Short film

The Loner
1980 · 30 min
A queasy, hypnotic descent into a hostile dreamscape, equal parts macabre and deadpan funny, demanding surrender to its warped logic.
- Directed by
- Tony Oursler
- Genres
- Fantasy
- Overview
- The Loner is a psychosexual journey through the dark landscapes of Oursler's insular narrative universe. The tape's paranoid, tormented protagonist — who is represented by such objects as a spoon and a water-filled sack — wanders through a hostile dreamspace of macabre obsessions and sexual alienation. Incredibly, Oursler renders this unlikely anti-hero as a sympathetic, totally believable "character." The artist's somnambulant, pun-laden narration and astonishing visual inventiveness add black humor to the surreal proceedings; for example, a bar scene is populated by an outrageous "cast" of found-object grotesques. Oursler's classic happy ending, in which The Loner "would live a wonderful life," rings with an ironic desperation.
- How it feels
- Dark, eerie, absurd and satirical. Slow-burning and demanding.
- About
- Isolation, obsession, identity, sexuality
- Content
- Strong sexual content. Mild violence and language. No gore.
- Note
- Written by AI, so it can be wrong. Full breakdown
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- Directed by
- Tony Oursler
- Genres
- Fantasy