Be careful what you wish for in kiddie comedy "shorts"

CEBU, Philippines - Warner Bros.’ new family comedy “Shorts” is set in the suburb of Black Falls, where all the houses look the same and everyone works for BLACK BOX Unlimited Worldwide Industries, whose Mr. Black’s BLACK BOX is the ultimate communication and do-it-all gadget that’s sweeping America. Other than keeping his parents employed, however, Mr. Black’s BLACK BOX has done nothing for 11-year-old Toe Thompson (Jimmy Bennett), who just wants to make a few friends...until a mysterious rainbow-colored rock falls from the sky, hits him in the head and changes everything.

The Rainbow Rock does Mr. Black’s BLACK BOX one better: it grants wishes to anyone who holds it. Before long, wishes-gone-wrong have left the neighborhood swarming with tiny spaceships, crocodile armies, giant boogers... and outrageous magical mayhem around every corner. But it’s not until the grown-ups get their hands on the Rock that the trouble really starts. Now Toe and his newfound friends must join forces to save their town from itself, discovering along the way that what you wish for is not always what you want.

Written and directed by Robert Rodriguez, “Shorts” stars Jon Cryer, William H. Macy, Leslie Mann, James Spader, Jimmy Bennett, Kat Dennings, Trevor Gagnon, Devon Gearhart, Leo Howard, Rebel Rodriguez, Jake Short and Jolie Vanier. 

 “There’s a nice lesson in it,” explains Rodriguez. “There are a lot of great characters and different events. Someone will wish for their dad’s science experiment to work and that wreaks havoc. And mom gets it and wishes she and her husband were closer and they become conjoined twins, and now they can’t get away from each other and have to work together. The little boy who narrates the story wishes for friends as unique and different as he is because he has no friends, and out comes space ships and aliens, and those are his brethren. And he misuses them. Everything is sort of misused, so it’s a good lesson on what not to do.

How Rodriguez come up with the film’s structure of going back and forward in time so that the story unfolds out of linear order?

“I just thought that would be an interesting way to tell the story because that’s what my boys do to me,” answers the director. “It would drive me crazy, but in a kind of funny way. They’d say, ‘Dad, come watch this.’ So, they would be showing me something on TiVo, showing me an episode of some TV show they’re watching, and they would be speeding through the whole thing. And I’m like, ‘Wait, wait, what’s happening?’ And they say, ‘Oh, no, just watch this part.’ And they’d just show me the good part. And if I laughed, they’d go back and they would show me maybe the scene before or the beginning and then maybe they would show me the end. And eventually I would see the whole thing. So I thought that would be fun—if the movie is speeding through and you can’t see where it’s going, and it’s out of order. 

Opening soon across the Philippines, “Shorts” is distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures, a Warner Bros. Entertainment Company.