"Solecism" by: justin r. durban

Very good short, the ending was awesomely good. The editing, music and acting made it very powerful. I also loved the tracking in shot where he's lying on his back and is on the phone.

No real new criticisms to add, I agree that the gardener just confused me, and there were some CC issues.
 
Just finished watching, I loved the acting. That guy put out a very believable performance. Nice camera work for the most part although there were a few times where you could see the camera being jerked slightly.

The audio was great and i really liked the story. It was simple but reflects real-life so people can relate easily. Well written and very well executed.

Very nice work :)
Congrats.
 
Beautiful camera work. Nice pacing of the story. I liked the main characters ups and downs with the phone conversations, gave the film a good rhythm.

And you about gave me a panic attack at the end! The Mom in me comes front and center when kids are in jeopardy like that. Even on a second viewing I still got anxious. And I'm counting that as a good thing ;) .

Very solid film. Great work!
 
Nice movie. The story is good. The acting is nice. But it looks like you forgot to remove the pull-down cause I could still see some interlaced footages. You should also remove the letterbox next time. The movie looks much better without it. Great job!
 
This one is in the top 3 for me. There were a few issues with CC and sound,(as if mine does not) BUT, that in no way distracted me from the twist. I have kids and that gave me chills. GREAT JOB.
 
The story is very intelligent and unfortunately sometimes a mirror of our western society. The acting of the main character was very good, but I didn't understand the southamerican man outside the house. What was his function in this film? Above all I liked this film. Compliments.

Susanne
 
Justin, nice work man. I really felt for the guy at the end and it was nerve racking for sure.. I liked the camera work for the most part, my fav shots being the profile shot in the kitchen as he rinses the burnt pan and the slow dolly in while he lies down on that sofa.. Nice twist at the end.. Overall a solid piece :)

Geoff
 
Wow, very interesting. I'm a dad of one little guy and another on the way and personally I found it very hard to relate in that I cannot fathom forgeting my kid for more than ten minutes (even that I've never done). But it did succeed in getting an emotional reaction from me.

Also, I was pretty dang disappointed that Justin Durbun does a video and there's pretty much no music to it. wtf mate? :-).
 
Justin, I finally got around to watching your film. Awesome. The reveal scared the bejeesus outta me. Definitely a "SNAP" moment, but alot more serious though :)

I agree with Shawneous, I thought you were going to make a movie that enabled you to make the ultimate score, but I guess you do that for everyone and you wanted something different? Totally appropriate for your story though.

Great job, great setup.

Thanks again for your help, and hopefully we can return the favor for you soon enough.
 
Hey man,

Just caught the flick. I enjoyed it and thought it's execution, tone, acting were all quite nice. Th editing and angles were especially great. I also really enjoyed your production design. His house just SCREAMS baby but you wonder where he is.

I don't like the gardener/neighbor. He just doesn't seem very well grounded in the film. I read what you said about him but I don't buy it. If we had seen maybe like a quick interaction between him and the lead, even if it's just the two in the scene together, I think I would have bought his presence more.

Story-wise I thought that this could have been tighter. It just seemed like a tad too much talking on the phone without getting to sort of the meat of the idea. Is this guy a negligent father or is he just so stressed he forgot about the kid? He comes off as a negligent father is some ways and not so much in others. Also, while I know the stuff on the phone pertains to the story, I would have like to hear it tie in with the theme/idea just a tad more. But that's me being really picky.

Overall I thought this was a very nice piece, well executed with a deep story.
 
Heylo everyone! I hope you don't mind me completely hijacking the entire forum with my thread comments. I just finished watching ALLLL the films so I wanted to get those out of the way first before getting back to Solecism.

I appreciate all the wonderful comments and I'm glad most of you enjoyed the film. Again, I wish I could explain the gardener, but there's just some things I would rather keep to myself and not explain. I guess that's the 'artist' in me. I would however; like to add one last shot just to wrap that up.

As for the forgetful dad.. yes, I realize there's no way in the world I would ever leave my son in the car, but I bet you that I'll NEVER let that happen to me just because of this film.

Another thing I'm surprised you guys never caught was the countdown in the film. Since it was in the vein of "Time", I wrote in a little easter egg sort of thing. Dunno if anyone got it or not.


Keep the comments coming!
 
OMFG, you really did hijack the entire Individual Discussion forum!! That's impressive. How long did that take you?
 
Hey Justin - I liked it. I didn't understand the role of the gardener though.

I was waiting all the way through for the score to come in. When it did come in, it did a pretty good job. I like how it subtly speeds up.
 
Arrik said:
OMFG, you really did hijack the entire Individual Discussion forum!! That's impressive. How long did that take you?
Click to expand...

Ha!! It took me a good 30-45 minutes last night. Since I had all my notes in a word .doc it didn't take too long. Sometimes I got to antsy and I had to wait the 30sec for me to post again.

Thanks Herman! I was reluctant to even do that much scoring. I wanted something very minimal, but it kind of got out of hand. I think it works for the most part, but I think right after the last... "boom", it does this double time click thing... that should have come in earlier I think. I may go back and re-visit the music and the wrap the gardener scene up for the festival cut. (tighten up the opening car scene)

thanks for watching!
 
