Time Is Running Out

This is a crisply animated and compelling story of an impending apocalypse, an initially uncertain end to a delicate world. Life carries on as normal for some, even as things fall down around them. Games are played, balls kicked amongs the darkening landscape as things turn to rubble.

The end, as it comes, is a crushing, looming thing. In the face of this unmaking one man fights as best he can. He tries to hold things together, to prop things up, as behind and around him things fall apart. To say more would be to give away the nature of the catastrophe, which though unexplained is sufficiently inventive in its manifestation that to reveal it would be to cheat you of the surprise.

This is a clever animation by Marc Reisberg, well served by the sound work of Jim Leary. While it never explains why things are happening, it's more than enough to convince. The design is not quite realistic; it gives the impression of experimental Russian versions of fairy tales. It's a crisp film, well executed. While it is as minimal an end of the world as one could imagine it is as satisfying an ending as one could hope for.