(courtesy IMDb)
SNAPSHOT
A social media meltdown forces Geoffrey to reassess his life and values. Quiet Life was awarded the BAFTA for Short Form at the BAFTA Television Awards 2025. (courtesy BBC YouTube)
You’re barely into the approximately 11-minute delight that is Quiet Life, directed by Rith Pickette to a screenplay by Alex Bruce and Luka Rollason, when it becomes clear why this short film received a BAFTA.
With magnificent narrative brevity, which doesn’t stint for a second on character or emotional impact, we witness the lead character, Geoffrey (Luke Rollason) undergo some significant personal trauma which, as is the way in our hyper-documented digital age, is filmed by EVERYONE who witnesses it, including, rather hilariously, one of the park statues who holds a stone mobile phone in their stonily angelic hand.
The footage inevitably goes viral and facing with one of the worst moments of his life playing out online to a global audience, Geoffrey retreats to his home (and his alarm clock cockerel; fabulous sight gag!) and banishes his phone, which doesn’t willing to stay out of his hand in a running gag that beautifully speaks to his endlessly invasive digital life is, to a muddy pit in his garden, and then to a recycling bin in a nearby lane.
To say anymore about the plot is to give away far too many of this clever and heart-tuggingly thoughtful film, but suffice to say that in a very short period of time, Quiet Life does a brilliant job of exploring sadness and loss, redemption and hope and how our modern propensity to showcase it all online may not be the best thing for us.
The short also sweetly but unflinchingly skewers the way all this digital connectivity has actually made us all the more separated from one another, an ironic state of affairs that our lead character will have to surmount to find what a happy-ever-after looks like for someone in his position.
Whether he gets that must be left to the watching of Quiet Life which is well and truly worth your time, making you laugh, think and wonder whether good old fashioned human condition may be in fact be exactly what you need for what digitally ails you.