This was a great little short; I think a card at the end stating it was a PSA for baby CPR would have been appropriate.

I'm a new father (6 month old) and work-from-home dad; so, the minute he walked into the house with the toys, the gig was up for me. The gardener (while I understand your larger 'artistic' point) seemed to give it away. It's Chekov's gun law: "if you show the gun on stage, you'd better use it." So, the tension for me was "when is [the lead] going to figure it out?" I was waiting for the reveal.

Just a character issue: when the smoke-alarm goes off, wouldn't he be concerned about 'little man' waking up? As a papa, aware of how noises play havoc on sleeping babies, I would. So, is the dad a klutz (as you would have us believe by the title of the piece) or just negligent?

Performances were great, sound was good and it was shot well. Good job and congrats on entering the fest!
 
Hey Edgen,

I caught the film.

Um... Where to begin. I had originally downloaded this a while ago, and skimmed through it. And I decided to watch it in full... Since you gave mine a shot (even though you had to fight through it).

The overall feel of the film felt very standard, and bland. There's really nothing engaging with the first, or really any of the conversations he had on his phone (he's having work troubles... What kind? How does that REALLY effect him? Also, how is his family REALLY going to suffer?). I'd like to have seen some more human interaction. There should be some conflict to keep the viewer interested... There was slight conflict but it was more one sided. I understand you probably chose the whole phone conversation thing to speed shooting time, but overall not very effective.

I will say your actor (...even though 8 years with a firm?? He looked... MAYBE 25) did a pretty good job acting.

The lighting overall wasn't very engaging.

And the gardener??? How did he pertain to the story?

Sound was clear, and the minimal score was nice.

I liked the overall story with a guy leaving his kid in the car (as this is something more common then people think). Although it felt a little cheesy when they ran out there and did CPR.

Was this also one of your first films? If so you did a good job! As with me I'm sure you'll take the good and the bad and use it as a strong learning experience.

Seriously congrats on completing a short. I completed mine, and it was my first REAL short. I've learned alot.
 
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I like this, but was confused by the gardener, I thought he was a dummy at first cos he didn't appear to move.
Acting was good and I'm pleased he saved the baby's life :)
Thank you
 
This one was well shot and the acting was very good. The pauses when he's on the phone seemed a little long to me though. I wouldn't mind hearing the other side of the conversation, and I think it could've spiced up the dialog.

I'm not a dad, and maybe I'm one of the "lowest-common-denominator" viewers, but I just thought his kid was with the wife or something. When your character has forgotten about his kid, and your audience doesn't know the kid is in the car (at least I didn't know) then everything until the reveal is just fluff, which is how I felt. There wasn't any suspense and I had no idea what the story was about. I think it would be more effective if the audience was told in the first car ride. Then, all the "fluff" is something bigger. It shows how focused the dad is on his own stuff, even to the point of forgetting about the most important thing in his life. I think it would add a lot more suspense. Especially if you showed the clock to the audience, then they're thinking "ooo, how long can that kid last in a hot car."

Anyway, I thought I'd give a non-parents take on this, if it's any help.

Again, the acting was very good. There were a couple moments that I didn't buy, or seemed off. - When he realizes the kid is in the car, it was too... I don't know.. duuhhh? Don't you think you would run through the wall if you remembered something like that? --When the wife says, "you guys have a good time at the park" it sounds like a question, not a statement.

Well done, but it didn't grab me because I didn't know what the story was until the end.
Congrats on entering and doing so much work for this fest!
 
Hey Justin, great job on getting another one done & in on time for the fest. I need to get back into these ... since I don't think the economy is going to allow me to get funding for a feature anytime soon, I've got nothing but time, right? :)

I've not read any of the other feedback on here, but just watched your film & put in my two cents worth.

1st, I see that you made it a point to have little to no score involved. VERY interesting approach, especially coming from a composer! That's fine. It worked. :)

I felt the main lead was a tad off the 1st half. Something about the phone call felt like he was acting, vs. us being privy to a conversation we shouldn't be hearing, etc.

The gardener outside was SUCH a distraction to me because everytime I'd see him I'd wonder what he's got to do with anything. Now I get it ... he was probably watching the baby in the car, wondering when the dad's going to come back out for it. Still, I was distracted by it.

Overall, I think the best part is the acting of the main lead starting from about the half way point on, especially his look at the end. GREAT. I think the female would have been screaming for an ambulance or something other than just watching him perform CPR on her baby, but that's just me. I know my wife wouldn't put all hope in me, and would be doing something else.

Camera work, audio, everything else seemed solid. I liked the story idea very much, and especially liked the ending, GLAD that the baby lived, so I got vested quickly at the very end.

If there's one thing I could change about this film, perhaps it would be the editing. Whether it's the pacing, or transitions ... not sure at this juncture, but it just felt like perhaps the editing was the area that most could have been improved to really take the story/events to another level.

All that said, I still rated this film fairly high, most likely because of the ending that did it for me. :)
 
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