Ever wonder what the birth of the universe would look like from the viewpoint of an egg? Well then look no further than Laura Sicouri’s Hello Big Bang. The surreal animated short begins with a Salvador Dali quote concerning science’s focus on the constants of life: the instincts of sex, the sentiments of death, and the anguish of space time. A camera pans to what is seemingly the naked body of a woman standing in a lake rippling with raindrops. A series of spiraling circles set upon the stomach of the body leads to an inner skeletal chamber that encapsulates the egg.Its journey begins when it drops through a series of pinball-like tendrils into a murky jellyfish-inhabited ocean, only to be captured by an upwards floating bubble. Once at the top of the water, the bubble releases the egg, plummeting it into a vast darkness. Cracked, a mirrored orb bursts from its remains reflecting the original landscape, spinning above a white baron desert.The grim aesthetic of the film casts a somber tone on the infinitely regressive cycle of the egg, set to an eerily apocalyptic electronic carnival soundtrack that is as surreal as its visuals. As the title suggests, the film seems to be a meditation on how life began and the anguish that results in tackling such large questions, but it’s that anguish that once again leads to birth and a journey towards life. Science’s fascination with this cycle and its circuitous nature is perhaps also a meditation on the indomitable spirit of humankind to endure and proliferate even in the face of the heaviest existential torment.