"A lament by Mikaela Bellamy"
A vent in the form of an experimental short film, Lip Balm is about finding ways to cope with what can feel like the lowest moments of one's life.
Social & External
The people behind it
Mikaela Bellamy
A young boy must relearn piano in order to rekindle the broken relationship between him and his mother.
In the darkness of a gothic night, two knights engage in a deadly duel, illuminated only by the mysterious light of a lantern. A noble lady, confined in a castle, has woven a mysterious connection with the contenders. Supernatural forces and inexplicable events will determine the fate of the duelists in a night of horror.
A spate of robberies in Southern California schools had an oddly specific target: tubas. In this work of creative nonfiction, d/Deaf first-time feature director Alison O’Daniel presents the impact of these crimes from an unexpected angle. The film unfolds mimicking a game of telephone, where sound’s feeble transmissibility is proven as the story bends and weaves to human interpretation and miscommunication. The result is a stunning contribution to cinematic language. O’Daniel has developed a syntax of deafness that offers a complex, overlaid, surprising new texture, which offers a dimensional experience of deafness and reorients the audience auditorily in an unfamiliar and exhilarating way.
During Thanksgiving week, two college friends interview a group of students who have seen the ghost of a deceased father.
An omnibus film based on Kim Oki's album Hip Hop Retreat. Twenty characters share the same table at different times, in different emotional states, each with their own story. Shot in one day, edited in one day.
Why wouldn't you? Is there any reason not to? We've got so much at our disposal, so, why don't you? Won't you tell me? Won't you please tell me? To have you down is simply unacceptable. Just look at this; or this; at all these hallmarks to guide you and convey to you the prime ways to feel lovely. Just follow them and you'll be set. So, I ask you again... Don't you feel lovely today?
Angelico and Raphael, childhood friends, reunite in the clan during their Cocoon period. They also meet Diego, Emile, and Julio, who are upperclassmen, and develop a friendly relationship, but their friendship is shattered by an incident. The “Dark of the Moon” version depicts the boys’ fleeting youth and their breakdown.
A group of college students go into the deep woods of the most haunted town in America to better understand fear... and they found it.
Shot in a series of long-takes over several days, the film follows a flower shop attendant (played by Devereaux, then actually employed at a small flower shop by the beach) in fragmented detail. The order of scenes resists chronology: moments recur, shift, or vanish, creating not the passage of a single day but the jumble of many, refracted into a meditation on routine and its quiet abstractions.
This is an amateur student mood piece comprised of footage I've filmed with my Camcorder at uni over the course of the first half of 2023. The prompt given for this was 'belonging' and so I've gravitated it around the premise of navigating a place that you feel as though you don't belong in, to the point where you become detached and alienated from your own identity. - Toby.
A disturbed loner suffering from insomnia goes through a series of bad luck and becomes detached from reality. As he falls asleep his nightmares seem to become reality.
A chronicle of the lives of a couple and the gradual dissolution of their relationship.
Bela, a woman with the desire to get married, seeks to sell the criature that she has been taking care of for years as a son in order to get money for her wedding; whatever the cost.
A man trapped in an aimless routine becomes the spectator of his own life as he wanders through the urban landscapes of his city in search of something that gives him meaning. Between memories and ghosts, he faces his doubts and longings, questioning what is real and what is just a projection of his loneliness.
A 2013 production of the original unfilmed TRUMP stage play from 2009, performed by the acting group D2. A blood feast that spans 7,500 years for vampires who have lost their immortality─ The “Clan” school has been established to educate and correct young vampires who have entered “the Cocoon period” (puberty in human terms). Sophie, a dhampir of mixed human and vamp blood, is hated by those around him for being “filthy”. Ul, who was born into one of the most prestigious families in the vamp world, is somehow attracted to the abominable Sophie. As Ul continues to research the “power of immortality” that vampires once possessed, he learns of the existence of TRUMP, the original vampire that is said to live forever, and begins to crave eternal life. Eventually, Sophie and Ul become entangled in the deep fate surrounding the legend of immortality. The young vampires are trifled with by the legend of the immortal “TRUMP”, in this ephemeral yet beautiful vampire entertainment.
History as immersion and dispersion in the fragments of the past, a visionary journey accompanied by the voice of Patty Pravo. Presented at the Taormina Festival '97.
