Womb With A View

Description

‘Womb With A View’ is a comedic short film with sung musical elements. It cuts between two parallel conversations between twin brothers- one on their 30th birthday and the other 30 years and 8 hours previously, in the womb, as their mother’s contractions start. Conversation 1 - Using stock CG footage of pre-natal twins, ambient heartbeat and muted synth underscore, with silent film-style dialogue cards to show the ‘conversation’, the unborn brothers discuss what is coming ‘next’. One of the twins believes that there is another world out there, while the other believes that their current world is all there is. They banter and argue, and are interrupted by ‘that song again’; a muted lullaby coming from somewhere. It’s their Mum (who one of them believes in, the other doesn’t), singing to them. Conversation 2 - follows the same pattern, this time discussing whether or not there’s a world to come after this one. The first brother teases the second, and has adapted the lullaby into a musical number, which the other brother begrudgingly joins, ending the film in a comedic duet, 'More To Life'.

Biblical Connection

Psalm 139, 12-16 is the basis for this story: ‘even the darkness will not be dark to you; the night will shine like the day, for darkness is as light to you. For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know then full well… all the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.” One brother understands this part of his identity - a fearfully and wonderfully made creation who was destined for this world, and is now destined for the next. He understands that just as his Mum was surrounding him in the womb, so God and the Kingdom surrounds us in this world. The other brother is wry and mocking, though he loves his brother. They meet up as adults, and the first brother has brought pictures of their baby scans, which sparks the conversation about being created. Eventually their conversation, and the song, leads through questions over the nature of identity, reality and hope, ending with the question ‘is this all there is?’