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DIRECTOR
Christopher Nolan
SYNOPSICS
Doodlebug (1997) is a English movie. Christopher Nolan has directed this movie. are the starring of this movie. It was released in 1997. Doodlebug (1997) is considered one of the best Short,Action,Fantasy,Mystery,Thriller movie in India and around the world.
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Doodlebug (1997) Trailers
Doodlebug (1997) Reviews
Rather obvious but effective enough for the short running time
A man is trying to catch some sort of bug running around his room. He takes his shoes off and intends to crush it under the heel of his loafer. However as he slowly begins to track the bug down and trap it, things chance dramatically but the man continues his course of action. Before Nolan hit the big time with several successful motion pictures, he made this short while studying English at University in London. It is rather atmospheric and is enjoyable for that reason. The plot is interesting at the start and has a nice twist at the end which is pretty obvious once you see it being set up, but this isn't too much of a problem because there are only a few seconds between set up and delivery, so you're not wasting time being led somewhere you have already arrived. It is very much a student film as it thinks it is cleverer than it is and it seems like the sort of idea you have when you think that nobody else would ever think the same way but this is just an observation, not so much an attack. In terms of atmosphere the majority of the film really works; grainy black and white, dark rooms with bright intrusive light spread sparingly across the room and 'things' moving rapidly around our main man. It does just enough to feel like it is building to something but not so much that the ending will be a disappointment. Overall it is worth seeing mainly because of what its director has gone on to do since this. As a short film in its own right it is atmospheric enough and with an interesting premise to the point that it is worth a few minutes of your time; but the ending is not as 'out of the blue' or as clever as Nolan must have thought it was at the time happily he has gone on to much bigger and better things since!
Good film short with insights into the human mind.
I think anyone reading this knows what literally happened as far as the storyline goes. In a dingy apartment, a guy that looks possibly insane, carries a shoe as a little black figure scurries across the floor. But what or who is this creature? Who is the man? I think the man represents the human condition. Man is constantly at battle with those who are lesser than us. We feel the need to conquer and thus we are the ones who pose threat to ourselves. The man hitting the small version of himself with the shoe shows abstractly the very thesis i just said. In hurting others, he really only hurts himself. (i am finding out while writing this that there are several morals or messages that the director wanted to portray, and i am doing none of them justice)
Humble Beginnings
A word of advice. Watch this movie straightaway without reading anything about it. Most of the plot summaries you'll go through will mostly end up ruining the movie for you. Its incredibly short (about 3 minutes) so even if it ends up sucking for you, it wouldn't have in any way hurt to devote 3 minutes to what I find a great start for a by now famous and master craftsman Nolan. Heck even a visit to the loo takes more time so giving 3 minutes to this movie without any second thought shouldn't be hard enough. Let the bug surprise you. Doodlebug came to my attention when doing a bit of research (that isn't the right term but I'll stick to it anyway) on Christopher Nolan now that his final movie in the Batman trilogy is about to hit out. It appears he made two more shorts before this of which one named Larceny, I've heard a lotta praises about but sadly couldn't manage to get my hands on it anywhere. So I decided to started my Nolan filmography with this one. For the meager amount of money, this movie is quite a watch. Excellent camera-work, nice editing which keeps the movie flowing smoothly (and not much like Nolan's later non-linear works), good effects for a short (that's just me though) and a decent performance make this worth a watch. Now I don't exactly know what messages this movie wished to convey but I do know that those were some entertaining and insightful 3 minutes into what was to come in the future from this guy. Following's up next for sure.
Prelude of a brilliant and promising career
Calling "Doodlebug" as being Christopher Nolan's baby steps into filmmaking would be an outrageous act. This isn't a baby trying to walk, this is a kid already walking and aware of everything around him, skipping part of the evolution but ready to do anything. Light years from making us dream within a dream within another dream and way before of resurrecting the Batman franchise or twisting Leonard's memory, Nolan made this wonderful short about a man who hunts something unknown with his shoes to later find out he's hunting himself in a different way and form. What comes after might not be all surprising but it certainly leaves a great impression on you, to make you frozen thinking what the hell just happened. The constant themes present on his works such as sanity loss (or the fight in discovering if you are sane or not) are there. He intrigues us in less than three minutes by showing this man (played by Jeremy Theobald) that seems disturbed by this moving thing he starts to chase, and even though he sees that this thing is him in a alternated version he kills it. Perhaps an allusion of us as human race, hunting versions of ourselves simply because they bothers us, by that I mean, humans, people who are born with the same constitution (flesh and blood) but with notable variations and characteristics. And that never ends. It's really delightful to watch it, you can sense Nolan's incredible sense of style filming in a scary black and white and using some incredible special effects. The student knew exactly what he was doing, a real professional. Many of us, and even the man himself couldn't possibly imagine than in matter of just a few years he would be directing names like Guy Pearce, Al Pacino, Leonardo DiCaprio and Scarlett Johansson in outstanding pictures. Well, here's a positive proof of why this man is one of the greatest directors in activity at the moment and why he deserves all the recognition. His originality goes beyond anything. A real fun to watch. 10/10
I'm cutting this film some slack....for what it was, it's pretty good
The film begins with a guy chasing what you assume is a bug or perhaps a mouse in his apartment. However, when he catches it and you see what it is, it's an exact duplicate of him--only in miniature. When he smashes this creature, a chain of events follow and the movie ends. Every director needs to start somewhere. You don't start your career with a mega-hit but work up to it. Despite having some big name films to his credit, such as MEMENTO and BATMAN BEGINS, Christopher Nolan was still a nobody when he made this short film a little over a decade ago. In fact, it's his very first film and so I think it's important to evaluate it as an experimental film done by a student. In this context, it's a pretty good little film--though I agree with Bob the Moo that what will happen in the film is a bit obvious. The style is excellent and the film is only three minutes long--perfect for such a film. By the way, this film is part of the CINEMA 16: European Shorts DVD. On this DVD are 16 shorts. Most aren't great, though because it contains THE MAN WITHOUT A HEAD, COPY SHOP, RABBIT and WASP, it's an amazing DVD for lovers of short films and well worth buying.