Being Born Twelve Times (short film)

Being Born Twelve Times
Directed by	Zabëlle Skye
Written by	Skye
Starring	Skye
Cinematography	Skye
Edited by	Skye
Release date	30 June 2019
Running time	2 minutes
Country	New Eiffel

Being Born Twelve Time is a 2019 New Eiffelic experimental surrealist short film created by Zabëlle Skye—written, directed, shot, starring and edited.

Production

Background

Zabëlle Skye, then-King of the Kingdom of New Finland and later Prince of the Principality of New Eiffel, is an independent filmmaker. Alongside producing short films for his film production studio Z&jProductions alongside his younger brother Janus Smith, Skye also produces films independently. Being Born Twelve Times is one of these works. According to Skye, Being Born Twelve Times was rooted in the surrealist film genre. He first became interested in surrealism upon learning about surrealist cinema at his film school in Surrey, England in early June 2018.

Skye spent the next week writing down a list of ideas for a surrealist film, culminating in the black-and-white Layers released on 12 June. Excluding The Doll (2017)—which is sometimes regarded as a Z&jProductions work despite being created independently by Skye—Layers was his film independent short film. Skye viewed the surrealist Un Chien Andalou (1929) the following day, which he immensely enjoyed and regarded as one of the greatest short films ever made. Despite this, Skye did not watch any further surrealist or artistic films.

Conception and filming

The idea for Being Born Twelve Times came to Skye in early June 2019 while he began to rediscover his interest in the surrealist and artistic film genres. He ostensibly wished to highlight the hardships some people faced under capitalist governments, without criticising capitalism directly. Skye chose the name before commencing production for its pure absurdity, and because he believed it sounded highly pretentious. The first version of the film was shot in mid-June, but the footage was scrapped for undisclosed reasons. Skye reshot the film on 30 June in an upstairs room of the Main Building in the largest New Eiffelic city of New Leeds that was being renovated. Filmed in one take on an iPhone 7 at 240 frames per second, a black and white filter was added in post-production. Skye edited the film that same day.

Release and legacy

Being Born Twelve Times was released on 30 June 2019—the same day it was shot and edited. According to Skye, it is about "the story of the Post-World War II economic boom and the financial crisis of 2007–2008, and what it is like growing up poor in a capitalistic society". Critically, the film was panned by audiences. Despite this, Being Born Twelve Times became Skye's favourite film that he created until the release of Insaniam on 22 May 2020, which Skye now regards as his "magnum opus". Being Born Twelve Times inspired Skye's later—and equally effortless—avant-garde films Chair on 10 July and Protect the Earth on 13 July 2019, both of which were also received negatively. Following the critical reception, Skye ceased making surrealist and artistic films.

See also

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