From Omeleto.
A man wants to marry.
TILL DEATH DO US PART is used with permission from Jacob Hamblin. Learn more at https://instagram.com/hamblino.
Alden works diligently as an apprentice for an undertaker. He’s also in love with a beautiful young woman, but he isn’t allowed to marry her because he doesn’t yet make enough money to support her.
Desperate and willing to do anything to marry, Alden decides to steal a valuable piece of jewelry from a mysteriously murdered corpse that recently passed through the undertaker’s office. But Alden soon learns that nothing is ever free in life — and his desires exact a high price.
Directed and written by Jacob Hamblin, this elegantly eerie horror short blends classic gothic horror with modern sensibilities. Set in a hauntingly atmospheric world, the story follows an undertaker’s apprentice who, desperate to marry the love of his life, digs up the grave of a mysteriously murdered bride to rob her corpse of its wedding ring. Beyond its visual and atmospheric achievements, the film explores the lengths to which we go for love, the blurred line between devotion and obsession, and the moral compromises that desire can drive us to make.
The premise might seem macabre at first glance, but the storytelling approaches it with a careful reverence for the gothic tradition, combining mood, practical effects, and deliberate pacing. Starting with the stately black-and-white cinematography and camerawork, the film is rooted in classic film tradition, particularly of the expressionist vein. But with its foundation of psychologically penetrating, character-focused writing — and a unflinching exploration of a desperation borne of both passion and poverty — it also has modern resonance.
As the undertaker’s apprentice, actor Dave Martinez plays Alden’s besotted adoration of his fiancee with an eager tenderness and he vividly conveys Alden’s frustration at his lack of money. From this emotional base, it’s easy to see why he’s tempted to rob a grave for a valuable bijou that would solve all his problems. But the film’s narrative carefully follows how one seemingly easy solution leads to further complication — and then to sinister, dangerous consequence.
Elegantly crafted, deliciously spine-tingling and suspenseful, TILL DEATH DO US PART reminds us why we fell in love with horror in the first place: the thrill of the unknown, the intimacy of shadowed spaces, and the haunting resonance of human desire taken to its extreme. It is a short film that lingers, both visually and thematically, long after the credits roll: a gothic love story with a darkly seductive edge.
