There are more than a few films out there about the artistic struggles of filmmakers and writers. Outside of the films themselves, many creatives get their start directing shorts while others come out of the gate swinging with a full-on directorial feature…and the practice of abandoning projects due to lack of funding, rejection, or shifting passions is all too familiar. Having previously worked on two short films that premiered at SXSW, director Gillian Wallace Horvat tackles filmmaker frustrations and ambitions in her directorial debut, I Blame Society.

We’re pleased to premiere the first poster for the film, which you can check out below.

I Blame Society Poster

Originally a project that began four years ago, Horvat’s feature is about a struggling filmmaker who feels the confidence in her abilities slipping based off of feedback from her peers and family members, so she decides to prove herself by completing an abandoned film – and committing the perfect murder. I Blame Society was originally crafted as a real documentary entitled I, Murderer with Horvat as the director exploring whether our not she had the qualities needed in order to succeed in executing the quintessential murder. Last year, she picked it back up as a narrative with a dark comedy lens shot in meta fashion by an almost entirely female crew. Horvat plays herself as the protagonist and mixing filming with narrative and doc footage.

I Blame Society is premiering at the International Film Festival Rotterdam as part of their Bright Future Competition on January 28. The festival deemed the film to be “a titillating meta-story about the camera as an excuse for abuse, artistic transgression and blurry boundaries.” To promote the film’s premiere, a teaser poster featuring the work of world renowned artist Anthony Burrill was created. A jack of all trades, Burrill is a graphic artist, designer, and print-maker who is praised for his pervasive style of communication. He is best known for his typographic, text-based compositions, with his piece “Work Hard and Be Nice to People” being his most famous to the point where it has become an artistic mantra for many in the design community.

Burrill’s bold, straight-forward and minimalistic poster is an apt reflection of Horvat’s film. Art, like human complexity, is never truly just black and white. There is always a reflective and almost introspective quality that has a deeper thematic layer beyond a deceptively simple surface. I Blame Society is a low-budget indie that aims to do just that and tests the boundaries of independent filmmaking beyond what we are willing (or sometimes able) to see.

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