Filmmaker Statement

Mac Unboxes His New Cellphone is a comedy short based on a fleeting moment that I spotted in a home video I filmed circa 8 years old. A few years ago, while re-watching a tape of myself goofing off in the foreground, I realized that in the background you could overhear a serious discussion going on between my mother and aunt about my aunt’s recent divorce and my mother’s doomed marriage. From this small moment, this short film was born. Through the structure of a mid-2000s Youtube unboxing video, I was curious how much we could learn about a marriage and a child’s perception of his parents from what’s overheard in the background. Additionally, I explore how much a child is capable of innocently revealing about his personal life while discussing something as banal as the specs of a cell phone and question how aware he even is of the weight of his confessions.