The Start of Something Beautiful: A Short Film about Life, Loss, and Rebirth

"After his fiancé's sudden death, a medic-in-training becomes targeted by a spirit with the ability to manipulate thoughts." The compelling question of Something Beautiful is, “What is the price of clinging to internal perceptions?” The central idea of this project is to create a story about a character whose internal conflicts surrounding an event, in this case his boyfriend’s death, end up creating an environment in which those internal perceptions and his adherence to them lead to a potential downfall. Throughout my college experience, almost all of my open-ended work has involved some psychological aspect. The idea of one’s view and experience being vastly different from the truth, with little way of knowing, fascinates me. It’s a powerful way of assembling a story and an inherently nontraditional way of depicting things – one I’ve found works. The brain is a maze and there are countless engaging, innovative ways to depict this maze. The result of this project will be a 10–15-minute festival-ready short film exploring the themes discussed above. Production was a difficult process outside of the capstone system, and editing is underway as of April 2022, with a full release and festival run planned for the summer.