Small but perfectly formed

Welcome to the Virgin Media Shorts news blog, our regular report on the latest and greatest from the short film industry.

Too busy, no time; shorts are the answer for frustrated film buffs seeking a cinematic bite with substance... So what have we had to chew on so far in 2008?

Following the untimely death of Anthony Minghella, Indian filmmaker Shekhar Kapur is to direct Minghella’s contribution to New York, I Love You, an episodic feature in the style of 2006’s Paris Je T’Aime. The British director wrote the segment himself – a short about the ‘value of life’.

Other directors who made the news include the 2008 BAFTA winners Paddy Considine, for Dog Altogether and Jo Allen for the animated short The Pearce Sisters, a ‘tale of love, loneliness, guts, gore, nudity, violence, smoking and cups of tea’…

And finally, May is the month of the Cannes Film Festival – and we’ll be bringing you more on that in the near future, including the shorts with a fighting chance of making it big ‘in competition’ – the festival’s main event. This is the one that offers the holy grail of filmmaking: the elusive Palme d’Or…