Canadian Premiere
Selection 2023 Before features

Smoking Kills

Directed by Dulcinée DeGuere

Credits  

Official selection

Palm Springs Shortfest 2023
HorrorHound Film Festival 2023
Overlook Film Festival 2023

Director

Dulcinée DeGuere

Producer

Dulcinée DeGuere, Russell Kahn, Lío Mehiel, Christopher Robinson

Writer

Dulcinée DeGuere

Cast

Lío Mehiel, Flora Wildes

Cinematographer

Robert Nachman

contact

Voyeur Productions

USA 2023 13 mins OV English
Genre HorrorComedyExperimentalLGBTQIA2S+

Olivia lays on a shag, green carpet covered in crushed doritos, chain-smoking as she waits for her Tinder date. Trey arrives and is immediately off-put by Olivia’s strange demeanor, but undeniably attracted to her seductive charm. But when Trey asks her to stop smoking, their dynamic quickly evolves into a cat and mouse power exchange in which Olivia is determined to dominate Trey. Hoping to get her in a more sensual mood, Trey offers Olivia some GHB. But instead of turning her on, the drugs feed her shadow self - the part of her defined by addiction, shame, and self-destruction.
As the night goes on, Olivia’s nicotine addiction causes mood swings that Trey struggles to keep up with. Hoping to get her in a more sensual mood, Trey offers Olivia some GHB. But instead of turning her on, the drugs feed her shadow self - the part of her defined by addiction, shame, and self-destruction. As Olivia loses her grip on reality, the film’s formal qualities descend into psychedelic mania and genre-bending soundscapes in attempts to glorify its problematic messaging.

Olivia - fully overcome by mania - overdoses Trey on GHB and stabs her cigarette butts out on his skin, repeatedly. Finally, and with a delicious grin, she lights her cigarette one last time before plunging it into Trey’s eyeball. Satisfied with her work, she leaves him on the couch, shirtless and maimed, just in time for the actual homeowner to arrive back to this gruesome scene, her toddler in tow.

Showings