2000 - ZEN AND ART OF LANDSCAPING
Zen and the Art of Landscaping is a comedic short film about an
unsuspecting landscaper who goes by the name of Zen (Greg Haberny).
Zen finds himself in the middle of a domestic crossfire with a suburban
dysfunctional family after being lured away from the sanctuary of
the front lawn by the lonely housewife (Kathleen Garrett). Hilarity
ensues.
David Kartch cast himself as writer, producer and director to make
this 17-minute film shot in color. They choose to shoot the movie
on 16mm film and then blow it up to 35mm. "Although video is
constantly improving, I knew I wanted to work with film," he
says. "I still don't feel comfortable lighting video. In the
past, I worked in 16 mm format, but found that to be a bit limiting
due to the aspect ratio and sound quality for projection. I would
have loved to shoot directly on 35 mm if it was affordable. We opted
to shoot in Super 16 (for a wide-screen aspect ratio and bigger
image area)." It was his master’s thesis film at Columbia
University.
The short is a huge success, it not only appeared in dozens of film
festivals including winning the Short Filmmaking Honorable Mention
Award at the 2001 Sundance Festival, it won the 2001 Gold Medal
in the Narrative category at the Student Academy Awards.
This short is in the Archive 100 because it is simply a great short.
The key word is simple. It shows the art of the short film by giving
us so much information in such little time. Short films don’t
always need to be over 30 minutes to be able to get the whole story
accomplished and to define the characters. This film gets that done
and more within 17 minutes. It all takes place in two locations,
the front yard and the inside of the house. There aren’t any
special effects or even much camera movement. It isn’t needed;
it’s all about the story. The screenplay for this film is
so well done and has trimmed all excess fat to keep us entertained
the entire time. Towards the end of the short there are plot twists
and new character developments every 30 seconds. As an audience
we find out new information at the same time as the characters do
so we really feel like we’re a part of this story as it keeps
unfolding. And it’s all pure hilarity.
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