Floored is a film chosen for screening at the HollyShorts Film Festival last month.
Floored (Plan D [Emily Alpren, Marchelle Bradanini], 2026)
A “comedy about women’s pain”, Floored takes inspiration from the real-life experiences of Alpren and Bradanini, as mothers who initially met in a Hollywood baby group. It covers themes around motherhood, ageing, female identity and visibility, and suppressed rage. When an ageing actress feels ignored and lost in life, and searches for healing, and seeks out a ‘pelvic floor guru’, this deeply satirical piece takes on truly sinister proportions.
With the basic idea of how to be a woman who is both creative and a mother in LA, Plan D’s cast of characters face their own insecurities and anger as their bodies change. Floored brings together a collection of women, each dealing with their own position in life at around age 40. Trilby Glover plays Eleanor, who organises the meeting in her home, and the cast also includes Mara Wilson, who we remember as a child actress in Matilda and other films.
Not to be confused with other short films also called Floored but about very different subjects, this one uses the yummy mummy and Housewives of … stereotypes while sending up the idea of wellness, personal chakras, and the general principle of coaches and gurus. The colour palette is especially of note as every woman has a bold identity identified by blue, green, yellow etc.
The ending is set to be a shocker, and whether it really works I will leave up to you. But it is nicely done, and the whole film is a good balance of amusement and some serious points about how marriages can work once a baby arrives.
Floored was part of this year’s HollyShorts Film Festival.