LIVE FROM MEMPHIS

Many moons ago, I was a creative writing minor during my undergrad and someone, somewhere taught me that it's much harder to write a short story than it is to write a novel. It's clearly a vast over-simplification, because neither one is easy, per se, at least not easy to do well. But the short story has its own unique set of complications and requires a writer to be able to powerfully choose just a handful of words to communicate the same emotion or image that a novelist can explore for pages and pages.

^{Brett Magdovitz and Adam Remsen in "Scrambled Eggs".}

As I sat watching the second series of Hometowner Shorts during IndieMemphis, I wondered if the same is true for film-making. If shorts are a much more daunting undertaking, creatively speaking, because of what you have to accomplish in such a small space. Whatever the answer to that question may be, the films I saw Wednesday were "shorts" only in literal length—in depth and bite and general mind-blowing-ness, they spanned endlessly.

Kentucker Audley's unscripted "Family Tree," for example, was a fascinatingly real slice of life of a brother and sister. I would detail the plot for you, but there isn't one, really, at least not in the traditional sense—things happen, and the characters react to those things. But for some reason, I was transfixed, probably because I felt so empathetic toward the brother. That, and the resonance of the improvised dialogue. It's so natural, because it is natural and off-the-cuff. It brings an authenticity to the work that scripted pieces just can't achieve.

Rounding out my favorites from the line-up were "Woke Up Ugly" and "Scrambled Eggs." "Eggs" for its rich visual moments, a character I genuinely liked and a love-at-first-listen-to-your-iPod scene. "Ugly" for its kitsch, its writing and an ending that made me want to go up to director Ryan Parker after the show and say, "Okay, so THIS is what just happened...right?"

I was excited to hear during the Q-and-A session at the end of the screening that several of these films will be heading to other festivals, in the U.S. and around the world. I've already noted and I'll emphasize again that I'm no expert or master critic, but these were some of the most engaging films—in terms of writing, visuals, original stories, concept, directing—that I've seen. Ever. Period. OF ALL TIME.

Big words, I know, but I wouldn't say it if I didn't mean it. I left Studio on the Square that night raving about what I'd just seen and still shaking my head at those last few minutes of "Woke Up Ugly." It's been a long time since a movie, even a feature-length, stuck with me for that long. I'm impressed, Memphis filmmakers. You've made a believer out of me.