Isabel Peppard

A tale of friendship between two unlikely pen pals: Mary, a lonely, eight-year-old girl living in the suburbs of Melbourne, and Max, a forty-four-year old, severely obese man living in New York.

When Clara discovers her deceased mother’s revered ‘Book of Dark Whispers’, she can’t stop reading the strange stories within its mystical pages. Each weird tale reveals a new facet of the twisted human psyche… or the not-so-human, as the case may be. From the horror of grief to sharehouse living disaster, from existential dread to right-swiping vampires, there’s something for all tastes; as long as those tastes are twisted!

A young artist sits on the sidewalk, struggling to make a living. She makes drawings for the passersby. A businessman recognises her talents and offers her a paying job. The prospect seems inviting but the reality threatens to kill her imagination.

A lonely house-wife’s plan to end it all takes an unexpected turn when her last hurrah begins a radical journey of sexual exploration and personal re-invention.

The lyrical and monstrous are interwoven in Gloomy Valentine, a stop motion, animated short film that tells the story of Gloomy, a woman struggling to overcome the sadness of a broken heart. Aesthetically influenced by gothic surrealism, Gloomy is haunted by memory and is ultimately consumed by nightmarish shadows.