Martin Starr, subject of The A.V. Club’s most recent Random Roles, is in Hell. As the titular character in the Vice short film Leonard In Slow Motion, Starr is forever stuck in slow motion while the world around him moves at regular speed. While the handicap does make him look cool and/or like the end of a Wes Anderson film, it creates problems that make him terrible at his office job, annoying to his friends, and constantly missing out on talking to his crush (Beth Dover).
In just nine minutes, writer/director Peter Livolsi brings Leonard’s problems to light and shows the ups and downs of forever being out-of-synch. Meanwhile, Starr brings a real lived-in, sad appeal to Leonard in this entertaining short that finds people mostly just bored by his freak abilities. In real life, most people would probably just force him to re-enact the opening titles to Reservoir Dogs, but maybe that’s implied.