Context

The short movie Barbiecue was made for the module 'Time Based Storytelling'. During this four week period we were tasked with filming a one-minute short movie about a subject of our choosing.

Barbiecue is about Jesse, a shy boy who doesn't quite fit in with his friends. One day he finds a barbie doll in the supermarket, by which he is immediately fascinated. His friends catch him starting at the strange doll and decide to challenge him. Jesse gets peer pressured into eating the barbie doll and magically turns into a girl. In a panic he runs away and tries to find a way to turn back into a boy. While researching Jesse finds out his friends filmed him and publicly uploaded the video. Scrolling trough the abundance of hate comments, he notices one particular nice comment and gets a step closer to accepting himself.

Though the story may sound absurd, it has a deeper message. It is about self-acceptance and peer pressure. 

Process

When thinking of what kind of story to make, a lot of different ideas were reviewed. We settled on the barbiecue because it discussed the themes we wanted to address most.

When the script was written we moved on to trying out different shots, to see what would best communicate our point. For example, the mirror scene is shot that way to make sure we get to see Jesses emotions.