We Out Here: Shorts

A collection of short documentary and fiction films from the region and the Diaspora that form a patchwork portrait of Caribbean identity.

Yves & Variation
Dir. Lydia Cornett  |  15 mins  |  2019  |  United States, Haiti
Every day, concierge Yves Deshommes practices his violin behind the front desk of a Manhattan office building. But during the hours outside his shift, Yves’s life is revealed to be equal parts intrepid and inspiring.

Measure
Dir. Karen Chapman  |  9 mins  |  2019  |  Canada
Nine-year-old Shane seems to be wandering the streets of Toronto alone, but he is on a secret mission that is too important to fail. He has one last thing to do before his mother finds out that he’s been suspended from school.

Black Composer Trilogy Part I: A Quality of Light
Dir. Madeleine Hunt-Ehrlich  |  8 mins  |  2018  |  United States
A Quality of Light is the first part of Hunt-Ehrlich’s Black Composer Trilogy, each of which draw on her family’s history to shed light on untold stories of black women artists. This film weaves together archival footage and quotes by revolutionary and writer Aimé Césaire with scenes that foreground the effects of aging on the director’s grandmother, who was a prolific composer.

November/December
Dir. Elenie Chung  |  11 mins  | 2020  |  Trinidad and Tobago
In a prestigious all-girls secondary school in Trinidad and Tobago, the Michaelmas term seeps with anxiety for all in their last year. Cyan, indecisive about her university choices, finds herself at odds with expectations of where she should go, why should she go and if it matters if she goes. However, as exams approach with expected dread, one by one, young girls are vanishing in the school grounds.

Jerk
Dir. Raine Allen-Miller  |  10 mins  |  2018  |  United Kingdom
Winston arrived in London from Jamaica back when the streets were paved with promise. A lifetime later, he’s become the smiling face around the neighborhood that everyone knows – the friendly local jerk chicken shop owner. Today, the mask is beginning to slip.