“Noodles Forever” won the $100,000 grand prize at the inaugural Cards Against Humanity Short Film Festival, selected from among 10 finalists. The film was written, directed, shot, scored and produced almost entirely by USC alumni. Most strikingly of all, its plot centers around a weiner dog and the man who hit him with his car.
Director and School of Cinematic Arts alum McKinley Carlin infused his vibrant, surreal comedy with aspects of reality, loosely derived from his own life experiences. In the film, main character Phil tries to hide the corpse of said wiener dog just as he enters his daughter’s birthday party, far from what actually occurred when Carlin found his eureka moment.
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“I almost hit my sister’s dog back in Minnesota,” Carlin said. “He ran out into the street and right when that happened, I was like, ‘Oh, I have an idea.’”
Thus, the concept of “Noodles Forever” was born. After a brief moment of discovering the eponymous character wandering around, the audience is soon met with a freeze frame of a sedan striking the canine. However, the filmmakers knew they had to balance out the tragedy with a light-hearted respite. After all, it was still a comedy. Carlin saw to it that this was not lost on the viewer.
“It’s really important that you let an audience know that they can laugh … right after [Phil] hits the dog is an anime ringtone,” Carlin said. “You got to give [the audience] a little bit of leeway, and you got to give them permission to laugh as soon as possible.”
An aspect of the production team’s comedic approach also manifested itself in how the score of the film framed the themes. Some scenes jabbed at putting on a dishonest show in social situations and shrouding one’s humanity instead of accepting it. Producer and composer Evan O’Brien spoke on how he brought these deeply human themes to the fore through music.
“It just kind of hit me that the sound of [the film] could reflect how the comedy is really about how we’re only human, even in these civilized settings where we’re all supposed to be nice to each other, and not explode out of anxiety or insecurity,” O’Brien said. “The music should reflect this primal, kind of tribal, very visceral, animalistic, locks-into-your-spine simple grooves, very simple melodies and loud drums.”
Throughout the film, shiny and dreamy outdoor scenes stand out visually and give the story its dichotomy between a cheery, playful event and a dreadful, violent loss. This ambience can be attributed to the short’s director of photography, Tre’len Johnston. He spoke about the simultaneous pressures and joys of working with and depending on natural lighting.
“[The sun] was something that I stressed over for an entire month before filming,” Johnston said. “Every single thing was planned out to a T … It was about location scouting and being very, very thorough in our schedule.”
Despite the structured schedule, Carlin and Johnston’s flexibility and creativity combined to create a final product that they were proud of. Johnston highlighted the importance of allowing yourself to make changes, while also balancing new ideas with a robust structure.
“The style of this film was born out of us creating it,” Johnston said. “It’s all about a healthy balance. When you have a strong director that knows exactly what they want out of this scene … it kind of gives me the flexibility to check off their boxes, and then for myself figure out, ‘What can I add to this scene?’”
Carlin explained that trust on set creates both a better environment and a better artistic product. He offered a caution to filmmakers old and young, urging them to try what they wanted to try and have confidence in their choices and the choices of others.
“I’ve seen so many films that are destroyed by the ego of the director, like absolutely evaporated, because they either don’t trust anybody and do everything themselves,” Carlin said, “or they don’t trust themselves enough, and that leads to people that are indecisive, because if the director is not decisive, then what am I doing? You’ve got to strike a balance.”
O’Brien reinforced the idea that allowing creative malleability in the end produced some of the most iconic moments in the film.
“We soon learned that a lot of the best ideas come when you just completely abandon what the movie is in your head, when you read the script and just try something really crazy,” O’Brien said.
The filmmakers all met through their USC connections. Carlin and O’Brien began a longtime friendship and creative partnership by getting assigned together in their mandatory Intermediate Production course.
“Through sheer happenstance, McKinley and I were put in a trio together,” O’Brien said. “We had the best time, we really hit it off, and the creative collaboration just really grew from there.”
Carlin proved a common SCA belief to be true: The people you meet end up being the same faces you will see in your professional life going forward. He doubted it at first, but through collaborations like “Noodles Forever,” realized it had some accuracy.
“You can’t experience it fully until it happens to you, and now moving forward, it’s like, ‘Okay, I got my DP. I got my producer.’ Everyone’s ready for the next thing,” Carlin said.
The Cards Against Humanity Short Film Festival was a unique event not just because of its gargantuan grand prize, but because of its insistence to have the recipients be chosen not by panels of judges, but rather by the audiences themselves. Carlin spoke on how this gave him confidence that “Noodles Forever” was a piece of art that stayed with audiences.
“That was my favorite part of the festival, because it felt like, to me, it was a weird, quasi-box office victory,” Carlin said. “It really matters that people are seeing it and responding to it, and so for it to be voted on was the best feeling ever … That made it so much more personal for me, for sure.”
“Noodles Forever” is available to watch for free on the Cards Against Humanity Short Film Festival website for the rest of the year, in celebration of its grand prize achievement.
