Maurice Cormier on They Are Killing Us...: Surreal Horror as Political Anxiety

Some films explain themselves. Others arrive like a nightmare and ask only that we feel them. They Are Killing Us..., directed by Canadian filmmaker Maurice Cormier, belongs firmly to the second category.

Described by Cormier as a non-narrative surrealist and experimental short with elements of science fantasy and body/eco horror, the film emerges from a nightmare vision of a possible near future. It is a work shaped by anxiety: climate change, war, racial violence, attacks on the free press, and the growing sense that the world is moving toward something catastrophic unless we radically change course.

Made through a self-taught mixed-media process involving photography, stop-motion animation, digital painting, and experimental visual techniques, They Are Killing Us... transforms limitation into language. The film has travelled widely on the festival circuit, with official selections at Short. Sweet. Film Fest., Texas Short Film Festival, Toronto International Short Film Awards, Experimental, Dance & Music Film Festival, Cannes International Film Week, and Toronto Lift-Off Film Festival. It received Best Experimental Micro Film at Texas Short Film Festival Winter 2026, Best Experimental Film at Toronto International Short Film Awards, and Best Story at the Experimental, Dance & Music Film Festival, alongside several nominations, semi-finalist placements, and honorable mentions.

For Final Cut Magazine, Cormier reflects on making cinema without permission, teaching himself animation, the importance of festivals for outsider voices, and why experimental film remains one of the most urgent spaces in independent cinema.

Maurice, They Are Killing Us... feels like a nightmare transmission from a possible future. What was the starting point for the film?

I previously made two short underground experimental films in the mid-to-late 2010s, and I was planning to move into more commercial work by making short horror films in 2020. Then COVID hit, and suddenly I couldn’t make a short film featuring actual actors.

So I had to delay those projects and go back to the no-budget underground experimental filmmaking route, which is where I had been honing my craft as a filmmaker.

It took a while to come up with the full idea for the film. During COVID, I was rewatching the documentary Jodorowsky’s Dune, Eraserhead, and Shin Godzilla, while also reading the manga Attack on Titan. That was when the imagery of a skin-covered planet, bleeding blood and opening up, began to emerge in my head.

Alongside the anxiety of the 2020s—climate change, wars, racial violence, attacks on the free press, and so on—the idea for They Are Killing Us... began to form.

By the time 2024 came around, the entire idea for the short film was fully formed, from beginning to middle to end. This film became a kind of self-therapy for me, a way of processing where we might be heading in the near future, but through the lens of an experimental surrealist body horror film.

Your director’s statement says viewers should not try to think, but simply feel the film. Why was that important?

They Are Killing Us... is a non-narrative surrealist and experimental short film with elements of science fantasy and body/eco horror.

It captures my current anxieties about the world and where we might be heading in the near future, whether that happens tomorrow morning or ten years from now. But because that near future is still only a possibility, it can still be prevented.

As a Canadian filmmaker, I feel that the world—especially places like the United States right now—needs to see this short film and be shaken by its contents.

I can’t promise that people will enjoy it or understand it. They might even ask what it is supposed to be. But I would say this: don’t try to think. Just feel it.

The film was made under serious limitations. What were the biggest challenges?

Time was the biggest challenge.

While I was making They Are Killing Us..., I had a full-time job, I was studying photography part-time, and I had other commitments. It was a very long process to shoot and edit the film.

When I was given a two-week vacation last year, I used that time to finish the short.

The mixed-media visual style is one of the most striking aspects of the film. How did you develop that language?

The experimental process of using mixed media to create the visual look of the film is what I’m most proud of.

I never studied animation or mixed media in college or art school. Since I had no actors to work with, I had to work within my limitations. Knowing photography, along with photo editing and digital painting, I started researching mixed media and stop-motion animation online and in books.

That process helped me create the visual language of the film. I became self-taught in stop-motion animation and photography while making it.

Your path into filmmaking began with a love of cinema but also with a sense that the industry was far away. How did you find your way in?

Since I was a kid, I wanted to be in some kind of creative profession. Whatever it was going to be, I knew it had to involve creativity.

