Before Vermines, Sébastien Vaniček’s already shocking first films
The young director has already shot four short films and a genre mini-series, with a preference for horrific atmospheres.
The trailer for Vermin revealed to us some fragments of the very worked aesthetic of its director, Sébastien Vaniček. The film is a survival urban in which the inhabitants of a city are trapped and must face an invasion of deadly spiders. This is a first feature film with a young and eclectic cast (Theo Christine, Jerome Niel, Finnegan Oldfield, Sofia Lesaffre, Lisa Nyarko), fully assuming his belonging to horror…
Make no mistake, Sébastien Vanček has a lot more experience than you imagine. From his first shorts, we already observed his obsessions and his brand which, we hope, will fully blossom in Vermin.
With four shorts and a three-episode mini-webseries to his credit, he previously worked on the genre elements that infuse into Vermin. His four short films are all available on the streaming platform Shadowz and its web series is accessible on Youtube. Let’s dive right into the dark, violent and critter-infested mind of a promising young filmmaker.
Mayday : Life and death impulses
This is his first short film produced and released in 2015, initiating his future filmography. Mayday rhymes with radical. It is an indescribable trip featuring the hallucinations of a character during a plane crash, mixing impromptu orgasmic will and apocalyptic violence. With this filmic experiment (more than a narrative film), the filmmaker already offers a daring direction that he will master better and better throughout his work. Mayday reflects his birth cry, a powerful and indomitable roar that announces his arrival in the industry…
Fangs : A dog’s life
In 2018, he delivered his longest film, Fangs, thirty minutes following the life of a fighting dog, constantly mistreated by her master. The actor Olivier Barthélémy (Mesrine) embodies this violent loser who still imagines that dog fighting will get him out of poverty. We particularly remember the intro credits of the film, which once again signify the maturity and artistic vitality that inhabit Sébastien Vaniček. A dog fight filmed like a music video, on film, testifying to a true love of images. We also spot a little prophetic cutaway where the director films a grasshopper in close-ups… We learn in his bio that he started as a kid by filming insects with the family camcorder. No coincidence.
Do not move : good dog, bad dog
In 2021, he made his first collaboration with Jerome Nielinternet star and comedian, present in the casting of Vermin. He extends his experience of the doggie film by offering a visual release in which Jerome Niel is a mute character punching the face of an owner abandoning his dog on a vacant lot. The director continues his experiments by switching to the 4:3 format, always with his appetite for good grained peloche. A little message of prevention against the abandonment of pets gently punctuates the surge of violence in the film. So be careful if you mistreat your dog, Uncle Séb will come for you…
holo : The Pokemon’s Connection
Second collaboration with Jerome Nielaccompanied by another YouTube star Jérémie Dethelot, holo, released in 2022, marks Sébastien Vaniček’s entry into the scam film genre. In around fifteen minutes, the filmmaker summons the brothers’ cinema Safdie (magnificent nod to Uncut Gems which opens and closes the film), and recounts the setbacks of two losers trying to scam dealers in extremely rare Pokémon cards. No drugs in the pockets, but Charizard, Tortank and other Bulbasaur in ultra-limited edition and above all holographic. A little nugget with an unexpected and fatal drop, a brutal warning to all compulsive collectors.
Zer : Confinement madness
Filmed in full confinement, Zer is the filmmaker’s latest achievement. In three five-minute episodes, he makes a mockumentary following the descent into hell of a theater actor (well, again Jerome Niel) desperate at the idea of cultural activities stopping due to the pandemic. We’re starting to get to know the loustic and it’s all going to quickly turn into a happy, violent mess, sometimes almost absurd, mixing conspiracies, grocery store robberies and chases. One thing is sure, Sébastien Vaniček doesn’t like to stay locked up.
Now you are armed to go and see Vermin and survive alongside the characters against this horde of bloodthirsty spiders. Sébastien Vaniček is far from being his first attempt, and the experience acquired on his courts will be more than beneficial for his first feature. A young filmmaker to follow closely.
