Synopsis
Facing angry protesters, a determined drag queen does her best to finish a fairy tale reading at the local library. But when an alien invasion upends Earth’s existence, the queen encounters new challenges that carry terrifying outcomes for humanity. Trapped within the library, her storytelling skills are suddenly put to extraordinary tests, jeopardizing the lives of the last humans on Earth — the families who’ve cherished her stories and the protesters who’ve scorned them. Ultimately, it is the supreme power of imagination that holds the key to both the queen’s survival and the invaders’ domination.
Director Biography –Aaron Immediato
Aaron Immediato is an award-winning, independent filmmaker based in Los Angeles. His short film “The Last Story on Earth” is currently enjoying its festival run, including screenings at the London Short Film Festival, Frameline: The San Francisco International LGBTQ+ Film Festival, OutfestNEXT Los Angeles, Reeling: The Chicago LGBTQ+ International Film Festival, and Out on Film: Atlanta’s LGBTQ+ Film Festival. In recent years, his short film “Bathroom Troll” screened at dozens of festivals around the globe, including the Iris Prize LGBTQ+ Film Festival (Cardiff), Fantastic Fest (Austin), Inside Out (Toronto), and Fringe! Queer Film & Arts Fest (London). The film received Audience Choice Awards for Best Short Film at the Brooklyn Horror Film Festival and qFLIX Worcester and was subsequently distributed by Gunpowder & Sky’s horror platform ALTER. Aaron holds an MFA in Film and Media Arts from Temple University.
“The Last Story on Earth” is a creative response to the wave of attacks on Drag Story Hour events across the U.S. and around the world. Protesters claim it’s harmful for drag performers to read stories to children, but this is just an irrational pretext used to somehow justify their attacks. The truth is that parents may choose freely to attend and have the right to make educational and cultural decisions for their own children. It is, of course, nothing but another iteration of homophobic and transphobic attacks aimed at limiting the freedom of LGBTQ+ people. But it’s also an attack against imagination. Throughout our collective time on this planet, storytelling has been a cherished tradition that’s defined the human experience and our insatiable quest for meaning in a seemingly doomed existence. Storytelling activates the imagination of the recipient, stimulates the brain, and pushes the human race forward. Whether it’s Neanderthals painting mythological legends in caves or drag queens reading fairy tales in libraries, the power of creating and imagining worlds leads to breakthroughs in science, technology, art, business, medicine, and so much more. “The Last Story on Earth” presents a nightmarish sci-fi scenario to remind us of the value of imagination and instilling it in future generations. In the film, we see that other, more advanced beings in the universe are well aware of this and have harnessed the immense potential of imagination to prepare their own offspring for intergalactic domination. They’ve been watching us, searching for the very best, most skilled storyteller on the planet to use for their own diabolical invasions. And it just turns out this happens to be a fabulous drag queen in a quaint little library. “The Last Story on Earth” is just that: the last story on this world we’ve called Earth before it’s decimated and stripped of its most valuable resource — the human imagination.