Aftermath/Genesis

[Nobody]

The Awakening was Nacho Cerda's first short film that he did in black and white. It's about the death of kid in school and how he doesn't realize he is dead at first. It was a great short film. Like another reviewer said, "Nacho Cerda did with The Awakening in 6 minutes what The Sixth Sense took 2 hours to do."

Aftermath is the next short film that is around 30 minutes long. The film is about a coroner who is working on bodies, but when he comes to his last, a young woman, his work takes a turn into somthing more dark and sinister. The film is the next step in his death films, and shows the audience that once you die nothing is over yet. Your body is sliced, mutilated, and has its organs taken out and stuffed back in. You have no control over it. Only the person doing it will determine how much your body will suffer after death. Aftermath is a truely disturbing film and contains the best special effects I have ever seen. The film is beatifully shot on 35mm with a great musical score that sharply contrasts the nastiness of the film.

Genesis is the last in the series and is also around 30 minutes long. It is about a sculptor coping with the loss of his girlfriend/wife by making a statue of her. But as he continues to work on the statue it slowly turns to flesh while he turns to stone. While maintaining the special effects of Aftermath, Genesis is not near as graphic. This film is more of a story of how death effects the people left behind. It is a pretty sad film, and as with the other two there is no dialogue. The film relies heavily on the emotion and facial expressions of the main character. I think it is my favorite film out of all of them.

All three shorts are great films and are highly recommended. See them as soon as possible. Whether your looking for gore or for a great story or for great filmmaking, you won't be dissapointed with these films or the great DVD that Unearthed has put out.

Score: 10/10

Review by Lust del Carrion

[HNT]

I just got this one from Netflix yesterday. Gonna watch it tomorrow I think

[Nobody]

Sweet. You will be surprised by how good these films are.

[HNT]

Im think that Awakening was really pretty good considering it was just a student film. The symbolism was a bit heavy handed,and it suffered from your usual film student pretentiousness, but Cerda's talent was quite evident even at this early juncture.

Though it is the most notorious of the three shorts (and likely the only reason that this DVD has a commercial release) I can't really say that I cared for this film at all. Sure the special effects were good, but the film itself was very shallow in scope and depth. Frankly,it had absolutely nothing to say, and accomplixshed nothing but the presentation of a few shockng images. I consider this film to be sub par in every respect except for the SFX, which are worthy of some mild praise.

The third film, Genesis, is terrific. Frankly, after the dissapointment of Aftermath I was genuinely surprised to see such a mature and emotionally challenging piece of work as this. As LDC correctly pointed out, this film deals with the effect death has on the living. Addiitonally, however, there are some astute observations about the nature of art, and the toll that bringing an artistic creation to metaphorical life can exact upon the real life of the artist. The pain and loss in this film are palpable, and it is quite moving.

Overall, I'd have to say that this DVD is worth viewing for GEnesis alone. I doubt that I will ever watch Awakening or Aftermath again, but Genesis belongs in my collection

[Conan]

I really want to watch this.

[Nobody]

You should. Genesis is a great film. Aftermath is too and has more to say if you can see past it being just shocking. Not to mention Aftermath and Genesis are both so well filmed it is unbelievable. Cerda is now a favorite of mine just from those films. Hopefully The Abandoned will be good too.

[HNT]

So what is it that you felt Aftermath had to say beyond jsut presenting shocking imagery. I get the point in that the body itself is viewed as sacrosanct by us, but that in reality it is just meat and can be manipulated however we desire. I also see the heavy handed and obvious statement made by the difference of treatmetn toward the two male corpses and the female corpse. All of this is fairly routine stuff though, IMHO, so I am curious as to how exactly Cerda illucidated or addressed anything of significance in this film. As I said, the technical aspects of the film wre solid. I just don't think that there was much beyond the visual with Aftermath

[Nobody]

Yea you pretty much got it about the body being sacred and how people just shove us around after we are dead. I think you should re-watch it though because it seems like you didn't get to appreciate just how well filmed it was.

[HNT]

Yeah, maybe I will rewatch it at some point. I am gonna own it, because I'm gonna have to buy this DVD to have Genesis for sure

[Nobody]

Yea Genesis is now my favorite horror film, even though it really can't be defined as a horror film.

[HNT]

It is very good. Like I said, I was pretty disapointed in Aftermath, so I almost decided to go to bed instead of watching Genesis. I'm sure glad I decided to give it a shot

[Nobody]

Yea, I wasn't dissapointed in Aftermath at all. I guess when I view films I tend to look at how they are filmed also and the different angles the director shoots, because thats what I wanna do when I get out of High School and stuff. So I reall loved how it was shot and the whole atmosphere and how the whole film and a cold blue metallic tint to it. I loved Genesis more though.

[HNT]

inf3ct said:

Yea, So I reall loved how it was shot and the whole atmosphere and how the whole film and a cold blue metallic tint to it.

Good point. I hadn't really paid much attention to that, but you ae definitely right

[Nobody]

And Pep Tosar is such a great actor. Do you realize he had to let everything fall on him and only use his eyes and stuff. I mean there isn't much to show, but he really gets the point across that he is perverted and evil before even starts mutilating that female corpse. You know Pep Tosar that played the autopsy guy was the same actor in Genesis.

[HNT]

I didn't know that. I can't really say that Aftermath required a great performance. I guess I really believed taht he was going to screw that corpse, so it was an acceptably convincing performance, lol. Didn't you find the fnal schene in his apartment to be a littel off compared to the tone of the rest of the film, though? It seemed almost as if it was played for laughs which didn't really fit with teh rest of the film