Director Sophy Romvari’s new film Blue Heron is coming out in select North American theatres through Janus Films. And to celebrate her first solo full length feature, the Criterion Channel is bringing back her short films. I had the privilege of watching some of these short films, two of them taking place in an apartment. These shorts, as they would, are aware of the connections that its characters have outside of its white walls. In Nine Behind, Nora (Noemi Fabian) talks to her grandfather about her father when she was a child. After seeing this on the big screen I became a fan of how she captures the immigrant experience.

In Norman Norman, the titular dog minds their business while news audio about cloning plays in the background. The best of these shorts is Still Processing, which I previously reviewed when it came out during TIFF 2020. Back then, I reacted to the short in an emotional level, which it still brings after watching it again. But this time around, I can also see how she, depending on the viewer, plays with form subtly. She mixes voice overs with subtitles without audio – instead of using her voice, she expresses pain through writing.

“Am I doing some parasocial trauma bonding or is Romvari objectively good,” I ask myself while watching these. I specifically ask myself this with It’s Him, as Shelby (Margot Berner) sits with her Mother (Robyn Bradley). Prior, she was watching a documentary, convincing herself that her brother Riley (Chance Calvert) is in the background. It’s Him feels like watching the work of an auteur, this film having easy connections with her other shorts. Putting on my critic hat, this is a director who knows how to match her story with style. The impressionistic approach here makes sense in depicting characters with missing pieces. The intimate camerawork also helps capture the emotions of characters looking for their light.

This image is released by Sophy Romvari

This intimacy also exists in another of Romvari’s apartment shorts, Pumpkin Movie, capturing a video call. The call has a Young Woman (Romvari) and her Friend (Leah Collins Lipsett) carve pumpkins in front of each other. While doing so, they discuss things like the big city versus Halifax and the different kinds of men. Specifically, the encounters they and their friends have with men varying from ‘means well’ to not. Seeing these two characters’ conversation is a reminder that yes, some men deserve some shit talk. Others, though, the ‘mean well’ men, deserve some benefit of the doubt, which these characters give. Either they’re being nice or they’re tone policing themselves even in a private conversation – interesting.

Aside from capturing the immigrant experience, loss, and womanhood, another component of Romvari’s brand is love of dogs. It’s easy to be reductive about those shorts, especially Norman Norman – I’ve read the occasional bad Letterboxd reviews. The ideas in Norman Norman feel clearer in  In Dog Years, a short about old dogs and their humans. The operative word here is ‘old’ because regardless of human or pet, it’s still difficult dealing with loss. Her camera focuses on the dogs while off screen, their owners discuss their relationships with their old dogs. And oh God I’m going to be so pretentious about this, but the camerawork makes me think about her gaze. There’s a Butlerian philosophy on who the camera is centreing and decentering – dogs are better than people.

Lastly, Remembrance of Joszef Romvari looks at archive footage of the works of her grandfather, a Hungarian production designer. Accompanying the footage is a voice over conversation between Ms. Romvari and her grandfather’s collaborator, Oscar winner Istvan Szabo. Aside from a big get, this short is a reminder of just how important ‘below the line’ crew can be. While watching this, things make more sense about her, even if on their surface their methods seem different.

Again, the Criterion Channel is thee platform to stream Sophy Romvari’s short films.