Life Rendered

By: Kelly Kearney

Set in the rural farmlands of Colorado, Mark leads a double life–split between caring for his disabled father’s cattle ranch and living his true identity, Orion, in the animated realm of virtual reality. Escapism is his only way of coping with his mundane life in rural Oklahoma, but when his two worlds come crashing together Mark faces the truth about his secret and the worry that his father could never accept him. Acceptance for one’s truth is the theme of Life Rendered and, thanks to technology, it seems more accessible than ever. 

With the juxtaposition between the hyper-masculne cowboy he’s expected to be and the gay man he hides inside a utopia of his own making, Mark (Owen Teague) manages to find love in the animated world – giving him a reason to get up in the morning and deal with the responsibilities of caring for a father (Luce Rains) who is going through his own identity struggle. The former rodeo star turned cattle rancher and current leg amputee went from a proud able-bodied man to someone whose current existence is foreign to the life he always led. The farmhouse, which is snuggled inside a breathtaking view of green rolling hills that go on for what feels like an eternity, acts as a sort of prison for both men who dream of a different life existing one pixelated world away. Mark, having no other way to express his desires and test his own gender fluidity, escapes to the ultra surreal VR world where he finds the love he thought he could never have. Like Mark, his father is burdened with the question of who he is now that he’s lost his leg. What seems like a technological barrier between the two becomes a vehicle for understanding each other, not to mention a way for them to find some common ground.  

Life Rendered gives hope to LGBTQ people looking for acceptance outside of an often unaccepting culture. In a time when attacks on the community are at an all-time high throughout small-town America, oppression can sometimes feel like a genetic illness that’s been passed down through the generations and for Mark life as a gay cattle rancher is not only a cultural sin but it’s an anomaly of the rural experience. It forces secrecy for survival onto people like him, whose lives depend on spaces where they can exist without judgment. Mark’s space just happens to be the life he created online and it is the only place he feels complete.

Directed by Emma Needell and co-written by Ryan Barton, the short (running approximately twenty-three minutes) feels almost like a full-length feature that left me wanting more. The story, which masterfully weaves together reality with the animated world of Motion Capture, is robust in not only the landscape but in the character development that does not depend on dialogue to guide the viewer along. Mark, played with the quiet brilliance of Owen Teague, expresses all of the depths of his character’s despair in the subtle nuances of a look or a sigh while the animated Orion is beaming with personality thanks to the love he’s found behind the headset. Likewise the lost and aimlessly existing father, played by Luce Rains, adds depth to the often overused trope that bigotry grows hearty in patches of land beyond the urban streets.

It is no surprise Needell filmed the short on the cattle ranch where she grew up; her love affair with the land is evident in the sweeping green hills pouring into every ultra sun-bleached shot. Where the romance fades is in the stranglehold conservatism has on the people who inhabit these spaces. In a place where it can feel like the modern world has yet to plant its feet on the dusty roads of the past, Needell imbues a feeling of both pride for her home and a need to shake it by its shoulders until acceptance comes tumbling out in the form of a cultural shift. Mark/Orion is the catalyst for that evolutionary change of mind, heart and modernity and his story is one to which many should relate. His escape into an animated world where he is free to love and be loved without the pressures that exist outside his VR goggles turns dreams into hope; hope that there are places where happiness exists for everyone – even someone like Mark and his wheelchair-bound cowboy of a father. Trapped in a world not of our choosing can also be the thread that ties us together and Life Rendered forces the viewer to question what we know while asking us to dream of the possibilities that exist beyond our imaginations. It manages to embrace its truths while facing a world full of uncertainty; promising to find common ground with those amongst the weeds of our differences in a time when differences seem to divide us more than ever. 

The emotions of this piece are brought to screen not only in the performances but in the dreamscape of motion capture animation which Needell and her team created virtually over the three-year pandemic lockdown. It was a bit of art imitating life – where minds from different corners of the earth met virtually to build a world untouched by the chaos we were all trying to survive. With the help of the free sources available at Unreal Engine (the world’s leading 3D creation software responsible for bringing realistic animated worlds to life on shows like “Game of Thrones”) Needell and her innovative team created their own vibrant world with the help of a custom-designed virtual camera system. Composed of anamorphic camera lenses, Needell was able to film the actors while simultaneously piloting their avatars to create an overlapping image combining the two into one. Life Rendered masterfully delivers Orion’s virtual world with mind-blowing surrealism that’s sure to entice other filmmakers into the motion capture genre. The animation is unlike anything we’ve seen before and the scope of possibilities–endless, but it’s how Needell ties together the real world with the animated one that sets this short apart from the rest of the Tribeca entries this year.

When it comes to short films the over twenty minute entries are few and far between, but Life Rendered succeeds in holding its audience’s attention while dazzling them with its modern take on technology as a form of communication, community and escapism. In the film’s quietest moments it’s the message of hope and acceptance that rings through loud and clear; sticking with you long after the credits roll. If you are struggling to find that sanctity of self-truth or if you have an unfulfilled desire to be loved in your most authentic form then Life Rendered is a much watch. The animation alone is something that has to be seen to be believed.