Apollo
Director: Giles Perkins
United States, 2024, 14 min
Shooting Format:Digital
Festival Year:2025
Category:Narrative Short
Genres:Drama, Thriller, Family
Cast:Isaac Witte, Cal Freundlich
Crew:Writer: Giles Perkins. Producers: Roya Alidjani, Tiana Cantu.
Email:hello@gilesperkins.com
Synopsis
15-year-old Angus considers the sacrifice he needs to make for the approval of his older brother’s friends.
Trailer
About the director
Giles Perkins is a writer and director based in Brooklyn, NY. Originally from Baltimore, MD, Giles is a graduate of NYU's Tisch School of the Arts with a B.F.A. in Film & Television Production. His two most recent films, Expiration Date (documentary) and Apollo (narrative), explore niche interpersonal conflict emanating from misguided American ideals.
Expiration Date will have its New York premiere at the 2025 Tribeca Film Festival. It previously screened at the Atlanta Film Festival, St. Louis International Film Festival, and Dallas International Film Festival, among others. Apollo had its world premiere at the Woodstock Film Festival where it was nominated for best short film. The project also earned Giles a finalist position for the 2024 Sundance Ignite Fellowship and a shortlist nomination for the Young Director Awards.
In 2023, Giles directed short documentaries on Brooklyn-based fashion designer KidSuper and each of his chaotic Paris Fashion Week shows, including the AW23 season he designed for Louis Vuitton. Giles is in post-production for his next short. He is also in the development stage for his debut feature film.
Filmmaker's note
Although I never had older siblings, this film is inspired by the many late nights I shared with older cousins in my most impressionable teenage years. The people I grew up idolizing seemed to have hung the moon for as long as I could remember. As I grew older and my name changed from ‘Little Giles’ to just ‘Giles,’ I was introduced to the many shortcomings my heroes possessed. In due time, I would have to decide if these flaws were something I could learn to accept or if they were truly insurmountable.
This is a decision I am still working through to this day.
In reflecting on these moments, I realized my responsibility to be there for my younger brother. Through the faults of those closest to me, I found how I could be supportive of him and his dreams. This project is the synthesis of these two understandings. It is a look at the more nuanced ways toxic masculinity perpetuates everyday life and more specifically, its degenerative effect on men’s ability to form strong and healthy relationships with each other.