7 minute coming of age short invokes peak Tim Burton
Filling time in between screenings at The Chattanooga Film Festival, I dug into their short offerings. By happenstance the one title that caught my eye was whimsically gory coming of age story Every Time We Meet For Ice Cream Your Whole Fucking Face Explodes (Based on the bizarro novella of the same name by Carlton Mellick III), which was paired by a wholesome, pastel colored poster featuring a young girl with an ice cream cone.
Given the contrast of title versus poster, I hoped for the best and I clicked to watch the 7 minute short. I was immediately impressed by the film’s production design here which is simply immaculate, as the film transpires in a pastel colored world and is the story of a young boy (Logan Schuneman) who falls in love with a girl (Arden Michalec) who is branded as the local high school freak. The film gives us just enough exposition on the unnamed girl, whose face is held together by rainbow colored stitches and is possibly a half alien, who is experimented on by her mad scientist father; so there might be some truth to that. The film casually puts that world building in the viewer’s ear, as not to distract from the courtship at the center of the bite-size narrative.
It’s after asking her to be his girlfriend proper that the pair have their first date at the Galaxy Drive-in, where you guessed it, she has ice cream and her face literally explodes, when she becomes excited when he touches her hand. The film uses a mix of CGI and practical here to great effect as its done for more comedic effect, rather than gross out. But that fits the whole soft aesthetic of the flick that is at its heart a super charming story of two outsiders who find solace in each other’s company. The leads here are both sublime, and just are so fun to watch. Also by encapsulating the story and not pulling the scope of the story too wide, director Anthony Cousins really delivers what is easily one of the best shorts I’ve seen. It’s very reminiscent of pre-Sleepy Hollow peak Tim Burton in the best possible way. Face delivers an emotionally engaging and entertaining glimpse of a story and a world that leaves the viewer wanting more, while not overstaying its welcome.
