Experiencing Interruptions?

Unfinished Voices

A real recording captured during a family’s final farewell in an intensive care unit forms the only voice of the film.

The audio documents a conversation between a doctor and relatives deciding whether to continue life-saving treatment.

The images, created through animation, do not reconstruct the event.
Instead, they observe empty hospital spaces, distant landscapes, and fleeting human figures.

These quiet images coexist with the recorded voices without illustrating them.

Within the context of an Asian family confronting death, the film reflects on how silence, care, and farewell unfold in ordinary spaces.

When the voices fade, the world continues.

What remains cannot be completed.

  • MFX Films
    Producer
  • Chih Hao Shen
    Director
  • Chih Hao Shen
    Writer
  • Project Type:
    Animation, Documentary, Experimental, Short
  • Genres:
    Animated Documentary, Asian family culture, ICU recording, death and family, Hand-drawn 2D
  • Runtime:
    10 minutes
  • Completion Date:
    April 30, 2026
  • Country of Origin:
    Taiwan
  • Country of Filming:
    Taiwan
  • Language:
    Chinese, Chinese - Min Nan
  • Shooting Format:
    Digital
  • Aspect Ratio:
    4:3
  • Film Color:
    Color
  • First-time Filmmaker:
    No
  • Student Project:
    No
  • Digital Cinema Package:
    Unavailable
Director Biography - Chih Hao Shen

Chih Hao Shen is an animation and documentary filmmaker whose work explores human existence, memory, and time through restrained visual storytelling.

His debut work received recognition from Rhode Island IFF. His short film 10 Seconds was selected by In The Palace, Fantasporto, and Asolo Art Film Festival (2026). His documentary YinYang Sea won the Grand Prix at Asolo Art Film Festival (2026).

His projects have been presented in international industry contexts, including Clermont-Ferrand, Visions du Réel, Cannes Short Film Corner, Short Shorts Film Festival & Asia, and Oberhausen.

Beyond filmmaking, he has worked in visual design and digital product development, including licensed merchandise design for The Lord of the Rings franchise in the Chinese-language market, visual work at the Bologna Children’s Book Fair, and founded and leads a software development company developing animation and visual effects tools within the Apple ecosystem.

Add Director Biography
Director Statement

This film began with a recording.

It was made during a family’s final hours in an intensive care unit, when they were asked to decide whether to continue resuscitation for a loved one.

Rather than reconstructing the moment, I chose to preserve the voice exactly as it was recorded.

The images in the film are animated spaces—hospital corridors, empty rooms, distant landscapes. They do not attempt to illustrate the recording.

Instead, they allow the voices to exist within a quiet world that continues beyond the moment of farewell.

In many Asian families, death is rarely spoken about directly. Decisions are often carried by hesitation, silence, and care.

The recording captures one of these fragile moments.

What interests me is not the depiction of death itself, but the space that surrounds it: the silence before a decision, the waiting, and the traces that remain after a voice disappears.

Perhaps what continues is not closure, but something unfinished.