in transit | experimental documentary

year: 2026

about: In this experimental documentary, an airport's daily operations are the canvas for an atmospheric look at transformation and impermanence.

upcoming screenings: tba

thoughts: For my day job I spend a lot of time at the Portland International Airport, watching planes land and take off. The entire structure of the airport, with comings, goings and people endlessly arriving or trying to get elsewhere, is a monument to impermanence and, after a season of personal loss, I felt compelled to express that cinematically. My original concept was to have ten one-minute shots from inside and outside the airport but as I began to shoot and edit the idea began to morph into its current form. All the shots in the film were taken in the parking garages that abut the terminal while I was on work breaks across several weeks. Along the way in the edit I added some atmospheric music and excerpts of a talk on impermanence from the Venerable Lobsang Chokyi and those components quickly began informing one another. The last thing I added were the titles: arriving, here, departing, gone. After finishing the film I learned that Ven Lobsang Chokyi passed due to illness in 2014 and her words deepened for me, underscoring the film's theme.

a northern flicker films project | shot and edited by brian padian