Liquid Love (2013)

Short films occupy a curious corner of world cinema, and they become even more curious when they originate from countries whose film industries are, to put it politely, not exactly prolific. The Seychelles, an archipelago nation of roughly 100,000 people sitting in the Indian Ocean, does not have what anyone would call an established cinematic tradition, which makes any feature, short or otherwise, produced there something of a rarity worth noting. Liquid Love, released in 2013 and running to just eight minutes, is a co-production between the Seychelles and the United Kingdom. It was directed by Pilli Cortese, and its brief premise concerns two souls bound together, with one beginning to receive mysterious signs from the other. That description, vague as it is, points toward something lyrical and perhaps spiritual in intent, drawing on the kind of island folklore and belief systems that rarely get screen time anywhere.

Details about the production are thin on the ground. Cast and crew information is scarce, the studio behind it is unconfirmed, and the film appears to have circulated primarily through online platforms rather than theatrical distribution (a Vimeo upload being the most accessible version for most viewers). Cortese's wider filmography is not well documented in the mainstream record, so it is difficult to place this short within a broader body of work. What can be said is that, at eight minutes, Liquid Love sits in the tradition of mood-driven short film making, the kind of project that prioritises atmosphere and image over conventional narrative. Whether it delivers on that ambition is another matter entirely. For context on what the short film format can achieve in the right hands, it is worth looking at other work from this era, such as The OceanMaker (2014) and Luigi (2013), both of which offer a useful point of comparison from the same period.

As a piece of world cinema, Liquid Love is perhaps most interesting for what it represents rather than what it contains. The Seychelles as a filmmaking location brings with it an obvious visual asset in the form of its Indian Ocean waters, and a short film built around underwater imagery is a logical, if not especially adventurous, choice. The folklore element, hinted at toward the end, gestures toward something more culturally specific, the kind of local mythology that rarely travels beyond its home islands. Whether those eight minutes make good use of any of that potential is the central question, and it is one that only a viewing can answer.

A-Z World Movie Tour Seychelles I will literally watch anything to fill that map it seems lol. https://vimeo.com/61046624 8 minutes of a woman swimming underwater. Some jazz music accompanies it. The last 20 seconds shows you some folklore, that's the only interesting bit.

I suppose there is something to be said for completionism as a motivation, even if the rewards are not always forthcoming. The folklore glimpsed in those closing seconds is genuinely the most intriguing thing here, and part of me wishes the whole eight minutes had leaned into that rather than treating it as an afterthought. It is the kind of cultural detail that a short film, freed from commercial pressures, is actually well placed to explore. Still, it filled a square on the map, and for a project like the A-Z World Movie Tour, sometimes that is the whole point. On to the next one.

Rating: ★  | Year: 2013  | Watched: 2025-09-02

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