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The Short Film Transnational: A Comparative Study of Indian and World Short Cinemas

In the contemporary media landscape, the short film has emerged from the shadow of feature cinema to become a potent vehicle for narrative experimentation, social critique, and cultural exchange. This paper examines the aesthetic strategies, thematic preoccupations, and production-distribution ecosystems of Indian short films in relation to their global counterparts (European, Latin American, and Asian). While world short cinema has historically been linked to avant-garde movements and film school pipelines, Indian short films—particularly from the last decade—navigate a unique tension between Bollywood melodrama, digital democratization (via platforms like Pocket Films and OTTs), and grassroots realism. Through comparative analysis, this paper argues that Indian short films are increasingly "indigenizing" global short film conventions (e.g., non-linear narrative, minimal dialogue, vérité style) while offering distinct interventions in caste, gender, and urban precarity. indianxworld short films

The disparity is stark: world shorts are often subsidized as cultural artifacts, while Indian shorts survive through brand integrations (e.g., What’s Your Status? for a phone company) or as low-budget passion projects. However, India’s mobile-first consumption (over 600 million smartphone users) has created a parallel festival—the algorithm. Viral Indian shorts like The Bypass (not to be confused with the above) are viewed more widely than many award-winning European shorts. The Short Film Transnational: A Comparative Study of

World short films (e.g., Six Shooter by Martin McDonagh) often hinge on a single, escalating irony. Indian shorts, influenced by the one-act play and the katha tradition, tend to build toward a moment of reversal rather than a plot twist. For example, Bypass (2019, dir. Priyanka Banerjee) follows a traffic boy (Nawazuddin Siddiqui) for 20 minutes; the revelation is not a surprise but a slow-burn emotional collapse. This reflects a cultural preference for rasa (emotional essence) over shock value. Through comparative analysis, this paper argues that Indian

The short film, typically under 40 minutes, has often been relegated to the role of a "calling card" for directors. However, in both India and the world, it has evolved into an autonomous art form. Internationally, festivals like Clermont-Ferrand and platforms like Vimeo Staff Picks have canonized directors such as Alice Rohrwacher ( The Pupils ) and Pedro Almodóvar ( The Human Voice ). In India, the death of mainstream short-film distribution in theaters was reversed by YouTube channels (e.g., Terribly Tiny Tales , The Viral Fever ) and later by OTT giants (Netflix’s Putham Pudhu Kaalai , Disney+ Hotstar’s short compilations).

| Feature | World Short Films (EU/US) | Indian Short Films | | :--- | :--- | :--- | | | National film funds (CNC, DFFF), festivals | Self-finance, corporate brand integrations, OTT commissions | | Festival path | Cannes (Court Métrage), Berlinale, Clermont-Ferrand | Mumbai Film Festival, Jagran, international diaspora festivals (IFFM) | | Typical length | 5–25 min | 15–40 min (longer due to narrative buildup) | | Audience reach | Festival circuits, MUBI, Arte | YouTube (50M+ views for hits like Khayali Pulao ), OTT anthologies |

Global short cinema excels at the absurdist metaphor (e.g., The Strange Thing About the Johnsons , 2011). Indian shorts, however, draw from indigenous traditions of oral storytelling and fable. Anukul (2017, dir. Sujoy Ghosh), based on a Satyajit Ray story, blends AI and domesticity, while Chidiakhana (2020, dir. Tushar Tyagi) uses a dilapidated zoo as an allegory for bureaucratic decay. Where world shorts often lean toward surrealism as an end in itself, Indian shorts use the fantastic to make the familiar strange—without abandoning emotional legibility.