Science fiction and comedy are usually a pretty rough fit, when it works at all, but today’s offering — a black and white short subject by Collin Black called Abduction Production — is the exception to the rule.

Abduction Production is a sci-fi comedy short film about a monotonous young couple, Barney and Beth, who are inspired by sci-fi b-movies to fake an alien abduction to spice up their relationship. They hire a local filmmaker and landscaper, Cletus, to create the most “realistic” UFO sighting video to help prove their elaborate hoax.

Crew:

• Writer, Director, Editor – Collin Black
• Producers – Joey Caldwell, Collin Black, Hayden Johnson
• Director of Photography – Sammy Lahiri
• Music – Joseph Reitz

Cast:

• Beth – Erin Bechler
• Barney – Collin Black
• Cletus – Jacob Rice
• Newsman – Christofer Smith
• Additional Voices – Jasper Jones and Becky Hirschfeld

The film Abduction Production was produced via a successful GoFundMe campaign, which resulted in a modest $1498 raised – but they still managed one of the most cinematically literate short films we’ve seen in a long time. They also managed to be genuinely funny, with well written dialog and sight gags every scif-fi fan will appreciate. It’s genuinely funny.

Anybody can grab eyeballs with a short film where a few tens of thousands dollars were spent on production. It takes a real filmmaker with vision to do that with a tiny budget like this. You have to get creative, and work within your limitations. Collin Black succeeds wonderfully. Kudos to him, his female lead Erin Bechler, his cast, his astute cinematographer Sammy Lahiri, the wonderful music written by Joseph Reitz, and the rest of his team.

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