UK Premiere
Boudoir Doll 闺房娃娃
MINT Animation Short Strand: My Spectrum, My Shadow, and My Self
Year of Production 2025
Production Countries/Regions China
Duration 14 mins
Genres Drama Animation
Dialogue Language(s)
Subtitle Language(s) English
Director(s) Dandan Lou
Director’s Bio
Dandan Luo, currently living in Guangzhou, is a lecturer in the Digital Media Art, Academy of Fine Arts, South China Normal University. Animation works have been shortlisted for the China Animation & Comic Competition Golden Dragon Award and the Xiamen Cyber Sousa Award Animation Festival. The director is an antique doll collector and handicraft maker who likes to use antique fragments and waste to make dolls.
Synopsis
A beautiful lady is immersed in the world of puppet creation. One night, the looming evil hand tied her up as a living puppet and forced her to watch a dark and hopeless stage play. The desire to struggle and escape arose inside and outside the stage.
Festivals & Awards
2025 7th HiShorts! Film Festival
2025 8th Beirut International Women Film Festival
Izmir International Women Filmmakers Festival
Scriptwriter(s)
Dandan Lou
Producer(s)
Executive Producer(s)
Dandan Lou
Key Casts
Curators’ note
A doll maker is stalked by disembodied hands. What begins as an uneasy coexistence turns into a nightmare when she is bound with ropes, transformed into a living puppet, and drawn into a theatrical world. There, a space shaped by constraint and expectation emerges, and the boundary between maker and object begins to blur. Through its stylised imagery—mirrors, frames, and the tactile presence of the doll—the film reflects women's unease around autonomy, marriage, and prescribed roles, transforming craft into a quiet yet unsettling confrontation. （Alexandra Paulus）
Director’s Statement
This film is a reflection of the director's state of mind, embodying the contradictory dilemma. The heroine longs to create in quiet solitude, but the troubles of life are like the demonic hands that invade step by step. The babies in the stage play not only represent women's anxiety about marriage and childbirth, but also symbolize the time squeeze caused by various trivial matters in work and life. The heroine's creation of dolls is a niche hobby. Under various social responsibilities, her personal pursuits can only give in repeatedly. The heroine is like the doll she created, which can move but cannot be free. The name of the film and the character's appearance come from the boudoir dolls that were popular in Europe and America in the 1920s. Their slender and elegant appearance was specially designed for adult women, and they had various new female costumes. To a certain extent, they represented the liberation of women in the Jazz Age, but it seems to be contradictory with their charming figures and the characteristics of being placed in a boudoir.
