"Late" --- A film by Drew Ott

Mickey Munday said:
going off memory, i thought the dude walked outside and just fell in the pool and let hiomself drown in the end? that wasn't on purpose?
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It was never clear if he had killed himself, fell in and died, fell in and got out later or just jumped in to "clense" himself of the pain. Drew said before he left it vague on purpose.
 
I liked this - has a very natural feel, the camera gets out of the way, lets the story unfold. The acting is superb, top-notch, your lead delivers his lines very convincingly, there is no over-the-top acting which lesser actors would fall prey to. Great swimming pool scenes, I like the sexual tension between them, how she wants to swim, he's not in that mood at all.

This is a really well done short!!! I'm watching this one again.

On a second viewing, a couple more notes: 1) I don't like the music choice. I think this would have been better off with no songs. 2) Just before the CU sequence between neighbour and lead, there's a split second of the neighbour entering the frame from the left - did you put this in because otherwise we wouldn't know she was approaching him? The color palette is off in that scene, was it a pick-up? 3) Funny you chose a "click" sound for when he turns off the TV - they don't work like that anymore, but it works for us as an audience - it tells us that the TV is being turned off.

Really well done! This is in my top 5.
 
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Good job! The film looked great. My main critique would be TONE. Obviously the parents were cartoon character, played for laughs, but the rest of the story seemed to be playing it straight. Poignant and flippant don't mix that well IMO. I think if you'd played the parents as real people it would have worked better for me... tied in with that is how they told him such a serious and important secret during a commercial break. Why would they do that? Didn't make sense to me and took me out of the picture, ie. "Is this a joke, or what?"

Loved the ending, very "Graduate" like. Did not come across as suicide to me.

Your young age make this film all the more impressive. Look forward to your next film.
 
First I thought that some parts of the story are not really credibly - the parents seem very artificial, but I agree with Maximus: "the parents were cartoon character,..." seen from this angle it works. I love the camera work, the edeting and also the music. The element of the grandmother is for me a little bit weak (perhaps better an old mother!). When the main charakter started to travel on bike and made hitch hiking: I don't know if it is normal in USA that there is someone who picks you up with a bike? For me it seemed a little bit a romantic idea. Above all I like your film. Compliments.

Susanne
 
this whole suicide thing mystifies me. I got it. Probably the part of the movie I dug the most. This being a high school movie is most impressive. It looks great. You've got a knack for film making for sure.

The story itself wasn't my cup of tea. I could go on about that, but really it's just subjective and I won't rake you over the coals for it. I'd just keep an eye on making sure your writing isn't so blunt. I felt like i got conked over the head with the deeper meaning of the story.

Overall, nicely done. Looking forward to what you've got in store next!
 
Hey Drew,
Great job! The lighting in the pool scene was great, and the main actor and girl were good together. The lighting with the interior scenes wasn't so hot. I thought they were too dark, but maybe that's what you were going for. I thought the dialogue was a little on the nose, and the actors were a little stiff, but overall great job with your first DVX user film.

best,

JP
 
Great cinematography here. Good work Drew. The acting was good, although Peter could have been more distressed, especially in light of the ending. I have to say that it does make sense for Jessica to strip down to her swim suit once Peter arrives. Otherwise, she would have been waiting there at night with just a bikini on. I don't think she would have done that. Overall, the pacing was nice and the editing solid.

I'm not a fan of the story, dark comedy or not. Mostly because of a deep personal bias, but also because the humor I felt was directed at the subject of adoption in general, rather than the parental ineptitude in dealing with the topic.
 
Understated. Dug it! The night scene at the pool was beautiful. So was the bike hitching segment. Me likey the pretty red stripes. Could you talk a bit about your lighting set-up and camera settings for those scenes?
 
Very nice job Drew. The lighting was excellent. The acting was also very good, and your casting was top notch. I really liked the pool sequence and the biking/hitchhiking sequence.

One of my problems with this is the parents. They are just too over the top. In the writing and in the performances. They kind of remind me of the family in Million Dollar Baby if you've seen that. Of course, that film won the best picture oscar, so maybe I'm alone here. I just find them implausibly mean.

My other critique would be that although all the shots in the opening scene are nice individually, I don't think they cut together well. Perhaps a slightly different edit would fix this.
 
Thanks for the comments everybody. Really helpful stuff.

Justin Kuhn said:
Could you talk a bit about your lighting set-up and camera settings for those scenes?
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Of course.

