Some people chase world records. Others accidentally discover they might already be breaking them. That’s certainly the case with Kaylee Kotkins, a perinatal nurse with an extraordinary talent for burping. Her ability, for which she currently holds the world record for the loudest female burp at 107.3 decibels, is chronicled in the new documentary short short, ‘Eructation.’

Victoria Trow made her filmmaking debut on the project, after working nearly 15 years directing award-winning commercials in advertising. The UK native, who has also lived in Tokyo and Portland, also served as an executive producer on the upcoming movie.

‘Eructation’ will have its World Premiere this Saturday, March 14 during the 2026 SXSW Film Festival in the Documentary Short Competition presented by Vimeo. The premiere screening will be held at 2:30pm CDT at Austin’s Rollins Theatre at the Long Center during the festival’s Documentary Short Program 2. For more information on the project, visit its page on SXSW’s official website.

Ahead of the movie’s premiere, Trow generously took the time to talk about helming and producing ‘Eructation’ during a recent exclusive interview over Zoom. Among other things, the filmmaker discussed finding a story in her own neighborhood, turning a bodily function into a documentary subject and why the most unexpected talents sometimes offer inspiration for the most compelling movies.

Film Factual (FF): You directed the new short documentary, ‘Eructation.’ What was your inspiration in making the film?

Victoria Trow (VT): I have known Kaylee since 2021. We were in the same friendship group, and we’d see each other at different parties and events, and have funny little chats.

Then one day, I was on a beach in central Oregon in a place called Tygh Valley, and I was sitting right next to the beer cooler. Kaylee grabbed a beer, chugged it and then ripped this massive burp. It was so loud, it basically ricocheted and reverberated off these cliffs around the river.

I thought it was amazing, so I complimented her burp. I said, “That’s an amazing burp.” She said, very brazenly, “I’m going for the world record for loudest female burp.”

So, I just started asking her a million questions. I was like, “You’re going for the world record for loudest burp? What is the record? What’s that louder than? How do you burp so loud? When did you know you could burp so loud?” So I just asked all these questions.

After I left that chat, I spent the next couple of days thinking, this could be an amazing short documentary. So I started thinking about how it could come to life.

I then texted my friend Max Henderson, who’s the DP (Director of Photography). I asked him, “Do you want to make a documentary about burping?” He said, “Yes, alright.” So it all started from there.

Then I just had to convince Kaylee to do it. Initially, she was like, “Oh, I don’t know if I want to make a documentary about burping, as I don’t know if I want to be known as the girl who burps.”

I was like, “Well, let me pitch it to you. I’ve been thinking about all these ideas for it, including how we would shoot it, and how we would show the sound. But we wouldn’t show a burp until the end.” So she was like, “Alright, I’m in.”

FF: Speaking of getting to know Kaylee and persuading her to take part in the movie, how did you get to know her background? What kind of research did you do into her life?

VT: It was so awesome. I love this film we made, but what’s really special is that we became such good friends out of the experience.

That initial massive burp ripped in August, and then we shot in February. So, we had almost six months of getting to know each other, so we spent a lot of time together.

We would talk about the burps, and discuss her process. So by the time we did shoot, she felt really comfortable talking about it.

Kaylee is a nurse, so this was one of the first exposures she’s had to shoots. So I really wanted her to be comfortable.

So the shoot was awesome. We became such good friends through the process.

FF: While you were making the documentary, what was your approach to directing the project?

VT: I really wanted to elevate it. I really love mockumentary formats. I love ‘Drop Dead Gorgeous,’ and ‘This is Spinal Tap’ is one of my favorite films ever made.

So I was thinking a lot about taking the documentary form and elevating it. It plays into the absurdity of this tiny person saying, “I’m going to go for the world record for loudest female burp.”

So, I really wanted to make it gorgeous in how it looked. Part of that was working with Max, who’s an amazing director of photography. We actually met on a shoot for a commercial in Mexico for Don Julio. He was filming it, and I was on the agency side.

