El Empleo (The Employment) - Short film

Nongmaithem Rakesh *

El Empleo (The Employment)

Review of the Short film "El Empleo (The Employment)"

Genre :Short Film/Comedy
Length : 6.24 min
Ratings: 9/10

What makes us a human being? It is the consciousness, joy, sorrow, pain, pleasure that makes us human. If we take out these ingredients from life then our life will be dull, lethargic, boorish, and above all we become mechanical being. We will be like zombies. This is the message that the short animated silent movie "el Empleo" (meaning The Employment) wants to deliver.

Directed amazingly by Santiago Buo Grasso. He is an Argentinian animator and director. Besides this movie he has directed two other short films viz., Padre and Hello. The movie " el Empleo" has won 7 awards in many film festivals like Annecy International Animated Film Festival, Havana Film Festival, Hiroshima International Animation Festival,etc. The movie was produced in 2008.

The movie opens with closeup of a watch having a human being with its two hand acting as the minute and hour hands. The alarm rings and a hand slowly puts it off. Then, a long face with half open eyes devoid of any passion is shown. He shaves in front of mirror with the hand having no face holding the mirror for him. He drinks his coffee on a chair and table of human beings.

He goes off to work neatly dress. He waits for the taxi. However, the taxi is no car but is human being carrying him on the back. He reaches his office and the door is also made up of human beings. In the office he lays down on his stomach in front of a door. Then a human steps on his back, rubs off his shoes and went inside. The movie ends here.

The movie is poetic in character both storywise and technically. You can see that people are exploited by the superior. As it can be seen in the movie. He sits on the chair and table made of human. It represent exploitation of weak and poor by the strong and rich people. Further, it also highlights that what it seen from the outside is not always true inside.

The long face man although neatly dressed become the door mat in the end. If you lose your passion you will become mechanical as the long face man represent. He lacks the passion for his work.

The movie is silent as zombie, dead people, weak and poor people has no voice. The light was dim representing lack of energy. The pace of the movie was lethargic representing the whole theme.

I will suggest everyone to watch this wonderfully made short movie.