What is a Short Film?

A short film is essentially a film that is not long enough to be considered feature-length.


The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences states that a short film is "an original motion picture that has a running time of 40 minutes or less, including all credits." Many short films are about 10 minutes long.

A lot of short films are a lot more "arthouse" compared to what is shown all the time at the cinema. The smaller budget of short films is possibly why not many thriller/action short films are made, but more comic or more of a speciality type of film, aimed at specifc audience members.

One of the most well known producers of short films (in particular of this era) is those created by Pixar Animations. During the theatrical runs of their feature-length films, they would screen a short film as well. These proved to be extremely popular and were later released on a compilation DVD.

One of my favourite short films is called Harvie Krumpet. It is an animation by the director Adam Elliot (who created one of my favourite films Mary & Max). All of Elliot's films are done using grey plasticine and he calls them "Clayography" - clay animated biographies.

He uses the traditional "in camera" technique, in that all the props within the scene are handcrafted miniture objects. His longest short film, Harvie Krumpet runs for 22 minutes and was narrated by Geoffrey Rush. It won Elliot his first Academy Award for Best Short Animation. It was played at over 100 film festivals all over the world.

Elliot has 3 other shorts called; Uncle, Cousin and Brother. Like Harvie Krumpet, they are "clayographies" and tell biographical stories of the character. Each of his films revolve around a bittersweet nature to them, as they all feature characters that have some sort of disability. For example, Harvie Krumpet has Tourettes Syndrome and the cousin in Cousin had cerebral palsy.