He has shot a lot for fashion brands. He also made his own documentary last year, ‘The Goldfish Project,’ which is so gorgeous.

I really wanted to bring this kind of elevated lens to our short. He wanted to shoot on a Sony 9000, which is a camera from the ’90s. It’s giant! I was in his office in New York, and he was like, “Let’s shoot on this!” It looks like a kind of VCR in its size. That really helped inform the aesthetic.

We shot the short in Portland. Being there in February is really green and lush. Then Kaylee’s apartment, where we shot a lot of scenes, has a lot of woods and reds in the carpet and rugs. So I wanted to build a palette around that rich blend of colors. Overall, I wanted to lean into where we were shooting.

That all came together and informed how the film looked. It was inspired by such things as the world that we’re in, and how Kaylee dresses.

FF: Besides the overall visuals and the cinematography from Max Henderson, who you just mentioned, how did you approach creating the score and the sound for the film?

VT: I really wanted the sound to be a character. I think that’s actually what I wrote in the treatment that I made. It’s all about sound, right? This one burp that has to beat this world record. It would have been a really short documentary if Kaylee had just said, “I need to be louder than a leaf blower, a vacuum cleaner and a blender.”

So I loved the idea of putting those sounds into the scenes, so we can really quantify just how loud this burp needed to be to beat the previous record. So that was one of my first ideas – I thought about how do we make the sound so central to this idea?

That was so much fun to play with during the shoot. The record is louder than a jet plane taking off. But we couldn’t get a jet plane, believe it or not! We could barely get a leaf blower, because they were about to ban gas-powered leaf blowers in Oregon. So my husband had to drive about 100 miles to get us a gas-powered leaf blower the day before the shoot, poor thing. (Trow laughs.) The leaf blower was such a central idea to the look and the sound of the film.

FF: Like you mentioned, Matt served as your cinematographer, and he also served as the editor on the film. How did you work together to put together the final version of the short?

VT: I think that this edit is like version three of the edit, so it was pretty quick, to be honest. It was awesome having the edit and editor be so involved with the actual shooting. I really planned out the shots. Our final product is very similar to the initial treatment I put together.

We have a burp diary that’s featured throughout the film that includes illustrations from Kaylee, which was such a surprise. I asked her to keep a log when we started talking about her burp, but I didn’t expect her to fully illustrate it. So that became this amazing extra texture that we could add throughout the short. Max did such a good job of fitting that in with the talk track.

Since Kaylee’s background is as a nurse, she talked about the fundus. I don’t know what the fundus is

So bringing in this serious stuff, and then cutting to these illustrations that she did, just add to the short’s sense of humor. Max did such a great job of creating that rhythm throughout the film.

FF: Besides helming the short, you also served as the executive producer. How did you approach balancing your directorial and producing duties during the shoot?

VT: We were all wearing a lot of hats because it was self-funded…But if I could go back in time and reshoot it, I would have tried to find a first AD (Assistant Director). I think to have someone who’s job was to keep us on schedule and be like, “We’re losing light!,” that would have been so helpful.

But I have learned so much about formatting for

exhibition and the DCP (Digital Cinema Package) process. It helps when send off your final files, so your film can be played in a movie theater. But you don’t have a movie theater to then watch your files. So that’s been a chaotic experience, and I’ve learned a lot of technical stuff.

FF: ‘Eructation’ will have its World Premiere (this) Saturday, March 14, at the SXSW Film Festival. What does it mean to you that the short is playing at the festival?

VT:  Well, I never made this with the goal of bringing it to festivals; instead, I made it for me to make something. This is the first thing I’ve ever made, so I had no expectations for it. So the fact that it’s going to South by Southwest is just amazing.

I’m so grateful and happy that people are enjoying this film as much as we enjoyed making it. It’s such a cool feeling. The response has been really amazing and completely unexpected so far. I’m so excited for it!