On the night the world ends, a woman breaks into a stranger’s house and is welcomed to dinner by her future self.
I write and direct films.
As his body lies motionless in a hospital bed, a dying man imagines his own death as a final workplace dismissal, in a surreal corporate meeting where the only agenda is his departure from life.
Set in a dark, minimalist studio, a protagonist moves through three stages—plant, animal and infant—while confronting allegorical figures of external pressure and past desires.
Flow
Director / Cinematographer / Editor
A self-shot record of a volunteer teaching placement in Kuangou Village, Yongdeng County, Gansu Province. Shot and edited independently, prior to formal film training.
About
Laurence Gao is a writer-director and recent Film & Television graduate from Edinburgh College of Art. Her work is drawn to characters caught between control and vulnerability, often using heightened or surreal situations to explore intimacy, identity and the ways people construct meaning around their lives.
Her short films combine precise visual composition with emotionally ambiguous storytelling, moving between dark humour, discomfort and tenderness. Alongside directing, she has worked across production, assistant directing, editing and camera departments on student and independent productions in the UK and China.
Artist statement
I am interested in the moment when something we have always taken for granted suddenly becomes strange. My films return to questions of love, freedom, mortality and choice, but resist treating any inherited definition as final. Through intimate gestures, rituals and moments of absurdity, I try to create characters who remain complicated, ordinary and capable of defining themselves.
Edinburgh, UK
Available for London / UK productions