“Zero One,” directed by Peter Corrigan

San Diego Short Film Festival

Animated

1:54

 

The uncanny valley is starting to look more like an uncanny ravine.

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“Zero One” follows a sniper in a future urban war. Actually (minor spoiler), it doesn’t – as it plays with our expectations both in terms of point of view and the very nature of what we’re watching.

The film is animated in Unreal Engine, which began as a way to render virtual worlds for video games but is increasingly being adopted by visual artists for TV and cinema. If you’ve watched “The Mandalorian,” you’ve seen Unreal Engine in action.

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Here, Corrigan manages to coax a visual fidelity out of the tool that had me initially questioning whether it was actually animation. He starts with shot behind the sniper in the war zone at night, with electric light, explosions and fire illuminating the back of his helmet as he walks. Only when we cut to a shot showing the sniper’s face do we get a hint that this is a digital actor – but only a hint. We see the reflection of a flare in his eyes, as his face is lit in its eerie blueish glow. At that point, you can either revel in the subsurface scattering or just let the animation transport you to this place for about the next 90 seconds.

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I mentioned in a previous review of a computer animated film that there’s a danger of coming across as a tech demo, but the truth is that “Zero One” can be enjoyed both on that level and as a short film. As a tech demo, it’s incredible. As a film, it’s pretty good. Simon Delaney’s delivery is a little like a drugged J.K. Simmons, but he evokes the languidness of the material without quite stepping into full-blown ennui. And the questions of whose perspective we’re actually getting, and whether the “zero” of the title is ultimately a verb or a noun, are a lot more profound than you would expect from something shorter than most commercial breaks.

Fairly or not, “Zero One” is by and large worth a look on its own merit but mostly as a harbinger of where the users of these cinematic tools will be capable of taking us.