A diplomatic meeting between two parties is tense, but seemingly successful—until the leaders rise to shake hands in front of the assembled group as flashbulbs pop and cameras roll. A firm handshake is one thing, but the characters in Ennio Ruschetti’s short film Hand in Hand take it to an extreme new level.
No dialogue is needed—just a series of sounds that amplify from grunts to gasps to shrieks of complete horror—to soundtrack the events that unfold. It’s no surprise Hand in Hand was singled out by both Short of the Week and Vimeo Staff Picks; it’s a perfectly executed mix of clever writing and pacing, packing an entire epic drama into just under four minutes. Check it out!
Impressively, the film’s entangled “monster” of political fat cats was achieved using mostly practical effects. Speaking to Vimeo Staff Picks when the film premiered online earlier this month, Ruschetti went into detail about how he accomplished the illusion:
“The moment of entanglement was a very fun challenge and one of my favorite parts of making the short. Up until the point where we see the finished monster, there is actually only one VFX shot: the two-shot of the politicians with the many hands where they realize what is happening. We just placed a bunch of people behind them and they all entangled their hands. Then we removed the people. After the supernatural amount of hands was established in the first shot, we just filmed a lot of hands strangling the politicians in close-ups. It worked and looked great and it is all in camera... it is also easier for the actors when they are actually drowning in hands.”
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