ESCAPE ATTEMPT
A desperate man tries to make his way to an uninhabited planet with the help of a young and idealistic couple. In their Fantasia 2024 short ESCAPE ATTEMPT, directors Daniel Shapiro and Alex Topaller take audiences on a journey across time, space, and humanity. Based on a novella of the same name by the Strugatsky Brothers, this dazzling twenty-nine minutes of storytelling hits harder than you might expect. Performances are outstanding across the board. Without spoiling the impact of this explosive narrative, I can easily say that it is a visually exciting and thoroughly engaging dive into the metaphor for the cyclical nature of history—the cliche warning about what happens when we don’t learn from our past. I highly recommend seeking out this short. I imagine it is only the beginning for Shapiro and Topaller.
Daniel Shapiro and Alex Topaller, founders of the Aggressive design studio, deliver the US/Polish co-production ESCAPE ATTEMPT based on the Strugatsky Brothers’s novella of the same name.
OFFICIAL SELECTION
Sitges International Fantastic Film Festival of Catalonia 2023
FilmQuest 2023
Landshut Short Film Festival 2024
Haapsalu Horror and Fantasy Film Festival 2024
HONORS
Grand Prize – FilmQuest 2023
Best Sci-Fi Short – FilmQuest 2023
Navigator Award for Best Sci-Fi Film – Haapsalu Horror and Fantasy Film Festival 2024
DIRECTOR
Daniel Shapiro, Alex Topaller
EXECUTIVE PRODUCER
Jacek Kulczycki, Daniel Shapiro, Alex Topaller
PRODUCER
Lukasz Tomasz Koltunowicz
WRITER
Christina Lazaridi, Daniel Shapiro, Alex Topaller
CAST
Anna Burnett, Andrzej Chyra, Ieuan Coombs, Piotr Witkowski
CINEMATOGRAPHER
Pils Kajetan
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