Stars

2005 • 10:27 min
English

‘STARS’ is an experimental animated short film which spans six months in the lives of partners Brian and Sophie. Sophie is told that she has contracted a rare fatal neuron disease which invades her central nervous system and has certain side-effects including synaesthetic episodes: a rare condition in which the brain confuses signals coming from one’s senses. As her condition deteriorates she experiences sensory hallucinations, which illustrate sound as vision, taste as touch etc. Sophie begins to deal with her fate by feeling that there’s no one in the world except herself and Brian. She breaks social and moral laws (slaps strangers in supermarkets) and experiments with human relationships (films herself and Brain making love). As the months pass, Sophie’s hallucinations become more frequent and invade her everyday life, giving her new perspectives on how to deal with the world that’s slipping away from her. This leads to Sophie becoming more estranged from her family and becoming indifferent to her partner. Her relationship with the people she loves and the world around her become solely illustrated by her confused sensory perception until she cannot distinguish the difference between life and death. Brian refuses to leave her side and becomes the sole person recognisable in her world, and she slips away aware only of what they felt for each other in her final days.

Director Eoghan Kidney
Production Delicious 9
Screenplay Eoghan Kidney
Animation Delicious 9
Sound Paul Morrin
Music Somadrone
Cast Ruth Negga, Domhnall Gleeson

My more recent work is more live action based: vimeo.com/1264493