Dreams are just that…dreams. One woman discovers the harsh reality of a dream unfulfilled in Colin Henning and Chad Hylton’s short film Penelope! We open on a plantation home, where Penelope awaits her husband’s return from the war so the two can start a family. Her anticipation grows as she reads his most recent letter. Instead, her husband arrives sealed in a coffin. In an instant, Penelope must come to grips with her unfulfilled dream.
Directed by Colin Henning, Penelope! is shot like an episode of the Twilight Zone or Alfred Hitchcock presents. It opens in an idyllic setting of a well-to-do mansion while cracking the door open to reveal sunny skies and a family for Penelope. With the flick of a switch, the dream is dashed. Penelope now finds herself caught between reality and a nightmare.

“Penelope awaits the return of her husband from the war so the two can start a family.”
Having been raised in North Carolina, director Henning speaks to life in the antebellum South and the indoctrination of southern conservatives pushing the fleeting dream of family and making decisions about one’s life based on fantasy.
Penelope! is all about the visual tone the filmmakers create to illustrate their point. DP Hylton beautifully (and ominously) recreates the setting of Gone With The Wind and masterfully turns it into a Southern Gothic horror location. The film’s rendition of Amazing Grace is just the right touch to Penelope’s downward spiral.