HollyShorts 2020 Review – We’ve all been there, at the mercy of a relentless infomercial. Writer-director Daniel Fissmer mines these unfathomable depths with his new short entitled From the Makers Of…. Here we watch as a  studio audience is subjected to a barrage of marketing pitches for condiments climaxing in a hedonistic act of capitalism and euphoria. Fissmer’s inspirations are apparent, yet the madness maintains its spark until the final moments.

We open on Ralph (Arlo Sanders) in a simplistic kitchen set. He is pitching a ketchup (or castup) substitute to a clamouring collection of onlookers. Surrounded by black curtains and being pumped with a firehose of product solutions, the wide-eyed assembly watching claps and cheers. But wait there’s more. Another salesman pops out of a cabinet to pitch a mustard substitute. Then still another emerges to hype a mayonaise-like product and so it goes. The joke is the increasing levels of absurdity and forced excitement and, I personally loved it. But where do you go from there? Fissmer tries his best to offer a button to the short through a fourth-wall-busting conclusion but, well, this consumer wasn’t buying it. It’s fine, but just doesn’ meet the level of surreal insanity that came before it.

Sometimes it’s about the journey more than it is the destination and here that is the case. The cast, too numerous to mention by name all meet the challenge of exuding increasing levels of hypnagogic euphoria. They start happy and when things go off the rails so do they.

For pure WTFness Fissmer‘s From the Makers Of… delivers. Part Mr. Show, Part Tim and Eric, all batsh*t.

6/10 stars

 

From the Makers Of…
RATING: UR No Trailer Available
Runtime: 22 Mins.
Directed By:
Written By:

About the Author

Norman Gidney is a nearly lifelong horror fan. Beginning his love for the scare at the age of 5 by watching John Carpenter's Halloween, he set out on a quest to share his passion for all things spooky with the rest of the world.