Created by Alice Ainsworth
A CLOSER LOOK: VIDEOGRAPHIC CRITICISM 2025 – Young video essayists comment on popular audio-visual culture. Produced as part of the BA (Hons) Film and Television degree at Southampton Solent University and brought to you by Making Waves Film Festival.
What does guilt look like? In Fishboy (2021), director Anita Bruvere uses stop-motion and paint-on-glass animation to give that emotion a haunting presence. This video essay examines how the film explores guilt as both a psychological and visual force—something felt, but also something seen.
Set in a surreal, waterlogged world, Fishboy tells the story of a man struggling with grief and self-blame, unable to fully open up to his partner, Laura. The short builds on the metaphor of drowning—guilt as a weight that pulls you under—and uses animation techniques to express this internal struggle. From colour choices to shifts in animation style, every detail contributes to the emotional texture of the story.
The essay connects these choices to wider ideas about memory, emotional trauma, and the limitations of support when someone cannot forgive themselves. It also touches on the power of the uncanny in stop-motion—how slightly unnatural movement and distorted character design help mirror the discomfort of unresolved guilt.
As part of the A Closer Look series, this video essay is a compelling example of how short films can deal with complex emotional material using style, symbolism, and restraint.
This essay is part of A Closer Look, a series of video essays created in collaboration with Southampton Solent University and hosted by Making Waves Film Festival. Each one offers a thoughtful perspective on a piece of moving image culture, seen through the lens of emerging critical voices.
