Woody Cavenaugh

If last night was the only night you came out to check out the 48 Hour Film Project, you might have come away with a bad impression. Maybe it was just my expectations, the first night was good, the second night was great, I was hoping that tonight would be incredible. Instead what I saw as a whole was worse than the first night. As a group they stunk on ice. But individually there were a couple of good ones. Here's the breakdown in order of appearance.

The Throwaway by Contagious Media, The team name is ironic, I think they might have actually been contagious. This team has a sad story that I have to share. They are a new team of inexperienced young people who threw their all into this effort. With ten or twenty minutes to spare they got across the finish line and then sat back to catch their breaths. The time ticked away and the deadline was reached. As they are sitting around talking about what they did and what they would do better next year, it slowly dawned on them that they never actually copied their film to the tape they turned in. They had turned in a blank. They went back and turned an actual tape, but it was too late to qualify them for judging. How was the film? If it was meant to be a spy comedy, it failed to deliever the right laughs at the right places, though the audience did laugh. If it was suppose to be serious, it failed because the audience was laughing. In the lobby I overheard someone say that this piece would have been much better had it ended just after their opening graphics. It was a harsh comment, but they did have some excellent opening graphics and that may have set our expectations too high. With more experience this team could perform. I would call this maybe the best of the young newbies.

Rapper On Da Ruuf by The Macaroni Project. These guys got musical and ran with it. Nothing happened. There wasn't a plot or anything, but I think most people chose this as one of their top three choices. Great idea, great execution, and a possible explenation for the origin of Rap. Love it or hate it, I think Dr.Seuse was the inspiration for the entire movement and this piece convinced me of it. At no point during the night did I laugh harder than I laughed during this piece. I met some of the cast and crew of this piece and they were all really a fun bunch.

Love Meat Tender by Mini Boom. As I heard in the lobby after someone said, "I want to use Love Meat Tender as an example of what NOT to do when making a comedy". Technically it was shot ok, they had some pretty low resolution graphics, clever use of the softball, and really clever credits. What they didn't have was all on the creative side. Still, next year, if they got a genre more suited to their style (definately not mocumentary or comedy), who knows what they could accomplish.

Coney Island Whitefish by No Wah-Wah. A few tips to young filmmakers everywhere. In most cases Autofocus is NOT your friend. I think this was one of those teams who had only a camera and for that I applaud them for at least trying. Another tip, if you are indoors and you want the camera to focus on an opening exterior door in the bright sunlight, DON'T. It takes a very skilled group to pull of that shot without it looking horrible. (No one tonight pulled it off.) I would talk about the story, but I don't know what it is. I got so wrapped up in trying to figure out if they were trying to establish the passing of time, or just having terrible continuity problems. Wait, you want us to think that you are showing a sex scene but everyone is in their underwear. You know, when soap operas do this they put the actors UNDER a sheet, so we believe they are naked. The saddest part of this film was when it was over, there was only a smattering of polite applause. That means that I wasn't the only one who was thinking "WTF?"

Late To A Kill by Phenomena. This was very funny, very creative, and mostly likely to be forgotten by audience and judges alike. (Not that it mattered, I see they didn't cross the finish line in time.) I think this was another newbie team, but they were solid. I was really torn between voting for this one and voting for one other. The reason I ended up not voting for this one was that though they were fine technically and story wise, they didn't try anything. They risked nothing and took all the easy ways out. If they had gotten this piece in on time, it might have paid off for them.

Love Overdue by the Strait 90's. This was my favorite of the evening. It was a good complete story, with good acting and nice cinematography (They had two Directors of Photography). They had light problems but pretty much everyone tonight did. I am thrilled that they are eligable, but overall I don't think they will stand up to the strong competition found on other nights.

Yes, Jane, Yes by Sugar Free Productions. I loved this idea. I would love to see a good experienced team shoot and edit it though. What they had in concept, they totally lacked in technical know how. If Good As A Mugg or Team Underexposed had this it would have been a winner.

The Lowering by Summer of Love. I have worked with their team leader before and I know he is a solid local filmmaker. If you had asked me before this competition who the real competition was, his name would have been on the list. That said, I didn't like this horror. What we had was a woman with substance abuse problems and a really cute goth chick, and they edited these two different things together. Most of the people I talked to did like this, but they seemed more pleased with the technical aspects than the story. (Was there a story?) This piece made a stab at post production sound to create a horror atmosphere, and I guess it was effective, just not enough to carry it in my opinion. If I was going to fault them for anything technically it would have to be their lighting. Afterwards at the Q&A they admitted that they had a whole different story and location but they were so creeped out by the abandoned house location that they chickened out and went for the B plan.

GOK Tom Lipscomb Productions. I know Leo, I like Leo. This film got off lucky by being last. It was cute, it was quirky, and it had some good dialogue. It wasn't very strong technically, but the reason I voted for this film and not "Late To A Kill" was that they took some risks on shooting and effects to raise their production value. So I guess what this tells me is it really is better to try and fail, than never to try at all.

So there we are. It was a tough night. Of the nine teams that showed only four qualified for judging. My picks were "Love Overdue", "Rapper On Da Ruuf", and after much deliberation "GOK". If these three films had shown last night, none of them would've gotten my vote.

My overall choices from all three nights were
1. "The Gift" by Team Underexposed
2. "Unhinged: The Sly Stephens Story" by Hyperactive
3. "Organized Art" by Good as a Mugg

My Bonus 4th pick would be "Triggerfinger" by The Jive Mechanics

Saturday night at The Sky Bar starting at 7pm is the Wrap Party, where we find out what the audience as a whole liked for the Audience Award, and what the Judges thought for everything else. Besides "Best of" (The award everyone wants) there are the following other categories, Best Directing, Best Script, Best Cinematography, Best Editing, Best Acting, Best Use of Character, Best Use of Prop, Best Use of Word, Best Music, Best Sound Design, Best Effects.

If you don't make the party, drop by here on Monday and I'll recap it all.