Imagine taking a punch to the face while walking down a sunny Los Angeles street in the early nineties. Who would the perpetrator be? It's a question director Chris Milk pondered for his 42-second short film Last Day Dream, which recounts the major events in a man's life from birth to death.

Milk filmed the short over eight days last fall with a crew of four and a cast drawn from his family and circle of friends. The film unfolds in split-second flashbacks, shot point-of-view style.

"The shots go by quick, but the wardrobe and props are all time period specific," he explains. "The man is born in the ‘70s, grows up in the ‘80s, goes to college and gets punched out in the early ‘90s. Who would be more likely to punch you in the face around '93 other than Pauly Shore?"

The Encino Man star wanted to speak with Milk about a project he was developing, so the director cast him in the short. "When we met I asked if he would be in a short film for one sec," he says. "He agreed."

The detail in Last Day Dream is one of many surreal moments from Onedreamrush, a series of 42 films by 42 directors lasting 42 seconds and inspired by dreams. Commissioned by vodka brand 42 Below, the program plays like an art house version of BMW Films with a list of participating directors that runs the gamut from avant-garde to art house to advertising.

Among them are Kenneth Anger, Jonas Mekas, David Lynch, Larry Clark, Harmony Korine, Lou Ye, Gaspar Noe, Asia Argento, Tadanobu Asano, James Franco, Leos Carax, Mike Figgis, Abel Ferrara, Cat Power, Ryan McGinley, Taika Watiti, Floria Sigismondi and Universal Everything's Matt Pyke.

Onedreamrush debuted in May at the Cannes Film Festival and in China at the National Film Museum in Beijing and is viewable online via the microsite 42x42.com.

Initially, the Bacardi-owned brand wanted to create a user-generated content contest for young filmmakers to increase brand awareness in the Chinese market. The idea proved unwieldy, so Ilya Rozhdestvensky, executive producer from 42 Below's Beijing-based agency Ilizz Ltd., called Rajan Mehta, founder of New York-based creative studio Dagr Nott & Associates.

Mehta, co-owner of Paris-based creative firm and fashion line Surface 2 Air, immediately deemed the UGC idea limiting and expensive. "There have been so many user generated film projects," he says. "How do you expose that overseas and how do you build a story around it?"

Instead, he suggested curating 41 original films by established filmmakers and save the 42nd spot for the Chinese winner of a UGC contest. During a meeting in New Zealand with CEO Paul Dibbayawan, he argued this approach better suited 42 Below's brand values and reputation for conceptual and striking non-traditional ad campaigns. By reaching out to established filmmakers with cult followings, such as David Lynch and Harmony Korine, 42 Below would have an instant audience with the fans.

"One of their values is to be pure, raw, edgy and independent," says Mehta. "So let's let the filmmakers do what they want. Let's not make it about you, let's make it about dreams. Let's make it about a canvas that all these filmmakers will get excited about."

Dibbayawan liked the idea and Mehta started reaching out to directors via producers and friends Griffin Marcus, David Komurek of creative shop Wanted Worldwide and Quintessence Films director Michele Civetta.

The posters for Michele Civetta and Asia Argento's respective onedreamrush films.

Civetta and his wife, actress/director Asia Argento, agreed to contribute films, as did Quintessence's Larry Clark and James Franco. The more directors with respected reputations in film and art signed on, the easier it became to attract others.

"The curation was the most scrupulous process. It took a long time," says Civetta. "We basically said that we wanted to encapsulate a couple generations of filmmakers so we went back to people like Kenneth Anger.

"We also said let's open this up to people who aren't traditionally known for their filmmaking. People like Grant Morrison, who is a prolific comic book writer," he continues. "Before we knew it the 42 spots were actually full."

Each director was given a budget of $10,000 to produce a film, the option to shoot in China through production partner the Beijing Film Studio and complete creative freedom to interpret the "how we dream" brief. Each director would also retain the rights to their film.

For his film Astarte, Civetta cut together footage from the 1920s of a black magic mass with images of a modern ritualistic occult ceremony as "a traditional invocation of a goddess in terms of a magical dream."

For S/HE, Argento created an abstract micro-documentary about a group of Brazilian transsexuals that hang out at the grocery store down the street from her house in suburban Rome.

Aside from the creative freedom, many of the directors valued the project as a way to gain exposure in the Chinese market. "I think there's a hidden charm or a hidden desire to know what's happening in China," says Mehta. "It's a new frontier for people."

Since the films were essentially labors of love for the directors, Mehta asked his client not to exert too much pressure to wrap production by a certain date. For example, the deadline for Milk to complete his film was October 15, but he was able to work until December to finish.

"Nobody's making any money off of this," he says. "So you can't be hounding them like a brand going, ‘We need this now.' Let it grow organically which is what happened."

Not all of the films are available online, though some of the directors have posted the shorts on their own websites. The project was initially conceived to spread virally, but after the Cannes screening, the brand decided it would play better at film festivals and more intimate screening events.

Plans to screen the films in New York, London and Rome are under way and French film producer agnes b. has expressed interest in publishing a book about the project through her production company Love Streams.

To watch the Onedreamrush demo reel, footage from the premiere in China and films by Chris Milk, Harmony Korine and Matt Pyke, head to the screening room.

www.42x42.com
www.dagr-nott.com
www.quintessencefilms.com