Meet the Lost (and Found) Souls of Morongo Valley, California
When the Novemba Films crew found themselves in California with time to kill, they headed to the desert until they reached Morongo Valley, a place that has more than meets the eye.
Here’s some more background from Blair Macdonald on “Morongo”, our latest Short of the Week.
Leaving LA in a rented car loaded with our camera gear, we headed for the desert. We’d just spent a few months pitching on commercials, developing ideas and plotting the next 'big thing'. We’d pounded away at our laptops long into the night, fuelled by a heady mix of angst and ambition, but the results were nothing tangible, a kind of anti-matter, a vacuum of creativity and feeling.
This trip was an antidote to all of that. We had a burning desire to just get out there and film. So we hit the road. After a couple of hours, not long past Palm Springs, we arrived at a small town carved into a narrow valley in the high desert. We pulled into the gas station to grab a cool drink. Outside we met a guy playing hacky sack with mesmerising skill and intensity. He introduced himself to us as J3, and said he’d glimpsed the fifth dimension. It was time to start filming.
As the sun began to set across the valley that day, we decided we might as well stick around Morongo Valley, population 3,552. There was just something about it. This film is a depiction of the next 4 days spent in the town.
Short of the Week is our series dedicated to showcasing the best short documentaries available online. Get in touch to pitch yours.
