“A Good Long Cry” (shorts program)
Tuesday, June 23, 2026, 3:00 PM, Vogue Theatre
- 🤩 Shutterspeed, dir. Jasper de Maeseneer, 2025, Belgium, 25 min., in Dutch and Flemish with subtitles
- 😁 Big Boys Don’t Cry, dir. Arnaud Delmarle, 2025, France, 24 min., in French with subtitles 🇺🇸 U.S. premiere
- 😁 Taxi Moto, dir. Gaël Kamilindi, 2026, Switzerland/France/Rwanda, 21 min., in French with subtitles 🌊 West Coast premiere
- 🙂 Three Times Mina (3XMina), dir. Nans Laborde-Jourdàa, 2025, France, 27 min., in French with subtitles 🇺🇸 U.S. premiere
(The films may screen in a different order than shown here,)
🤩 Shutterspeed, dir. Jasper de Maeseneer, 2025, Belgium, 25 min., in Dutch and Flemish with subtitles
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| Shutterspeed: Lou Goossens |
Frameline blurb: Fifteen-year-old Cas (an amazing Lou Goossens, Young Hearts, Frameline48) poses for his school’s trainee teacher and amateur photographer Jard. When he becomes painfully aware of the power imbalance between them, he seeks to reverse their dynamic.
Lou Goossens was astonishing in Young Hearts, capturing the joy and anguish of first love and of recognizing what it means to be in love with another boy. In Shutterspeed, we see a darker side of the depth of emotion Goossens can portray, in another excellent performance, as he goes from smitten with his crush to devastated to find that things are not as he believed. Any film with Lou Goossens is automatically a must see, but this one earns it honestly.
As for the future, I’ve seen interview clips with Goossens, and he speaks impeccable English (and French!), so maybe one of these days we’ll see him in something where we don’t need subtitles. That would be especially nice because my one knock against this film is that the subtitles have insufficient contrast, often placing white text on a nearly white background. (Please, folks, yellow text with a black outline!)
😁 Big Boys Don’t Cry, dir. Arnaud Delmarle, 2025, France, 24 min., in French with subtitles 🇺🇸 U.S. premiere
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| Big Boys Don’t Cry |
Frameline blurb: A scorching summer in a small village near Marseille. After a three-year absence, Lucas and his group of friends welcome back their best friend Hicham. This eagerly-awaited return quickly arouses conflicting emotions in the gang, but above all, new hopes in Lucas. Big Boys Don't Cry was nominated for a César (France's equivalent to the Oscars) for Best Fiction Short Film.
Lucas doesn’t know how to read Hicham, who left to join the military and hasn’t been back in three years, but comes back for a wedding. Hicham seems happy to see Lucas, though perhaps not as happy as Lucas is to see him. Lucas proposes that Hicham train him so that he, too, can join the military and they can be crewmates on a long mission at sea, but Hicham is cool to the idea.
I didn’t feel like I fully understood the context of the story, but the tension between Lucas and Hicham, and Lucas’ trepidation about showing his true feelings, are palpable. Highly recommended.
😁 Taxi Moto, dir. Gaël Kamilindi, 2026, Switzerland/France/Rwanda, 21 min., in French with subtitles 🌊 West Coast premiere
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| Taxi Moto |
Frameline blurb: A filmmaker sees the shooting of his film cancelled and begins looking for what remains of it, elsewhere, with another actor. What they explore together is no longer just a film, but a reflection on the stories that are silenced and the ones people take back for themselves. Through their conversations, the boundary between cinema and life dissolves, and the film becomes a space of intimate resistance, where thinking, desiring, and speaking become one and the same gesture. Winner of the Teddy Award for Best Short at the Berlinale.
Certainly an element of “meta” — a film about making a film — but some real insights into oppression and censorship from the outside and their internalized counterparts. Highly recommended.
🙂 Three Times Mina (3 X Mina), dir. Nans Laborde-Jourdàa, 2025, France, 27 min., in French and Spanish with subtitles 🇺🇸 U.S. premiere
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| 3 X Mina |
Frameline blurb: Mina is in Cannes to perform for three nights during the Festival. She drifts from glittery clubs to hotel rooms, from lovers' arms to those of friends. There's Mina the performer, Mina the lover but also Mina the Italian singer from the '70s, whom she evokes on stage every night.
This short is basically a snapshot of the life of a lip sync performer, but with very little context to draw you in. The Frameline blurb says that the main character “drifts,” which is right on point, and it doesn’t make for a very engaging half hour. We’re watching a stranger interacting with strangers. It’s nice enough, and it was interesting to hear French spoken with a Spanish accent, so I’ll rate it Recommended.
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