SHORT FILM: 'Blinky' Just Wants to Be Your Friend

I Watch Stuff posted this short film today, and it impressed me to the point where, even though it's not actually timely, I wanted to share it with everyone through The Bill Kuchman Chronicle. Blinky, a 12-minute short film that was written and directed by Ruairi Robinson, tells the story of a boy and his robot. Blinky is supposed to be the boy's best friend (and surrogate parent), but things don't exactly go that way. (This is your warning that Blinky is actually a horror story.)

Max Records, best known from his role as Max in Spike Jonze's Where the Wild Things Are, plays the boy. Despite Records basically using the same performance he delivered in Where the Wild Things Are, Blinky is quite impressive. It's brief but manages to pack a lot into its 12 minutes. The animation is almost seamless, something that seems to be easier and easier for independent filmmakers to do now.



Something about the design of Blinky reminds me of a Robie the Robot bank I had when I was a kid. Remember those? It was a yellow robot bank that would eat coins and lick his lips after he was done. If you don't remember (or weren't lucky enough to have one), here's a video of a Robie bank in action.