Oscars 2026: ‘All the Empty Rooms’ is about absence and presence
· Scroll
The Oscar-winning All the Empty Rooms is about memorialising absence. The 33-minute film directed by Joshua Seftel unfolds mostly in the bedrooms that belonged to children who have died in school shootings across America.
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On Sunday, All the Empty Rooms won the Oscar for Documentary Short Film.
In the documentary, television journalist Steve Hartman teams up with photographer Lou Bopp for the project. They meet the families of four children who have died in the shootings.
The parents and siblings are still grieving for the victims. The rooms are left as they were on the day of the deaths. It is as though the children will walk in any minute.
Bopp is discreet, his photographs capturing the minutiae of the victims’ lives – their clothes and toys, their school projects, their dreams. Hartman is respectful too, his gentle questioning revealing the feelings of the shattered families.
There is an unmistakeable presence in the unconscionable absence. The courage of the parents is heart-rending. The victims feel alive, through the photographs as well as the memories of their loved ones.
Out on Netflix, the documentary draws its power from its subject. All The Empty Rooms creates its impact entirely from the idea of paying tribute to a terrible tragedy in a way that is unconventional and thoughtful.