Rating: 3/5 stars

The 2025 SUNY Oswego Film Club’s Genre Fest featured six student-made romantic dramas, all produced over a single weekend. Requiring both that genre, a specific prop (either a flower or a ring), a high camera angle and one of two pre-written lines of dialogue, the films might have come out homogenous. However, the final products were not only wildly different but also largely enjoyable, embodying a range of student talent.

Cold and Unforgiving

3 stars out of 5

Genre Fest’s opening short was a 4-minute experimental film from Delilah Keyes. Consisting of a series of grainy, black-and-white still images from around the snow-blasted Oswego campus and a computerized voiceover from a lonely comet drifting through space, “Cold and Unforgiving” might at first appear low-effort, even lazy. However, Keyes’ script, its robotic delivery, and the juxtaposition with that abstract, almost otherworldly photography ultimately makes for a satisfyingly introspective experience, reminiscent of analog horror or the likes of Radiohead’s “Fitter Happier.” It quickly becomes clear that the narrating “comet” is anything but, being at the very least a metaphor for the audience, or rather, humanity: damaged things drifting endlessly forward through a cold and unforgiving vacuum. A pessimistic view for a romantic drama if taken at face value, but one that Keyes does well to communicate, in this commendable experimental short deserving of the festival’s Best Editing award.

That’s Life

3 stars out of 5

Radically contrasting with “Cold and Unforgiving” was “That’s Life,” from Miles Hedderman, Eve Winston, Steven Moran and Evan Maggette. Part of this contrast was its more straightforward narrative — two characters competing for the affections of a celebrity — and overall execution, but another part was its tone. In spite of the fest’s stipulations of romance and drama as the genres of the produced movies, “That’s Life” leans toward romance and comedy, albeit to great effect. The film elicited laughter from the audience throughout, notably at an effectively choreographed and edited fight scene part way through and with its final twist. Moran’s editing deserves mention in general, as does Winston’s script, but Maggette’s performance as the hopelessly enamored Adam arguably carried the piece and was recognized with the Best Performance award. The movie also won Third Place, a fitting decoration for this technically imperfect and categorically ill-fitting but overall fun short.

Children of Stars

3.5 stars out of 5

Genre Fest’s most awarded film this year was “Children of Stars” – and for good reason. Most obviously excellent is the short’s visuals, for which it won Best Cinematography, recalling the similarly excellent look of director and editor Wonjae Shin’s previous festival entry, “Ryan’s Diary.” The short is otherwise competent. Sound is mostly solid, but with occasionally inconsistent quality; the editing, similarly, is good, but not perfect; the performances of stars Ryan Hyland (also the film’s composer) and Tara Nasiadka feel genuine enough; the script pairs naturalistic dialogue with a nonlinear structure, understandably receiving the Best Script award. It is a conceptually conventional romantic drama concerning a man’s terminal illness and its effect on his relationship, but Shin, Hyland, Nasiadka, Max Reinking, Matthew Espey and Charlie Ehrlich deserve praise for their execution of it in this standout student film that took home Genre Fest’s First Place prize.

Fact Tissues

3 stars out of 5

Wearing its influences on its sleeve, Quinn Youngs’ solo venture “Fact Tissues” describes itself as “shamefully plagiarized from Mike Hoolboom’s 1993 seminal experimental classic ‘Frank’s Cock.’” The similarities are obvious, between the screen divided into quadrants, the queer themes, the monologue delivered directly to the camera and the repurposed footage of, among other things, gay pornography. However, Youngs’ monologue and the movie as a whole are not nearly as cohesive or focused as “Frank’s Cock,” meandering through Youngs’ sexual experiences to eventually reach a far less edifying conclusion than its inspiration. “Fact Tissues” is still an impressive film, satisfyingly experimental and abrasive and admirably written and performed by Youngs. It could have easily contended for Best Direction, Best Script or Best Editing, yet went unrewarded. Perhaps this speaks to an unspoken, even subconscious preference for more conformist, heteronormative storytelling among audiences — which is not to disparage conventional, heterosexual romantic dramas like those that enjoyed awards recognition at Genre Fest. It is simply to say that the likes of “Fact Tissues” are similarly worth appreciating, however discomfiting they may be to some audiences.

Time Spent Looking at My Phone

2.5 stars out of 5

Winning the Best Direction award was “Time Spent Looking at My Phone,” from the team of director and editor Bart Safavizadeh and writer and cinematographer Hunter Rogers. Focusing on an isolated man as he opens up through a dating app and the woman (voiced by Arielle Newell) that he meets through it, the short is fairly competent, with a solid leading performance by Safavizadeh and a strong, relatively unique theme. That theme notably shines through in its structure, as the protagonist begins the film by shutting himself in his room, before slowly moving through increasingly public spaces, finally, cathartically emerging into the outdoors at the end. However, technical issues pervade the production, with inconsistent focus, lighting and sound. The stock footage of a blooming flower that bookends the film is potent as a thematic symbol and an image in and of itself, but its sheer visual fidelity weakens the remainder of the film in comparison. Ultimately, “Time Spent Looking at My Phone” is certainly appreciable, but other entries stood out more.

Reverie

2 stars out of 5

Genre Fest 2025 concluded with “Reverie,” from “Prestige” alums Elias Quiles and Eric Pinsdorf and starring Pinsdorf and Liz Ryan, with production assistance from Sarai Santiago and Anthony Mendoza. Though it features occasionally striking photography and a spirited performance from Ryan, overwhelming errors and inconsistencies plague the film. From misspellings in its opening and closing credits to a changing aspect ratio (mostly compressed, with a black frame dominating the screen), an often confusing and chaotic script and overall structure, fluctuating sound and picture quality, an intrusively visible microphone and a lackluster lead performance from Pinsdorf, “Reverie” is a disappointing entry from filmmakers who have proven themselves in the past. It fails to satisfyingly execute on its conventional but potentially moving premise, and the unlicensed use of composer Max Richter’s famous “On the Nature of Daylight” comes across as a desperate gimmick to elicit emotion from the audience. Despite all of this, “Reverie” received both the Audience Choice and Second Place awards. To revisit an earlier point, perhaps audiences prefer a subpar but conventional and heterosexual film to a commendable experimental queer film. Either way, “Reverie” proved a rather disappointing conclusion to an otherwise enjoyable film festival.

Image by Maria Pawelcyzk