Author(s): Shahroze Malik
Mentor(s): Gail White, CVPA
Abstract
This is our guiding question: Does the life of a man who knows nothing but pain and suffering hold more value than the life of a man who has known nothing but ease and bliss? Is there some vindication, some earned respect, some power or insight into the life spent in hardship over the life spent in clemency? Or is nature completely indifferent to whoever gets to live happily ever after and who gets to suffer? Does anyone even care if you lived a hard life? Can the man dying alone find contentment through all his struggles knowing the man in the room next to him has been given all the money, good looks, and talents at birth, and has his family by his side? What did the lonely man do to deserve this constant strife and what did the happy man do to deserve coddled love and blessings?
When one searches up on YouTube: “I’m 43 and I Still Live with My Mom,” thousands of search results come through of men and women voicing their struggles in their childhood bedrooms, feeling trapped in an endless cycle of self-loathing. There are so many men and women out there in the farthest corners of the internet feeling desperately behind, alone, and unwanted. These are videos of men and women who feel they can’t get ahead in life. These are people who have never won an award, never had a girlfriend/boyfriend, and never been complimented for any reason. I’m 43 and I Still Live with My Mom creates a mirror of empathy through an animated documentary, inspired from the testimonies of these people from their YouTube videos.
Audio Transcript
00:00:00:05 – 00:00:01:22
Hey, guys. My name is Rose Malik.
00:00:01:22 – 00:00:06:04
I’m working on an animated short
film funded by Oscar and it is titled.
00:00:06:04 – 00:00:09:04
I’m 43 and I still live with my mom.
00:00:09:06 – 00:00:11:09
Now, right off the bat,
you can already kind of
00:00:11:09 – 00:00:15:09
get an idea that this isn’t
the run of the mill, innocent,
00:00:15:18 – 00:00:20:02
cute, affectionate type of short film,
like probably done by a Pixar short.
00:00:20:03 – 00:00:23:05
No, this is a dark short film,
00:00:23:05 – 00:00:26:05
and it tackles really heavy subjects.
00:00:26:10 – 00:00:30:06
Now, when you search up this title, I’m 43
and I still live with my mom.
00:00:30:06 – 00:00:34:20
On YouTube, on Instagram, on TikTok,
on any video sharing service out there,
00:00:35:15 – 00:00:38:15
you will find a boatload of men and women,
00:00:39:05 – 00:00:43:02
a sea of people feeling desperately alone
all the way
00:00:43:02 – 00:00:47:15
from any corner of the internet,
uploading stories of their lives, rants
00:00:47:15 – 00:00:51:12
from their lives, talking
to anyone out there who’s willing to
00:00:51:12 – 00:00:56:07
listen about their conditions, about why
they feel so desperately behind in life.
00:00:56:07 – 00:00:57:03
Right.
00:00:57:03 – 00:01:00:22
So there’s like a serious this guy saying,
I likely die alone and angry.
00:01:01:03 – 00:01:04:02
This lady is saying 32 years old,
unemployed, single, living,
00:01:04:04 – 00:01:05:14
living with my parents.
00:01:05:14 – 00:01:07:16
This this guy is saying 35 years old.
00:01:07:16 – 00:01:10:16
Failed life over, over emotional
and socially anxious.
00:01:10:22 – 00:01:12:09
I’m 31 and have no friends.
00:01:12:09 – 00:01:14:10
I’m 23 and never had a girlfriend.
00:01:14:10 – 00:01:16:12
It’s not your fault
you’re falling behind in life.
00:01:16:12 – 00:01:18:20
I’m a 38 year old introvert
with no friends.
00:01:18:20 – 00:01:22:04
I’m 38 and most of society
would probably consider me as a failure.
00:01:22:16 – 00:01:26:01
Millions of people on this
on the internet,
00:01:26:07 – 00:01:30:09
talking and ranting,
decompressing to a camera
00:01:30:19 – 00:01:33:21
about all the all
the problems in their life that make them
00:01:33:21 – 00:01:36:21
feel worthless,
that make them feel like they’re losers.
00:01:37:05 – 00:01:37:20
Right?
00:01:37:20 – 00:01:43:11
And this person right here being ugly,
my experience has over 25 million views,
00:01:43:11 – 00:01:47:11
and it’s a cornerstone
about this type of experience
00:01:47:15 – 00:01:49:20
where people feel like
they don’t meet the standards
00:01:49:20 – 00:01:52:20
of what it takes to feel loved
or what it takes to feel valued.
00:01:52:22 – 00:01:55:16
And so they’re feeling so
alone and so behind, right.
