Geneva Jacuzzi’s Casket – By Chris Friend – Short Film Review

Geneva Jacuzzi’s Casket is an experimental short exploring a disjointed plot of cyber control, set to music written by Geneva herself. The film has very trippy and interesting visuals intercut with the story of Geneva interacting with her robot counterparts XXYZ-02, XYXZ-01, The Traveller and The Hive Mothers (all played by Geneva Jacuzzi).

The design of this short is incredible. I genuinely didn’t realise that Gevena Jacuzzi played the robots as well as herself, both Geneva who did hair and makeup and Ajax Rag Hulce (Costumes and Styling) outdo themselves of creating this vast empty futuristic cyber world intercut with an abandoned society in the real world. She gives very nuanced performances as each character, with her own character being more reserved, and truly speaking to her transformative performances as the robots that I didn’t recognise her. Perhaps, this is purposefully done to show the everchanging effect that more and more filters have on our face from social media.

Chris Friend’s directing style is unique and engaging, whilst at times I did not fully understand the plot, the psychedelic elements of the short kept me engaged throughout. Let’s just say that Brainhack productions really earned their name as it was a disorientating experience that stayed with me and made me think long after the short was over.

The themes of technology taking over society, and a more disjointed digital world is explored effectively by Friend. As the world retreats more and more into this digital world that is more disjointed, poignant scenes of an empty and abandoned real world undercut this to show humanities downfall. The editing also deserves praise, as Chris Friend strikes a great balance between this futuristic digital society and the bleak and grey contrast of the real world.

This creates an element of discomfort which is an interesting headspace to leave the short with – It really provoked a lot of thoughts within me for a short with a 6-minute runtime.

All-in-all, Geneva Jacuzzi’s Casket is a trippy and thought provoking futuristic short with a lot of concealed elements and themes told in an incredibly effective disjointed narrative in the short form.

We very much look forward to seeing where Chris Friend goes next!