Isabel Peppard

A tale of friendship between two unlikely pen pals: Mary, a lonely, eight-year-old girl living in the suburbs of Melbourne, and Max, a forty-four-year old, severely obese man living in New York.

A lonely house-wife’s plan to end it all takes an unexpected turn when her last hurrah begins a radical journey of sexual exploration and personal re-invention.

When Clara discovers her deceased mother’s revered ‘Book of Dark Whispers’, she can’t stop reading the strange stories within its mystical pages. Each weird tale reveals a new facet of the twisted human psyche… or the not-so-human, as the case may be. From the horror of grief to sharehouse living disaster, from existential dread to right-swiping vampires, there’s something for all tastes; as long as those tastes are twisted!

The lyrical and monstrous are interwoven in Gloomy Valentine, a stop motion, animated short film that tells the story of Gloomy, a woman struggling to overcome the sadness of a broken heart. Aesthetically influenced by gothic surrealism, Gloomy is haunted by memory and is ultimately consumed by nightmarish shadows.

A young artist sits on the sidewalk, struggling to make a living. She makes drawings for the passersby. A businessman recognises her talents and offers her a paying job. The prospect seems inviting but the reality threatens to kill her imagination.