A dystopian love story set in a world where a virus deems physical contact impossible.

Thirty years after a devastating disease has consumed humankind, Jack and the last of humanity live under the ultimate truce: to never touch again. Working as a disposal officer, Jack sees the last terror of the plague – in those who defect, who succumb to touch, disease and a despicable death – all from behind the safety of a pane of glass. But as the memories of his mother’s last loving touch begin to unravel him, Jack sinks deeper into a void between the sterile and the depraved, where desire is forbidden, fear is mandatory and everything depends on which side of the glass you stand behind.

Twenty Forty Three was my graduate film at Swinburne University. I know it’s a zombie movie, but really I’m a romantic – this was a film about love and unfulfilled love. The mistakes we all make. It’s all about coming back to some kind of simple human connection and emotional truth. And I love dystopian narratives – they aren’t constrained by reality so you get dramatic freedom – using unrealistic scenarios to create very real, powerful human narratives. But the very initial seed of an idea came from this fear we are supposed to have of each other. It allows us to disconnect and think of others as less than human – the ‘us’ against ‘them’ that drives so much bullshit in the world – that is something I feel strongly about.

Brilliantly directed by Australian filmmaker Eugénie Muggleton, who has previously brought us a more toned down drama ‘Small Hands‘, has turned to an over saturated genre to tell her latest romantic drama. Twenty Forty Three is a Zombie film there is no doubt, but Eugénie has tackled the subject in a way that we’ve never seen before. Unlike most Zombie films that start right along the beginning of the apocalypse, this short takes us further along the ride where civilization has already come accustomed to this new way of life – firing an interesting point of view of human emotions connecting to their needs and desires.