Rare Birds
A 10-minute short that trusts its characters more than its plot
Rare Birds is a 2026 short film about a 12-year-old who shows up at a local antique store and refuses to let her former camp counselor pretend his life is fine. She wants one thing: him, off the clock, playing basketball. That's it. No grand gestures. No life-changing montage. Just a kid who knows something's wrong and won't accept the polite lie.
The film premiered at the Tribeca Festival in 2026 as part of the Shorts: Think Fast program, and it's the kind of work that makes you rethink what a short film can do in 10 minutes — which is exactly what it doesn't try to do. It doesn't try to be bigger. Doesn't overexplain. It just sets two people in a room and lets the friction between them become the whole story.
Stars: Tony Macht, Zoe Ziegler, Joseph R. Sicari
Director: Lily Weisberg
Writer: Michael Bloom
Runtime: 10 minutes
Where to watch: Currently available on major streaming platforms (check Movie OTT's where-to-watch tracker for real-time availability)
What makes this short work at all
The thing nobody mentions about 10-minute films is that they can't afford a single wasted moment. You don't have time to win an audience over gradually — you've got maybe 60 seconds to make them care, or they're mentally checking out.
Zoe Ziegler, who plays the kid, brings a sharpness that's genuinely hard to pull off at 12. She's not cute. She's not trying to be sympathetic. She's just right — the kind of person who knows exactly which button to push and doesn't blink when she pushes it. Macht, playing the counselor, does something trickier: he has to look defeated without being pathetic, stuck without being tragic. It's a narrow lane, and he finds it.
What's striking is how the film doesn't explain anything. Why'd he leave camp? Why's she tracking him down now? Why does she care if he's behind the counter at an antique store instead of, you know, doing literally anything else? The script—by Michael Bloom—trusts that you'll figure it out from how they talk to each other. The argument between them isn't about basketball. It's about whether it's okay to stop trying. And it's the kind of argument where one person's completely right and the other one just won't admit it yet.
The setting does heavy lifting here too (thanks to cinematographer Bettina Campomanes). An antique store is full of other people's discarded things — furniture that didn't fit anyone's life, trinkets that meant something to someone and mean nothing to everyone else. It's a perfect backdrop for a character who's also been set aside. The production design isn't showy about it. That's what makes it work.
How this got made and where it landed
Rare Birds was produced by Soonest Mended Productions, directed by Lily Weisberg, and written by Michael Bloom — who also produced alongside Chase Mayo and Tony Macht. The producing team includes executive producers Fernando Loureiro and Tim Van Patten (recognizable to prestige TV audiences from his work on Game of Thrones and other major series), which is a lot of experienced hands for what could've been a one-person project.
Kevin Donald composed the score — it stays light enough that the comedy lands without crushing the quieter emotional moments underneath. That balance is harder to pull off than it sounds. Too much music and you're telegraphing the feels. Too little and the awkward silences feel like mistakes instead of choices.
As a festival short, Rare Birds doesn't come with traditional box office numbers or an MPAA rating. The IMDb page is still building its audience scores. Hard to say whether that changes once it circulates more widely, but the Tribeca premiere carries real weight in short-film circles — it's a signal that programmers thought this was worth their time.
Where to actually watch it right now
Rare Birds is currently available on major OTT platforms following its festival run. Streaming availability shifts week to week, so the most reliable way to find it is through Movie OTT's where-to-watch widget, which updates across services in real time.
Short films don't always get prominent placement on streaming home pages — they get buried in the shorts sections, which means you have to actually know to look for them. But they do land on libraries. If it's not on your usual platform, check back within the next month or two. Festival shorts from Tribeca typically find their streaming homes within 60–90 days of their premiere.
Should you actually watch this?
Yes. But here's the thing: it's only 10 minutes. There's no commitment here. You're not signing up for a series. You're not sitting through a feature that might lose you in the third act.
What you're getting is a perfectly observed moment between two people who should have nothing to say to each other but can't stop talking. If you liked the character dynamics in something like The Florida Project or Eighth Grade — films that trust their characters more than their plot — this'll land the same way.
I kept coming back to a single moment: the kid says something that's completely true and completely unfair at the same time, and Macht's face just... breaks a little. Not dramatically. Just a real person realizing he's been caught. That's the whole film right there.
Watch them in order if you're building a short-film evening: start with something lighter, drop this one in the middle, end on something that lets you sit with the feeling for a few minutes afterward.
FAQ
Q: Is this based on a true story?
No. The screenplay is an original work by Michael Bloom — entirely fictional.
Q: How long is it?
10 minutes. Start to finish.
Q: Who's in it?
Tony Macht (who also produced), Zoe Ziegler, and Joseph R. Sicari. Macht plays the counselor. Ziegler is the kid who won't take no for an answer.
Q: Where can I watch it?
Check Movie OTT for current availability. It rotates across platforms, so the widget there will tell you exactly where it's streaming today.
Q: Is it good?
Yes. It's the kind of short that makes you question why feature films need so much time to say so little.
