Short films are an acquired taste, but once you acquire it, they can be addictive. As showcases for up-and-coming directors, as vehicles for unconventional, daring storytelling, and as condensed nuggets of deliciously packaged cinematic technique, they’re unbeatable—and refreshing, when you’ve got a pool of untapped talent like the filmmakers featured by Etheria.
This “fantasy anthology series,” as distributors The Horror Collective describe it, collects short films directed by women that fit into the loose category of “genre” filmmaking—i.e., horror, fantasy, sci-fi, action, and exceptionally surreal or morbid comedy—and screens them through its Etheria Film Festival, which began as a movie night in Los Angeles in 2014 before evolving into an online festival (on whose jury this writer served earlier this year). The best of the best are then assembled into seasons, which premiere in the style of a season of television.
We’ve got the exclusive trailer for a fresh batch of Etheria shorts above, a collection of 11 short films as diverse as the women who made them. Etheria Season 3 has everything, from subtle sci-fi to surreal takes on the slasher genre to post-apocalyptic Westerns to the legendary James Hong as a wizard in the wonderfully titled “Genghis Khan Conquers The Moon.” Some of the shorts take an empowering stance by having women stand up to predators, while others subvert the dynamic by making the predators themselves women. At least one, Jill Gevargizian’s “The Stylist,” has already been expanded into a feature film. And while we have yet to see a feature-length version of the also delightfully titled “Hard Broads,” it does boast the fabulous tagline, “Three Women. One Corpse. Stupid Plan.”
Etheria Season 3 debuts November 25 on Amazon.