A deaf rapper struggles when a deadly gas forces humanity to live underground.


SILENT WORLD is used with permission from Charlie Dennis. Learn more at https://charliedennis.co.uk.


The British government has declared a state of emergency as deadly gas leaks into the air. Normal life never recovered, and now humanity must live underground and indoors and adapt as best as it can to straitened circumstances, which include looters who prey on those who get caught aboveground during evacuations.

Deafrapper Signkid is adrift in this new reality, made even more challenging by his deafness, and he struggles in moments of alarm when he can't hear valuable information during announcements. During one evacuation, he meets Dayo, whom he connects with over his rapping, though that connection can go only so far since she can't sign. That tenuousness of connection not just to Dayo, but to realtime information may prove dangerous during a perilous time in history.

Directed by Charlie Dennis, this short drama blends dystopian scifi atmospherics with a penetrating character study of a deaf man's increasing isolation and alienation at the worst possible time. It's a compelling exploration of a world gone mad, complete with parallels to our contemporary moment, but it's also a richly evocative portrait of how it feels to navigate an uncertain world, emotionally and on a sensory level, without hearing.

The sharp writing quickly and efficiently builds the dystopian conditions of the film's world, one where poisons fill the air, people must remain indoors and lawlessness pervades. There's a moody, hazy feel in the visuals, both naturalistic in its muted, drained color palette and woozy in its expressionistic camerawork. The visuals convey a disorienting reality, where nothing is stable or secure. Signkid navigates this strange, surreal world, but he is also separated from the people around him by the pervasive silence he experiences. And he's anxious because, in crucial moments, he can't fully understand what is going on.

We experience these moments alongside Signkid as he struggles to understand what's going on when safe zones are evacuated and poison clouds are imminent. The jagged editing and camera capture the disorientation during these key sequences, and the sound design also toggles between what the hearing world hears and what Signkid experiences. The discrepancy is not just engaging on a visceral, sensory level, but informative of how Signkid is at a disadvantage because he's deaf.

Rapper Signkid plays himself in the film credited under his name Kevin Walker and he's an engaging presence throughout. The moments he has rapping to himself and working on his music offer a snapshot of a creative, committed artist before the world went awry, and his understated yet precise performance conveys Signkid's anxieties and frustrations in situations where his deafness is a disadvantage.

As the world spins out of control and catastrophe nears, it feels like only a matter of time until he faces the biggest dangers yet. SILENT WORLD generates suspense as it veers into its final movement, ratcheting tension and uncertainty. But the postscript of the film packs the most impact, sharing the film's inspiration and Signkid's reallife experiences during the Covid19 pandemic. Though the film is scifi in its dystopian stylings, it also has echoes of our existing reality, making it all the most thoughtprovoking.