking the easy way out.
A clever short sci-fi film that you think you know where it's going before it surprises you with an emotional curveball.
Festivals
- Dances With Films 2019