I loved film from the beginning and would always get excited by the latest blockbusters as a child. As a teenager, I grew up during the era of DVD special features, so I started watching behind-the-scenes documentaries for The Original Star Wars Trilogy and The Lord of the Rings Extended Edition Trilogy. That made me fall in love with the art of filmmaking.

But I wasn’t sure it could be possible for me to have a career as a filmmaker. I had no connections at the time and didn’t live near the film industry.

At 16 or 17, I was thinking about becoming either a photographer or a novelist. I tried acting in high school, but preferred writing. Around that time, I came across Robert Rodriguez’s 10 Minute Film School videos online, and I realized you could make a film in your backyard or in your town. Suddenly, becoming a filmmaker felt possible.

There were also ads for DSLR cameras that could shoot high-quality cinematic video, and that made filmmaking feel more accessible.

I lived in Ontario, Canada, and I did a co-op at a local TV station, which helped me get into Mohawk College to study Broadcast Television. Around that time, I was getting into more avant-garde filmmakers like David Lynch, Werner Herzog, Alejandro Jodorowsky, David Cronenberg, Spike Lee, and Harmony Korine. My tastes were broadening.

During my final year in college, I wrote, produced, and was the on-camera subject of my autobiographical short film Normal: A Story of Autism. While making that film, because I wasn’t the director or editor, there were things I would have done differently. The experience taught me that in order to have full creative freedom, I needed to be in the director’s seat.

My first internship and job after college involved editing a feature-length documentary for a production company, as well as shooting industrial videos with them for a while. That became my filmmaking and screenwriting class. I learned so much about storytelling as an editor.

After that, I made two experimental short films, Imprinted in 2017 and Three Shots Each in 2019. Both went on to screen at various film festivals. I’ve been in the independent realm of filmmaking ever since I started making my own films.

What are you working on next?

I have a few projects I’m currently working on or hope to make, including Invisible Black Dot, a short film that would be a spiritual successor to They Are Killing Us....

I’m also developing four micro horror shorts, each between 15 and 60 seconds; an untitled 10-to-15-minute magic realist horror film; a six- or seven-part docuseries, though the seventh episode deals with difficult subject matter and may become a short documentary instead; Blue, a short documentary; and an untitled feature-length documentary on LGBTQ Muslim youth.

What role do film festivals play for filmmakers working outside the mainstream?

Besides giving filmmakers exposure, film festivals allow talent to network, make distribution deals for their work, create community among the filmgoing public, and give diverse talent—POC, LGBTQ, disabled, female filmmakers and performers—a chance to have their work shown to a wider audience.

Without festivals, these works might otherwise get lost in the sea of algorithms.

What advice would you give filmmakers entering the festival circuit with experimental or underground work?

First, do your homework before submitting. Make sure the festival is legitimate and that it accepts the genre or category your film falls under.

If you make a documentary, look into festivals that specialize in documentaries. If you make horror or sci-fi, try festivals that focus on genre or horror. If you make an experimental film, try submitting to arthouse or underground festivals.

In terms of rejection, it’s like boxing or working out when you first try it. It hurts a bit at first, but as you continue, you build resistance. Eventually, you don’t care about rejection as much. You just keep going, even as festivals start to accept your film.

Just because your feature or short is rejected does not mean it is bad. Sometimes it can be something as simple as how much room a festival has in its schedule, or whether your film fits the festival’s brand.

In terms of what film to make, make the film you want to make—the one only you can make. If this is your first time making a film, start small. Make a short film with one or two locations. Learn as you make it. Use your limitations as a guide, not a crutch.

Whatever “mistakes” you make the first time, apply those lessons to your next film. As you continue making films, you grow, get better, and discover what kind of filmmaker you are.

How do you see the future of film?

That’s a loaded question.

I think film and the film industry are in the middle of a transition. Platforms such as YouTube, Vimeo, Reddit, Kickstarter, and FilmFreeway are democratizing filmmaking, film festivals, and distribution.

Cameras that can shoot high-quality digital video are more affordable than ever. There are apps that can replicate film-like digital video. The walls and gatekeeping of the film industry are starting to erode. People don’t need permission or direct connections to make a film—or any art form, for that matter.

