Diogo Barbosa’s short film ‘The Factory’ follows the story of a factory in its last hours. The CEO arrives at work and sees that everything seems normal. He arrives in his office, then a man comes giving him the bad news – the business is going down, and he has to shut down the factory. When you do this, there is more than a radical decision involved; there are feelings, people who will be unemployed, mouths to feed, kids to be raised, houses to be taken care of. One by one, we can see the now-former employees getting their last paychecks and signing the release forms. The whole mood of the scene is dark, and to top it, something more comes in the end to foreground the actual grim ending.

​

In Barbosa’s short, we loved that there is no spoken dialogue, and all the ‘talking’ is taken care of by the soundtrack. We understand that the whole process of this film is on a super fast forward, but it is made like this to make a point on how fast life can change. The score is perfectly fit for this story, and it highlights the highs and lows whenever needed. The lack of spoken dialogue leaves plenty of space for the non-verbal actions that are extremely important in such a narrative. The guilt, the pain, the fear, all of these states are perfectly balanced and expressed by the cast in various ways.

​

The script is in the form of a fable where all the events seem to be highlights of a longer story. The point here is pretty straightforward, the reason why we firmly believe that Barbosa managed to create a fantastic film. The perfectly fluid camera work could also be included in the same category, as it gives the whole experience a sense of life-like perception. ‘The Factory’ is one of the saddest yet successful stories you get to see on screen, a story that cannot stress enough the ‘take anything for granted’ saying.