Margie Soudek’s Salt and Pepper Shakers
Documentary Short / 12 min / 2023
An artist and VFX instructor connects with her aging grandmother, Margie, in a documentary short on collecting, artmaking, and obsessiveness as a way to enhance our realities.
Margie has been collecting salt and pepper shakers for 73 years — at 94, her days are spent repeating the same, simple routine. When her granddaughter pays her a visit, the collection, now in the thousands, takes on a new life. The film — part love letter, part documentary, part experiment — merges the real, the fantastical, and the world of a computer desktop.
“The Saul Zaentz Innovation Fund was instrumental in bringing Margie Soudek's Salt and Pepper Shakers to life. This was a deeply meaningful project, and a rare honor to make a film with my grandmother. I knew I had something special, but I also knew I needed support to fully realize the way I envisioned telling the story.”
“Beyond providing the financial resources necessary to realize the film on my own terms, the grant gave me the validation I needed to trust myself as a filmmaker at a critical stage in the project’s development.
Documentary filmmaking is often a long and uncertain process, and having SZIF backing allowed me to devote the time, care, and creative attention the story deserved. The support not only made the film possible, but also affirmed my commitment to pursuing unconventional and ambitious personal work.”
- Meredith Moore, Director, Editor & VFX Artist
Writer, Director, VFX: Meredith Moore
Editor: Albert Birney, Meredith Moore
Producer: Jonna McKone
Original Score: Dan Deacon
Sound Design: Chester Gwazda
Sound Mix: Matt Davies
Executive Producers: Riel Roch-Decter & Sebastian Pardo
Sundance 2023
Big Sky Documentary Film Festival 2023
SXSW 2023
True/False Film Festival 2023
Athens International Film & Video Festival 2023
Florida Film Festival 2023
Milwaukee Film Festival 2023
DOC 10 2023
DeadCenter Film Festival 2023
DC/DOX 2023
Champs-Élysées Film Festival 2023
New/Next Film Festival 2023
The New Yorker Documentary 2023
Cinema Eye Honors Shorts List 2023