Can You Remember This Short Film?
Trying to remember the title or filmmaker's name.
A B&W (low contrast) short film from at least 10—maybe more—years ago:
The hero was played by an Asian guy. No dialogue. Economical.
Daytime: Young man wakes on elevated train, sees brunette sitting at the other end of the car. We can see his attraction to her. She looks through photos on her phone. They share shy glances. Self-conscious, he looks out the window, falls asleep.
She exits when the train stops. He notices she’s left her phone behind.
By lamplight: Alone in his bedroom, he wakes the phone, looks through her photo gallery—finds some photos of him sleeping on the train. He’s struck by this. He finds a photo shot, through a window, of a white towered building, which he maybe recognizes …?
Daytime: He rides his bike through the city (I believe this was in LA), approaches the white tower. They shot in L.A.; & the tower was on Wilshire:
https://www.laconservancy.org/learn/historic-places/wilshire-tower/
Still on his bike, on an elevated train platform, he holds up her phone against the tower: not quite the right angle. He looks around, guesses from which nearby building she shot the photo.
Daytime: In an apartment building, he approaches her front door, which is ajar. Inside we hear wet brushing sound: a painter is rolling fresh paint on the walls of the vacant apartment. A sad, vivid moment: She’s gone.
That’s all I remember in sequence.
It concludes with him snagging an address from somewhere—maybe from her apartment mailbox, or the contacts in her phone? Last scene is:
He, sitting in his bedroom. He takes a selfie on her phone, packs it a cardboard box & addresses it to her. Last shot I recall is his wondering expression as he thinks about the leap he’s taken.
Ring any bells?
P.S.—The same filmmaker, who was a man, also had a short about broken hearts in an airport departure lounge, which featured a miniature of the same lounge inside a suitcase or briefcase. The story’s melodrama played out by little figures inside the luggage. Recursive, Twilight-Zone-y plot. My memory of that one is poor; it may also have been B&W.
Posted Jul 6, 2026, 9:02 PM UTC