Price of Life (2018)

An animated short film that never gets old, especially with iconic characters from the Disney series.

The history of Hollywood is as ugly as it is beautiful. Most notably absent from Hollywood history are Black-produced films. “They’ve Gotta Have Us” explores the rise of Black cinema.

At 2:17 a.m., every child in a third-grade class wakes up, leaves their home, and disappears into the darkness—except one. The next day, teacher Justine Gandy discovers that Alex Lily is the only student left, while the rest have vanished without a trace. Did Justine have something to do with it, or is a far more sinister force stalking the town, targeting not just children, but anyone in its path?

These confines won’t really encourage you to read the film as a metaphor for the nerve-inducing experience we’ve all been through over the last year, however — and in the interest of maintaining your dignity, you probably shouldn’t. While the sociopolitical commentary may have worked for the similarly-themed Buried (2010), in which we find Ryan Reynolds on his own buried alive in the Middle East, but this futuristic take on the premise is best left as a piece of distracting entertainment. Nevertheless, the atmosphere is no less suffocating, literally and dramatically.

Rather than focusing on the bleak, cynical aspects of life post-pandemic, the focus is optimistic and hopeful.

A pop star at Radio City Music Hall gets the opportunity to change herself to save her music career.