Work samples
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FROG HOLLOW -- Feature Film StillA sci-fi narrative film in collaboration with Hansen Robotics and Singularity Net’s humanoid AI robot. This film takes place in a future where all humans have left a damaged earth for space stations, leaving behind Francis, a Humanoid robot tasked with caring for the planet. Frog Hollow is a metaphor for the human condition in our present day. Francis shows us that it is not the technology around us that defines and makes us uniquely human, but our ability to adapt and live in coexistence with our home, the planet Earth.
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ETERNITY ONE -- Feature Film StillA feature documentary film on the direct effects of the climate crisis, the history of labor, girlhood in the face of unstoppable change, while also investigating how deep time informs the cyclical nature of life, the future, and the present day. Filmed over four years on Tangier Island in the Chesapeake Bay, I’ve shot, written, and directed this intimate glimpse into the extraordinary within the ordinary, living amongst the insular community that the film is about and for.
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CRESTONE-- Clips from the Feature Film
A futuristic hybrid-documentary that follows a group of SoundCloud rappers as they navigate a post-societal existence in the now abandoned town of Crestone, Colorado. This artful documentary blurs reality and fiction as it introduces a new world: one where “performing” and “being” are indistinguishable. As the film explores the often hidden aspects of collaboration and friendship as well as the human desire to persist against all odds, it also interrogates the traditional documentary form’s inability to fully capture reality and the human experience.
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DIRT DAUGHTER -- Short Film Trailer
A narrative short film exploring the tangible nature of the internet. Often overlooked as a purely digital entity, the film reveals the physical infrastructure that underpins our online world. Set in a deserted department store in downtown Baltimore, Maryland, a six-foot-diameter fiber optic cable - crucial for transatlantic internet connectivity - is housed beneath the building. The story centers around a solitary security guard tasked with protecting this vital piece of infrastructure. As she navigates her isolation, an omniscient algorithm emerges, offering guidance in her quest for genuine human connection. Through this unlikely partnership, DIRT DAUGHTER delves into the profound impact the internet has had on our sense of self and our interpersonal relationships.
About Marnie Ellen
Marnie Ellen Hertzler is a filmmaker from the Southern United States, currently based in Baltimore, Maryland. Her work spans lens-based media, digital systems, and isolated landscapes, exploring the intersection of historical and speculative narratives to examine deep time, the environment, and the relationships between humans and the more-than-human world.
Her debut feature film, Crestone, premiered at True/False in 2020 and was subsequently showcased at SXSW, CPH:DOX, BAM… more
Crestone - Feature Film
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Crestone behind the scenes photo -
Crestone Still -
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Crestone | Official Red Band TrailerCrestone official trailer through Utopia Distribution.
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CRESTONE-- Clips from the Feature FilmClips from the feature film CRESTONE. -- In a world that undulates between fact and fiction, digital and physical, the last people alive on earth are a group of Soundcloud rappers living a solitary existence in the desert town of Crestone, Colorado. Once a religious and spiritual mecca for many, Crestone creates a compelling cinematic backdrop of endless sand dunes, waterfalls, and dark caves juxtaposed with images of tattooed bodies, cosplay wardrobes, and clouds of marijuana smoke. When the rappers are visited by a hometown friend, they decide to make a movie together. This movie is a love letter. This movie is about the end of the world.
Dirt Daughter
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Dirt DaughterMany of us believe that the internet isn't a physcial thing, rather an infinite, invisible resource. But the internet is finite, and very physical, and it is tucked away in a vast underground internet serer below a giant, empty building far, far away. Lily lives alone in this building and guards it and all of its visible, physical, nothingness. She just broke up with her boyfriend. (2019, 13 min.)
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Dirt Daughter StillStill from short film "Dirt Daughter" -
Dirt Daughter StillStill from short film "Dirt Daughter" -
Dirt Daughter StillStill from short film "Dirt Daughter" -
Dirt Daughter StillStill from short film "Dirt Daughter" -
Dirt Daughter StillStill from short film "Dirt Daughter" -
Dirt Daughter StillStill from short film "Dirt Daughter"
Hi I Need To Be Loved
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Hi I Need To Be Loved'I am going to have you read from a collection of my spam emails,' The director explains as she ushers actors from Craigslist one-by-one into an audition room. The actors and the director together attempt to breathe life into lifeless, manipulative, malicious, and nonsensical email dialogue in an attempt to realize and humanize the digital and inhumane. All is revealed to the viewer; The slate, light stands, teleprompter, a boom operator, film equipment litters the audition room floor, a cow pasture, a sunset, a strip club. Is this poetry or malware? (2018, 11 min.)
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Film StillActor while preforming a reading of a spam email from the view of the teleprompter. -
Film StillClose up of Actor while preforming a reading of a spam email. -
Set PhotographyA photograph on set of the Director (Marnie Ellen Hertzler) and Actor during the audition process -
Set PhotographyPhotograph of the farm location. -
Set PhotographyThe teleprompter - an integral character to the audition process of the film -
Hi I Need To Be Loved -- Short Film TrailerTrailer for the short film HI I NEED TO BE LOVED - Actors from Craigslist audition for a film by reading spam emails from a teleprompter. Three are cast: A Dancer, A Chef, and A Milkmaid. Is it poetry or malware? (2018, 11min)
Growing Girl animation and performance
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Growing Girl AnimationUtilizing unconventional animation platforms, and stock photo characters, Growing Girl is an animation that explores the form and setting of office culture, the reclamation of an empowered female identity, and a remedy for the internalization of an all-too-common social conflict. (2016, 11 min.)
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Growing Girl animation stillVideo still from Growing Girl animation -
Growing Girl animation stillVideo still from Growing Girl animation -
Growing Girl performance photoPhotograph from Growing Girl live performance Miami, FL 2017 -- Borscht Film Festival -
Growing Girl performance photoPhotograph from Growing Girl live performance Miami, FL 2017 -- Borscht Film Festival -
Growing Girl performance photoPhotograph from Growing Girl live performance Miami, FL 2017 -- Borscht Film Festival -
Growing Girl performance photoPhotograph from Growing Girl live performance Miami, FL 2017 -- Borscht Film Festival