Experimental short film
After an intruder infiltrates her apartment, Allie must deal with the remnants of painful memories that she refuses to accept.
A loop of a guy in Maine hanging out in his room.
20 men are chosen to participate in the roles of guards and prisoners in a psychological study that ultimately spirals out of control.
Clinging to a smooth, curved surface high above a sentient abyss, a woman tries to cover the few feet back to safety without losing purchase and falling to her death.
A grieving couple retreats to their cabin 'Eden' in the woods, hoping to repair their broken hearts and troubled marriage. But nature takes its course and things go from bad to worse.
When troubled teen Milo, who has a fascination with vampire lore, meets the equally alienated Sophie, the two form a bond that begins to blur Milo's fantasy into reality.
To escape neglect and abuse from his parents, a young boy plants some strange seeds and they grow into a grandmother.
When seventeen-year-old Hannah stumbles upon a website about Thinspiration--an online community devoted to anorexia as a life choice--she becomes an obsessive follower of the site founder, ButterflyAna. By the time Hannah's family realizes what is happening and get Hannah the help she needs, the disease has fully taken hold and Hannah is refusing to eat. Will this family be able to exorcise the demon of anorexia from their lives?
Four siblings' lives change drastically when their ailing mother takes a turn for the worse over the holiday season.
A college student moonlighting as a chauffeur picks up two mysterious women for a night of party-hopping across LA. But when he uncovers their bloodthirsty intentions—and their dangerous, shadowy underworld—he must fight to stay alive.
As the president of a trashy TV channel, Max Renn is desperate for new programming to attract viewers. When he happens upon "Videodrome," a TV show dedicated to gratuitous torture and punishment, Max sees a potential hit and broadcasts the show on his channel. However, after his girlfriend auditions for the show and never returns, Max investigates the truth behind Videodrome and discovers that the graphic violence may not be as fake as he thought.
Conman Robert Freegard poses as an undercover MI5 agent and kidnaps countless victims amidst a high-stakes manhunt, until the woman who fell for him brings him to justice.
On the outside, Helen has it all – a loving family and a successful career – but when her suppressed mental illness resurfaces, the world crumbles around her. Crippled by depression, Helen finds solace through her friendship with Mathilda, a kindred spirit struggling with bipolar disorder.
A group of high school outcasts get revenge on the students that torment them.
In late-90s suburbia, a lonely teenager meets a girl at school who introduces him to a mysterious late-night T.V. show — a vision of a supernatural world pulsing beneath their own. As time goes on, however, questions begin to arise about why the show sometimes seems more real than their own lives. In the pale glow of the television, their view of reality begins to crack.
A troubled young woman becomes obsessed with her mysterious new neighbor, who bears a striking resemblance to the girl's dead mother.
A young woman seeking self-improvement enlists the help of a renowned hypnotist but, after a handful of intense sessions, discovers unexpected and deadly consequences.
Twelve strangers wake up in a clearing. They don't know where they are—or how they got there. In the shadow of a dark internet conspiracy theory, ruthless elitists gather at a remote location to hunt humans for sport. But their master plan is about to be derailed when one of the hunted turns the tables on her pursuers.
A man and woman are drawn together, entangled in the lifecycle of an ageless organism. Identity becomes an illusion as they struggle to assemble the loose fragments of wrecked lives.
After fleeing his psychotic father, a young teen and his mom seek refuge in a remote farmhouse, only to face a pack of ferocious dogs and the sinister spirits that haunt the property.
A computer hacker's goal to discover the reason for human existence continually finds his work interrupted thanks to the Management; this time, they send a teenager and lusty love interest to distract him.
When a change of circumstances leaves Miriam unable to pay her college tuition, she makes a surprising decision: to start performing in adult films, using the pseudonym Belle Knox. Miriam lies to her family and her friends at school, keeping her double life a secret. But soon rumours spread and Miriam becomes the subject of vicious online attacks and unwanted attention. Miriam fights back: she talks to the media, saying her new line of work empowers her as a feminist. But her confident stand has unintended consequences. Miriam is shunned by her conservative family and her colleagues in the adult film world. One impulsive decision has quickly spiralled out of control - and Miriam's problems are just beginning.