How They Get There

1997 film by Spike Jonze

1997 (1997)

Running time

3 minutesCountryUnited StatesLanguageEnglish

How They Get There is a 1997 short film directed by Spike Jonze,^[1] which illustrates how lonely shoes wind up in the gutter. It is featured on The Work of Director Spike Jonze DVD and can currently be viewed on YouTube. The film does not contain any dialogue.^[2]

Plot

The opening shot is of a shoe lying in the gutter. It belongs to a man who is leaning against a parked car drinking a carton of milk. After a moment, the owner of the car then angrily tells him to stop. As the man walks off, he spots a woman across the road and as he stumbles on the curb - the woman mimics him. He looks at her oddly. She again copies him as he discards his milk carton on a fence and swings his arms. They continue mimicking each other until we see that the man is approaching a crossing in the road. However, the man is enjoying the game too much to realise the danger and continues to imitate the woman who is trying to warn him of the oncoming traffic. He is then struck by a car which flips over and forces his shoe to fly through the air and land in the gutter.

Music

The music playing through the movie is "Sentimental Journey" by Juan García Esquivel (originally written by Les Brown and Ben Home).

Cast

Rico Bueno as Angry Man
Lauren Curry as Girl
Mark Gonzales as Guy

References

^ Wilkins, Kim (2019-07-29). ReFocus: The Films of Spike Jonze. Edinburgh University Press. ISBN 978-1-4744-4763-8.
^ "How They Get There by Spike Jonze | Short Film". www.filmsshort.com. Retrieved 2023-07-19.