"The Riverbank" - 24 Hour Film Festival Entry

Chris Messineo

Chris Messineo

Veteran
Last week-end we competed in the NYC Midnight Run.

At midnight we were assigned the theme "revenge" and given 24 hours to write, shoot, edit, and score our film.

"The Riverbank"

I hope you like it,

Chris

p.s. There is no color-correction as there was no time.
 
The interrogation scene was shot in my dining room in the middle of the afternoon. :)

First, we hung blankets over all the windows to get the room dark.

Second, we hung a 150 watt clamp light from the current dining room chandelier as the key.

Third, we put a 200 watt kino behind the back of the actor in the foreground to provide some edge lighting and overall fill.

Finally, because of the dimensions of the room (very small) we actually always shot in the same direction and just had the actors switch sides of the table. We then moved the camera from the left to the right shoulder accordingly to give the impression that we were shooting in both directions.

At the time, I thought it would be a disaster and I was definitely worried about the low light and the HVX, but I think it turned out pretty well, given the time constraints.

Chris
 
CMessineo said:
Second, we hung a 150 watt clamp light from the current dining room chandelier as the key.

Third, we put a 200 watt kino behind the back of the actor in the foreground to provide some edge lighting and overall fill.

Chris
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Very cool! I see where the 2nd light helps when I watched it again. That's a good tip to remember!

I also peeked at the script and I love the end in the film. The last two lines in the script are fine - but with the performances you got - ending without those two lines is stronger, imo.
 
Nicely done (especially in 24 hours!). I think the women out shined the men in the acting department. They were really truthful in their performances. Only thing I can't get past is why these two hot women would want THAT guy, lol...

...ahem...

Like I said, nicely done.
 
mrpunch said:
I also peeked at the script and I love the end in the film. The last two lines in the script are fine - but with the performances you got - ending without those two lines is stronger, imo.
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Here is what happened with the script.

At midnight we got sent the theme: "revenge"

From midnight to 3:00 I didn't write a word. I was panicing. Finally my head cleared and I got an idea. I then wrote it from 3:00 to 7:00. The script that you read is the same one I sent to my actors at 7:00 that morning.

Everyone arrived at the location (my house) about 9:00 and we had a read though. It was clear that much of the dialogue was a bit cliche and I encouraged the actors to improvise and make the language their own. In particular I hated the last couple of lines in the script. We brainstormed and tried a couple of different endings. In the end, the actors did a great job making it all work.

Chris
 
I liked it, Messino.


Who Directed? The interrogation scenes were the best. I think with more time, it all would've been even better.

There's a lot of camera jitter going on. Is that just because it was handheld? It seemed very minute, like the jittering wasn't exactly from handheld shots but I could be wrong.

What about sound? Did you guys capture straight to camera? Onboard Mic?
 
STORYTELLER32 said:
What did the composer do to create the score? It was nicely done.
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I'm glad you like the film and nice of you to notice the score.

Paul Rivers, our composer, is an actor first and has been in 4 of our films. We only recently found out he writes music as a hobby. He had never done any film scores before, but we talked him into it.

In the morning we discussed ideas and mood and he was at the location all day, creating the score on a laptop.

After we finished the edit at 8:30 that night, the last thing we did was slide his music into place. We needed to fade out here and there for pacing, but otherwise it was perfect.

Chris
 
sweet! i wrote for a theatre festival called "24 hours" in january and it was the same sort of thing - we got paired up with actors and a director at 8pm on a friday evening - and had to incorporate the costumes and props that the actors brought with them into a script. i delivered it at 7am after staying up all night - and then i got to sit and watch it at 8pm that night! they changed the ending to something that i wouldn't have written. it worked 5x better. something you can only see after working with the energy of the actors.
 
Kholi said:
Who Directed? The interrogation scenes were the best. I think with more time, it all would've been even better.

There's a lot of camera jitter going on. Is that just because it was handheld? It seemed very minute, like the jittering wasn't exactly from handheld shots but I could be wrong.

What about sound? Did you guys capture straight to camera? Onboard Mic?
Click to expand...
I wrote and directed it.

I definitely agree with you about more time. The cool thing about the timed festivals though, is they really force you to focus. Then when you go back to a production without those constraints you feel like you can accomplish anything.

About 75% of the shots were handheld using a DVRigPro. I kind of like the camera motion, as I think it gives it a cool energy, but I can see where it might be too shaky for some.