For the pool scene we had a 2k open faced "Mighty" bounced into the pool creating the reflections on the background and on the actors. There was a fluorescent fixture sitting on the ground below the actors' feet to motivate light coming from the pool. We also had a chinaball extended on a c-stand with 2 arms to fill in the weird shadows coming from the fluorescent fixture on the ground. We used a Cool Lights 150w HMI thing for the backlight. For Jessica's shots in the pool, we bounced one 650w fresnel on each side of her and I think kept the chinaball on for eye light. I'm pretty sure that was it.

Camera settings, I don't really know what I did. Shot flat and graded in post I guess. Is that what you're looking for?
 
Drew, do I remember correctly you mentioning you're 16?!! If so, WTF!!!??? I'm amazed at your skills. I'm your number one fan!!!

No seriously. Where did you learn to light?
 
This was very well done, especially the family tv scenes. congrats on a great short. The only thing I could add is that the pacing felt a little slow at times for me.
 
Drew Ott said:
Thanks for the comments everybody. Really helpful stuff.



Of course.

For the pool scene we had a 2k open faced "Mighty" bounced into the pool creating the reflections on the background and on the actors. There was a fluorescent fixture sitting on the ground below the actors' feet to motivate light coming from the pool. We also had a chinaball extended on a c-stand with 2 arms to fill in the weird shadows coming from the fluorescent fixture on the ground. We used a Cool Lights 150w HMI thing for the backlight. For Jessica's shots in the pool, we bounced one 650w fresnel on each side of her and I think kept the chinaball on for eye light. I'm pretty sure that was it.

Camera settings, I don't really know what I did. Shot flat and graded in post I guess. Is that what you're looking for?
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Just wanted to cover all the basics. For instance I thought maybe you made some kind of interesting white balance choice to get that red tint in the bike hitching segment. I suppose that could have been post, but it looks kind of like it was done in camera. Was that scene shot with natural light?
 
Oh whoops, you weren't asking about the pool scene, but the bike scene.

We put actual sodium bulbs used in street lights on c-stands. No diffusion at all. I wanted the light real hard so he'd bike through pools of light. The lights were actually about 80 ft apart, but I was real telephoto so that the c-stands wouldn't be in the shot, and it compressed the depth more than I would have liked. I guess it works though.

Where did you learn to light?
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I'm not sure exactly. Books, forums, sets. I had been interning for Robert Baumgartner, a gaffer/DP, before I shot the film so I learned quite a bit from him, but I've also learned a lot about how to do it on a small budget by working on random short films (Luis Caffesse's Love Fest project for example).

What I've learned about lighting is that it's best to do lighting tests before shooting. People keep mentioning the lighting in the pool scene as one that stood out. I did tests for that scene and had about 6 hours with a friend to tweak that until it was exactly how I wanted. If I hadn't done that, I would have had no idea of what to do on set. I attribute anything that looks "good" to having the time for lighting tests.
 
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Drew Ott said:
Oh whoops, you weren't asking about the pool scene, but the bike scene.

We put actual sodium bulbs used in street lights on c-stands. No diffusion at all. I wanted the light real hard so he'd bike through pools of light. The lights were actually about 80 ft apart, but I was real telephoto so that the c-stands wouldn't be in the shot, and it compressed the depth more than I would have liked. I guess it works though.

I'm not sure exactly. Books, forums, sets. I had been interning for Robert Baumgartner, a gaffer/DP, before I shot the film so I learned quite a bit from him, but I've also learned a lot about how to do it on a small budget by working on random short films (Luis Caffesse's Love Fest project for example).

What I've learned about lighting is that it's best to do lighting tests before shooting. People keep mentioning the lighting in the pool scene as one that stood out. I did tests for that scene and had about 6 hours with a friend to tweak that until it was exactly how I wanted. If I hadn't done that, I would have had no idea of what to do on set. I attribute anything that looks "good" to having the time for lighting tests.
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I agree. it is all about preparation. prepare well and you come up with a much better film. you obvious;y did. looked great!
 
Great film, well put, and the color and comp were great, you've got great skills, hope to see more from you.
 
I didn't really follow the reviews here, so I don't know which points have been said before.

This was overall a great production! Acting was solid, good lighting, good sound and nice story. I liked it alot!

A few things that I recognized which didn't work for me:
The pool doesn't fit to the parents. I would never expect these people to have such a pool.

The pool itself was quite dark in some scenes, but the light it emitted was tremendous.

Good work young man! I wish I was that far when I was at your age. Congratulations!
 
good job on the film Drew! i liked the underwater shot. (i haven't followed the posts here, sorry if you already answered this. What did you use for the underwater shot?) the lighting was really good.

there were a couple of edits that took me away from the story during the first scene when the guy first walks into the room with his parents. nothing MAJOR, but they did make me go "what was that?"

can't wait to see more from you.
 
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