MUFF: Dysfunction, Family Style

A great selection of short films that deal with dark family issues, in meaning and sometimes, funny ways. Coming of age stories, family tragedy and prodigal children coming back home.

• Ulla
Director: Colin Garcia * USA * 7 min * MN Premiere Synopsis: A young widow falls prey to relentless torment from a wraith she encounters deep in the forest.

• Excess Baggage
Director: Chantal Massuh-Fox * USA * 26 min * World Premiere Synopsis: Rhen, an adopted teen misfit, lives in a small town trailer park community with her crazy adopted family. Alongside her confused brother Ned, they struggle with the daily hardships and hurdles of being social outcasts.

• Princess & Grace
Director: Tyler Wirtanen * Producer: Katherine Clark * USA * 10 min * MN Premiere Synopsis: A film about choice and consideration. All the pieces of one story, told through the eyes of various characters, stir up various feelings from love and pure happiness, to that of despair and anguish.

• Happy Hour
Director: Gretl Claggett * USA * 14 min * MN Premiere Synopsis: When a woman meets her boyfriend for a romantic night out, a martini triggers childhood memories that threaten her ability to trust and love. Based on a poem; narrated by Julianne Moore.

• Claire
Director: Cate Smierciak * Germany * 14 min * MN Premiere Synopsis: Alone on her first night in Berlin, a young woman gathers the courage to go out on her own, but after meeting a few locals at the corner bar, she is faced with more adventure than she bargained for.

• Goodbye Casey Trade
Director: Amanda Brennan * Producer: Hugo Kenzo * Co-Producer: Lisa Kelly * USA * 14 min * MN Premiere Synopsis: Tired of her self-involved parents and continuous bullying at school, fourteen-year-old oddball Casey Trade decides to carry out a fantasy with help from a fellow outcast.