As for sound, we used a sennheiser MKH416 shotgun mic running through a portable mixer and into the camera.

Chris
 
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CMessineo said:
I wrote and directed it.

I definitely agree with you about more time. The cool thing about the timed festivals though, is they really force you to focus. Then when you go back to a production without those constraints you feel like you can accomplish anything.

About 75% of the shots were handheld using a DVRigPro. I kind of like the camera motion, as I think it gives it a cool energy, but I can see where it might be too shaky for some.

As for sound, we used a sennheiser MKH416 shotgun mic running through a portable mixer and into the camera.

Chris
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Nice. The sound was great. It's actually better quality than most lengthy short-film productions.

Do you have any advice for on location sound capturing and mixing?

Also, I think you've really got a director's eye. The only scene that I could see you might have had trouble with was the bedroom scenes and bathroom.. and that's probably because of space limitations.

The interrogation scene, as said before, not only looked great... but it was very well directed. Framing was just really nice. You do well in such controlled enviroments.
 
Kholi said:
Nice. The sound was great. It's actually better quality than most lengthy short-film productions.

Do you have any advice for on location sound capturing and mixing?
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My sound guy has been with me since my first film. He is a good friend and fantastic with sound. We never use the onboard mic and he always does the mix in a portable mixer he wears on his belt (sorry I don't remember the brand).

Kholi said:
Also, I think you've really got a director's eye. The only scene that I could see you might have had trouble with was the bedroom scenes and bathroom.. and that's probably because of space limitations.

The interrogation scene, as said before, not only looked great... but it was very well directed. Framing was just really nice. You do well in such controlled enviroments.
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Thanks, but I think most of the credit for that has to go to our DP. He was contorting his body into all different shapes to try and hold the camera steady and get the shots we needed. I was just watching on our production monitor and providing feedback.

Filmmaking is a team sport. :)

Chris
 
CMessineo said:
My sound guy has been with me since my first film. He is a good friend and fantastic with sound. We never use the onboard mic and he always does the mix in a portable mixer he wears on his belt (sorry I don't remember the brand).


Thanks, but I think most of the credit for that has to go to our DP. He was contorting his body into all different shapes to try and hold the camera steady and get the shots we needed. I was just watching on our production monitor and providing feedback.

Filmmaking is a team sport. :)

Chris
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Definitely is.

Tell your DP he does a great job. xD

Glad you guys had fun. Totally jealous.
 
Very well done, I thought the soundtrack went well with the film, sure some of the shots seemed a bit flat in the lighting dept. but hey you had such a small timeframe.

The hand-held look of the film added a bit of bite to it as well. :Drogar-BigGrin(DBG)
 
24 hours, damn, great job! Will really help when you have a lot more riding on a project and are in a time crunch!

Score was great! I like the jittery handheld.. you see that all the time on features and TV.. It gives me the feel that I am in the room..

Lighting is so tough, but you did a great job for the time that you were given..

Recenetly we did a project here in Miami much like that call "INCUBATOR".. Out of 1000 people we got 3rd place in the Professional catagory.. We wrote it shot it and edited it in 12 hours.. We used free music off of the net..
I was the DP and had to light the entire project as if it were lit ONLY by candle light. No moon through the windows, or anything the windows were boarded up because it was supposed to take place during a hurricane.. The dedolights worked like a charm! It was a lot of fun!!


GOOD LUCK!!
-- Justin
 
Don't know if you saw my post in the Mayday thread, but yeah, I did check out this film... good job all around. I know how hard it is to do a drama that's not totally artificial in 24 hours.

Interesting how they start the contest at midnight, I can see the benefits of that. But did you find it seriously messed up your rhythm to start out that late? Did you change your sleep schedule the day before? Seems like it would be really hard to launch into production without being well-rested.
 
Justin Marx said:
Recenetly we did a project here in Miami much like that call "INCUBATOR".. Out of 1000 people we got 3rd place in the Professional catagory.. We wrote it shot it and edited it in 12 hours.. We used free music off of the net..
I was the DP and had to light the entire project as if it were lit ONLY by candle light. No moon through the windows, or anything the windows were boarded up because it was supposed to take place during a hurricane.. The dedolights worked like a charm! It was a lot of fun!!
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Justin,

Your film sounds great. Is it online?

Chris
 
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