Barrett and Jessica Burgin discuss The Angel
Barrett and Jessica Burgin are filmmakers with their company Burgindie Pictures. One of their recent projects is the short film The Angel, a film that combines aspects of Mormon religion, folklore and history with horror. We unpack their story and the film in this conversation.
Jessica has produced for internationally recognized film and media brands including HBO, 5&2 Studios, BYUtv, and Excel Entertainment, and recently worked as production coordinator on the documentary Artifact War (2024), which premiered at the Austin Film Festival. The Angel marks her directorial debut.
Barrett is an award-winning writer, director, producer, and published media scholar whose research examines religious identity and modes of storytelling, and whose student feature film CRYO (2022) was acquired by a national distributor and released theatrically. His work is studied in collegiate courses.
Their collaborative work—including the acclaimed shorts The Angel (2024) and Java Jive (2025)—are recognized for their engagement with Latter-day Saint theology, folk belief, and the simultaneous celebration and critique of Mormon thought and culture.
Burgindie Pictures: https://www.burgindie.com/
About The Angel
A Mormon Pioneer folk horror. Two plural wives receive a mysterious visitation amidst the blood red stone of Southern Utah. Our film mines the mystic folk doctrines of these settlers to portray a demonology never before depicted on screen. We are uniquely qualified to tell this story, as both of our directors claim that cultural heritage.
The Angel serves as a proof of concept for an award winning feature screenplay, The Third Wife, which has received industry interest for its commercial viability and been spotlighted by the Sundance Institute. The short has also been included in the Short Film Corner at Cannes, played at numerous prestigious film festivals, and even garnered academic attention for its historicity from a range of institutions, including BYU-Hawaii, Ralston College, the Association for Mormon Letters, the Center for Latter-day Saint Arts, the Mormon History Association, and the Sunstone Institute.