00:01:56:21 – 00:01:57:10
As a part of
00:01:57:10 – 00:02:01:04
my research for Oscar,
I have watched all of these videos.
00:02:01:04 – 00:02:06:04
I have watched over 200, over 200 videos
and three things.
00:02:06:16 – 00:02:09:16
Three themes are mentioned by each
and every individual,
00:02:10:04 – 00:02:12:03
and that is the genetic lottery.
00:02:12:03 – 00:02:14:15
Most of these people feel horrendously
ugly.
00:02:14:15 – 00:02:17:21
They feel like
they’ve lost the gifts at birth.
00:02:18:23 – 00:02:21:23
The gifts that make you attractive, that,
00:02:22:03 – 00:02:25:16
make you feel, you know, valued
and romantic relationships.
00:02:25:16 – 00:02:28:09
They feel like they’ve lost this lottery,
right?
00:02:28:09 – 00:02:32:08
Another thing is that they feel completely
and totally isolated.
00:02:32:17 – 00:02:34:01
They feel very alone.
00:02:34:01 – 00:02:35:17
They have no friends to talk to.
00:02:35:17 – 00:02:39:00
This, to talk to about this,
no family that they can trust.
00:02:39:05 – 00:02:42:08
So they turn to YouTube
to express their darkest,
00:02:42:08 – 00:02:47:00
most vulnerable parts of themselves,
and they find almost more relief
00:02:47:11 – 00:02:51:04
and having strangers support them
than their own friends and family.
00:02:51:23 – 00:02:55:19
And the last thing is, they all, all of
these people feel like they’re outcasts.
00:02:56:05 – 00:02:59:06
All these, these were not the popular boys
and girls at school.
00:02:59:13 – 00:03:03:07
These people were not valued because
of their looks, because of their talents.
00:03:03:12 – 00:03:06:11
They were relatively ignored
pretty much all their lives.
00:03:06:11 – 00:03:08:06
And they’ve always felt like there
00:03:08:06 – 00:03:11:01
they were different,
that there was something wrong about them.
00:03:11:01 – 00:03:13:20
And they had no shelter.
They had no people.
00:03:13:20 – 00:03:16:00
They had no tribe to go to. Right?
00:03:17:08 – 00:03:17:23
So our
00:03:17:23 – 00:03:20:23
our short film tackles all of these themes
00:03:21:20 – 00:03:24:19
and what it is in a synopsis,
in a sentence.
00:03:24:23 – 00:03:27:18
Our short film
is this and his last attempt
00:03:27:18 – 00:03:30:22
to feel loved, a hopeless romantic builds
00:03:30:22 – 00:03:34:19
a life size wind up doll to dance with
for the rest of his nights.
00:03:35:07 – 00:03:37:06
And that’s the project we are pursuing.
00:03:37:06 – 00:03:41:06
That’s what we’re animating in 3D
animation based on original 2D
00:03:41:06 – 00:03:42:06
concept art.
00:03:42:06 – 00:03:45:06
And that’s what we’re going to do
for this project.
00:03:45:07 – 00:03:49:00
Over the past few months,
I’ve worked on creating a Polish script
00:03:49:02 – 00:03:53:13
for this short film, and we have tested
the script at various writing classes
00:03:53:13 – 00:03:56:14
at George Mason University and writing
groups at George Mason University.
00:03:57:05 – 00:04:03:01
From the script,
we have created a series of original rough
00:04:03:01 – 00:04:06:16
concept art, and it starts off
00:04:07:00 – 00:04:11:11
very rough with various rough drawings
trying to, execute the idea,
00:04:11:21 – 00:04:14:22
trying to get a sense of the character,
trying to get a feel
00:04:14:22 – 00:04:18:21
for all the moods
and themes of of the short film.
00:04:19:00 – 00:04:25:01
And then from this rough concept art,
we have created final, beautiful,
00:04:25:05 – 00:04:28:11
gorgeous
sketches for our final short film,
00:04:28:11 – 00:04:32:04
and we are going to take these sketches
and animate them in 3D.
00:04:32:14 – 00:04:37:20
Now, as you can imagine, all of this work,
this is three months of original,
00:04:38:01 – 00:04:41:01
hard human talent at work.
00:04:41:02 – 00:04:45:00
No AI is used in any of these designs
in any of these drawings.
00:04:45:00 – 00:04:49:13
This is all original ideas
at full display,
00:04:50:05 – 00:04:54:14
and we are proud of all the ideas
of all the conclusions that we’ve reached
00:04:54:14 – 00:04:58:22
from the script in order
to start production in the 3D side.