The tale of a job seeker traversing the multiverse has made the 48-Hour Film Festival grand final, after winning the newly introduced "incredibly strange" category in the Dunedin City Finals last week.
PolyFutures InCorporated is the creation of four-person team Te Whare Raiona.
University College deputy warden and film editor Chris Jacobs said the film was an "utterly spontaneous" creation that nodded to films such as Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness and Everything Everywhere All at Once.
In the film a woman undergoes a job interview for a multiverse company.
"Various versions of herself from other universes come and tell her what she’s supposed to be doing, and she has to decide what’s the right thing to do.
"They tell her a bunch of conflicting information," Mr Jacobs explained.
Editing was challenging, as the 48-hour timeframe did not allow for a perfectionist approach.
This was compounded by the multiverse storyline which had about 14 different versions of the main character, with up to four versions appearing on-screen at the same time, he said.
He and teammate UniCol subwarden Jamii Kingston had entered the competition before.
However, it was an "amazing" debut effort for the team’s two other members, UniCol resident Tom Walsh and Carrington Residential College resident Odin Jacobs — Mr Jacobs’ son.
"You just can’t do it yourself, it’s not a solo project.
"It’s amazing to work together and really put something on the screen that resonates," Mr Jacobs said.
PolyFutures InCorporated also made the city finals for best use of genre, best editing and best use of required element (whisper) categories.
It felt "really, really good" to be awarded the "incredibly strange" certificate and be in the running in the national finals, he said.
"When our names came up for the incredibly strange [award], we were all shouting and screaming and stuff."
The grand final will be held in Auckland in November, an event the group will watch via livesteam.
