Why do we have aquariums? I think it’s to bring a bit of the ocean’s foreign wonders into our homes, to get lost for a while in the weirdness that lives beneath the waves. It’s refreshing.

“…meanwhile…,” a short film produced from the footage of another, longer film by Italian filmmaker Sandro Bocci releasing later this year, perfectly captures this stunningly alien quality of ocean life, specifically of starfish, coral, clams, anemones, and sponges:

Using time-lapse photography, black lights, and a slow-burning soundtrack that belongs in a Matrix movie, the short is able to confuse and mesmerize with the lives of our seas’ slow life. (Speaking of slow life, “…meanwhile…” is almost exactly the same as the short that first turned me on to these videos, entitled “Slow Life“.)

It’s nearly impossible to relate to life like this, which is probably why it’s so entrancing to watch. “A trip through a different perspective that would encourage reflection on the consequences of our actions on each scale of space and time,” Bocci calls it.

You can watch some of Bocci’s other short films here.