It’s easier than ever to make a film, but harder than ever to break through to the public because of the overload of videos being uploaded every day, which is made worse by algorithms.

That’s why I think film festivals and independent mom-and-pop theatres are going to become more important than ever in getting new voices, more independent films, and festivals out into the public.

In terms of avant-garde films, I don’t think they are dead at all. They’ve been digitized into the realm of streaming platforms like Vimeo, YouTube, Whush, and Kanopy.

As for film distribution, I predict more future filmmakers will make a big push toward self-distribution, especially looking at models used by films like Thunder Road, Hundreds of Beavers, and Iron Lung. Creatives can potentially profit more from that model and have more flexibility in making their films available across VOD, streaming, physical media, and other platforms.

It’s not easy, but it has major benefits. As people yearn to own the media they love, and not keep paying for streaming services, I see a DVD and Blu-ray revival similar to vinyl in the near future.

In terms of Hollywood, I see workers and creative talent fighting back against automation and building a better, thriving system. I could be wrong, but the dual 2023 WGA and SAG strikes, and the victories from those strikes, give me hope.

Notice that I use the word automation, not AI. Calling it artificial intelligence is a misnomer because it has no intelligence or thought. All it does is scan images and videos and regurgitate them into virtual muck.

To me, it’s not a new tool in filmmaking; it’s the next crypto or NFT. It’s a grift. Seeing apps like Sora shut down, major studios suing Midjourney, and the bubble starting to burst, I believe people are rejecting this tech and embracing human creativity.

That is why I believe human creativity and human perspective will be stronger than ever in the future of film.

Which filmmakers have shaped your own creative path?

There are so many filmmakers I admire, but if I narrow it down, I’ll cheat and choose two: David Lynch and Werner Herzog.

I love all of David Lynch’s films. He made surrealist cinema mainstream and changed television forever with Twin Peaks. Even though he made his last feature-length film in 2006, he continued making art until his passing. He made paintings, photography, daily YouTube videos, comic strips, music, short films, web series, and flash animation videos.

He didn’t need to ask permission to get his work greenlit. He went out and did it.

I also love Werner Herzog’s documentaries and the subjects he chooses to film. When it comes to fiction, Herzog always makes something interesting. He also advocates for the self-reliant DIY model of filmmaking and self-financing, which really appeals to me as a filmmaker.

Is there a recent film or filmmaker that impressed you?

While I haven’t seen Obsession or Backrooms yet, I was very impressed with Curry Barker’s first film, Milk & Serial. A budget of only $800—that’s impressive.

I’m also impressed by Kane Parsons taking an online creepypasta post of a simple image and spinning it into a series of short films and webisodes using a camera and Blender. He created a horror mythos akin to horror novelists like Stephen King and H.P. Lovecraft—minus the bigotry of Lovecraft, of course. It’s just impressive stuff.

I also really enjoyed the documentary Prophet Town by Dan Howlett.

Final Cut: Why They Are Killing Us... Matters

Watching They Are Killing Us..., I was reminded that experimental cinema does not need to explain the world in order to confront it. Sometimes a film can be more effective when it refuses clarity, when it works instead through dread, texture, repetition, and bodily unease.

Maurice Cormier’s film belongs to a vital tradition within independent cinema: films made outside systems, outside permission, and often outside comfort. It is not polished in a conventional industry sense, nor does it want to be. Its force comes from the fact that it feels handmade, urgent, anxious, and deeply personal.

What makes the film relevant is precisely its refusal to behave like a standard political statement. It does not lecture. It mutates. It turns the crises of the present into a surreal physical nightmare, as if the planet itself has become a wounded body. In doing so, it captures something many people feel but struggle to articulate: the sense that the future is arriving damaged.

Independent cinema needs films like this because they expand the language of what cinema can be. They remind us that film is not only narrative, character, and resolution. It can also be warning, ritual, scream, self-therapy, and visual disturbance.

In a culture increasingly shaped by algorithms, formulas, and marketable clarity, They Are Killing Us... feels like a necessary rupture. It is uncomfortable, strange, and uncompromising. And that is exactly why it matters.