As an ex-film judge for the Eerie Horror Film Festival, I’ve seen my fair share of short films. Having seen literally hundreds (if not thousands of short films), I’ve come to a single conclusion. The format of a short film invariably will come out one of four ways. On the rare occasion, a short can be a perfectly encapsulated story that has a full narrative in its brief run. Sadly, that’s not the norm. Many more of them are short but read more like movie teasers than fully fleshed out stories. The final few are sad cases where the director has attempted to fit far too much into a limited space with the end result being a garbled mess.
Aaron Sims’ short film ‘Archetype’ falls into the second category. It plays like the opening scene, or a “proof of concept” piece, to a full feature film. Even the final credits are full of concept art that hint that there is so much more to be done with the concept. The 7-minute film follows a military cyborg that has become aware of its previous life as a human. And, while the concept is very reminiscent of ‘Robocop’, it is so enthralling while it’s playing that it is easy to overlook the obvious reuse of ideas.
Here’s the plot for ‘Archetype’ according to the film’s YouTube page:
“RL7 is an eight-foot tall combat robot that goes on the run after malfunctioning with vivid memories of once being human. As its creators and the military close in, RL7 battles its way to uncovering the shocking truth behind its mysterious visions and past.”
‘Archetype’ creator Aaron Sims is a Hollywood art and character design veteran, having worked on such genre films as ‘Rise of the Planet of the Apes’, ‘Green Lantern’, ‘The Incredible Hulk’, and the upcoming ‘The Amazing Spider-Man’. ‘Archetype’ is featured on Sims’ production company’s website, most likely as a way to show off Sims’ skills. But, if Sims can make a film like this on a budget of $0, I’m all for Hollywood giving Sims a budget to turn this thing into a feature!
