By Reilly Wisniewski
The Dhust is an extremely creative animated short that focuses on the micro-sized people that make our world go round. The talented director that helmed this, Bianca Pietersz, produced this film entirely during the pandemic. Her first animated short, The Dhust, starts off by showing us two scientists watching Albert Einstein struggling over his work. Enter the Dhusts, who help Einstein uncover the world’s most famous equation. I really dug the look of the film. They combine real world imagery with 2D animation, which is something we don’t see a whole lot of. I do think the animation itself could use extra frames to improve the look of the animated characters on screen. I also think that the filmmakers could have used their own photos; that way they wouldn’t just have to zoom in on all the images they had. However, you can easily watch the film without being too distracted by those things.
As much as I love the animation, I wish we either got to spend more time with Kali or with her grandparents. With a film so short, I think it would benefit the film to focus on one story or the other. Halfway through, the audience switches from the story of Albert Einstein and Kali’s grandparents to Kali explaining everything that has happened since the creation of the earth.
The world they built in 5 minutes is pretty impressive. I think the reason I feel the way I do is because the film is the length that it is. They did a great job of setting up this world where these tiny people help us achieve all of our breakthroughs. I’m not sure if there is a second episode, so devoting time to setting up this whole world right after I had already got invested in what was going on with Einstein, felt a little strange. I think there’s a way to explain why these tiny people are so special without having Kali deliver a bunch of exposition.
Retouching on the aspect of creativity, I loved the theme song that was featured in this short. It’s just something that can elevate a short film like this to something more than it would have been. The film has humor, cleverness, and is just fun to watch. I can tell that these people had fun creating this and that’s the whole reason I appreciate filmmaking. It’s fun to do. My biggest criticism is that I wish I had more time with this story and that’s the best problem to have.
I would personally give this film 4 out of 5 stars.
Reilly Wisniewski is a Senior at Compass College of Film and Media. He is currently on his way to a Bachelor’s Degree of Fine Arts with an emphasis on Film Editing. He is a Film and Video editing intern at CMRubinWorld working on their Net Zero series.
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