The other day we got to see some short films directed by Ilya Chaiken, who wowed us earlier this year with her shoestring Brooklyn epic Liberty Kid (it’ll hit DVD later this year) and we just felt we had to share. Shot with the same gritty elegance that marks Chaiken’s other work, 2004’s The 100 Lovers of Jesus Reynolds (which also played Sundance) starts off as a funny little meditation on an East Village girl’s many, many love affairs. Then it focuses on one particular one-night stand the evening before the Mermaid Parade and seems to become a poignant portrayal of an important event in our heroine’s life. But like we said — it seems to. The effect Chaiken and writer-star Holly Ramos create is beautiful and hauntingly elusive: We sense that something has changed, but we’re not quite sure what. —Bilge Ebiri