Straight Circle

Oscar Hudson built a reputation for surreal, formally playful short films and music videos, so his move into features was always going to be strange. Straight Circle, released September 2, 2025, is exactly that: a comedy about two enemy soldiers stuck at a border in an endless, featureless desert who lose track of which side is which. Hudson wrote and directed, and he cast real-life twins Elliott and Luke Tittensor as Warne and Arthur, two men whose faces are identical and whose loyalties are not. Neil Maskell plays Noll, Matthew Dylan Roberts is General Alman, and Camilla Waldman and Catriona Andrew round out the small ensemble.

The film runs 1 hour 48 minutes and comes from a production stack that includes 2AM, BBC Film, Magna Studios, Such Content, Helekan Pictures, and Prospect Avenue, with Kevin Rowe, Thomas Benski, and Riaz Rizvi producing. Christopher Ripley shot it, Maxwell Sterling composed the score. It is a British-American co-production, in English, and it leans hard into deadpan absurdism rather than slapstick. [edit]

Two opposing nations maintain a tense border line in a vast, featureless desert where no landmarks exist to mark the divide. Warne and Arthur stand guard on opposite sides of this invisible threshold, wearing nearly identical uniforms that blur any distinction between friend and foe. The setup feels deceptively simple as they patrol their respective sectors, yet the monotonous rhythm of their days quickly shifts into something far more unsettling. Their interactions start with polite distance but slowly evolve into a strange camaraderie that defies the logic of war.

As time passes, the soldiers begin to lose track of which side of the border they actually belong to. They engage in conversations that highlight the futility of their existence while receiving increasingly nonsensical instructions from superiors like Noll and General Alman. The tension builds not through action sequences but through the escalating absurdity of their situation. They find themselves crossing the border without realizing it, swapping places, and engaging in rituals that make no logical sense within the context of conflict.

The narrative structure mirrors the protagonists' own confusion, inviting viewers to question whether the soldiers are truly losing their minds or if the world around them is simply too absurd to comprehend. Supporting characters like Mamma and Mother add layers of surrealism with cryptic interactions that hint at deeper meanings behind the arbitrary boundaries they enforce. By the time the film reaches its climax, the audience grapples with the same questions as the characters: Is there a right side? Is there a wrong side? Or is the entire concept of a border a collective hallucination?

The story avoids traditional plot twists in favor of a slow-burn descent into chaos where the only constant is the twins' inability to distinguish one another or their allegiance. This journey serves as a masterclass in atmospheric storytelling and satirical critique, leaving the final interpretation open to the viewer while challenging the very nature of identity and loyalty.[edit]