"THE TRADE" a Flyin' Monkey Films Production

thanks guys. Justin R Durban did a FANTASTIC job with the score and it's incredible all of the quality work he's pulled off for those who used him on their films.

I took it easy on the rack focuses this time around since I wanted to focus primarily on the actors performances and the use of the lighting to make the scene more tense. Glad it was an effective tool and that you enjoyed it so much.

Remember to vote!
 
Ah, another sell your soul to the devil film in this fest. It was especially interesting for me in that regard to see how our two devils compared.

This story reminded me of The Little Mermaid, when Ariel sells her voice to Ursula. It's not really established in Trade why the woman's voice is so important to her...is she a singer, a broadcaster, a lecturer? I think if we knew then it would add to the drama---her fear and apprehension. The scream blew my eardrums off.

All-in-all it's well shot and presented. Nice job!
 
Devil? Souls? No souls for sale here that I can see. :) I don't really count myself in the selling of souls category... more in the lines of immoral acts of trading...

SPOILER
I guess I many be missing a bit of clarity and it was one of those on the spot decisions to not have her speak at all, but the premise was to have her have already lost her hearing to a trade 10 years ago... and now she's trading her voice as well, so while she couldn't hear for 10 years, now she's being doomed to having both speech and hearing lost to her... horrifying aspect for anyone I think.
END SPOILER

Sorry about the scream... was going more for effect there. I think we almost got the cops called on us for that one. I'm very glad this film is being so well received. Thank you for all of your critiques.

Keep them coming please.
 
Aim session. The trade.

Aim session. The trade.

Carrying on the tradition from Timefest, the AIM sessions have returned, a live stream of whatever may come out of our heads as we watch your films. Here are Ben Sliker, Brad Mate, and Justin Kuhn's thoughts on "THE TRADE."

Since for some reason, since we couldn't get Adium, AIM and iChat to all agree with each in one chat room, we had to go to an online chat room for the 3-person chats. After almost being molested by a forty year old man in a chat room for "privates" (ben read private chat), we managed to hop on to the chatzy client, which worked well. Note: Never search "free chat" in google and expect what you are looking for.

Ben from x.x.x.104 started chat and sent out 2 invitation(s)
Ben: test
Jebus from x.x.x.250 joined the chat 11 seconds ago
Jebus: hola
Ben: heyo
Ben: tick tick tick justin
Kuhn from x.x.x.122 joined the chat
Kuhn: ok
Ben: HEYO
Ben: alright
Ben: "the trade"
Ben: everybody ready?
Kuhn: ok
Jebus: rdy
Ben: 3
Ben: 2
Ben: 1
Ben: go
Ben: this guy has some pretty serious life goeals
Jebus: i like how he circles it...like his gonna forget that day
Ben: requests? umm ... stop playing music?
Ben: CAMERA WOBBLE!
Ben: what's with these kids and the satan movies?
Jebus: she must have been in a wheelchair in the prequel
Ben: LOL
Jebus: and she wanted to dance in barns
Ben: this lighting makes her look like a piggy.
Kuhn: you can tell he's satan by how noisy his section of the picture is
Kuhn: because Satan made the "gain" button.
Jebus: this online chat makes me nauseous.
Ben: lol, you should have seen the first on i tried to use
Ben: a 40 YO man tried to molest me
Kuhn: this shot is going on way too long
Jebus: YOU MUST EAT...THE BROODWICH
Ben: lol ... worst scene ever. THE BROOD - PLACENTA EATING ... look it up. (here ... i did it for you ... CLICK HERE)
Ben: was the shot change really necessary?
Jebus: box cutter!? shes a terrorist!!
Kuhn: she's trying to hijack her way out of this film
Ben: seriously ... they haven't used box cutters since 01
Ben: ooo ... wait ... too soon?
Jebus: why does satan have to be black huh?!1
Ben: i hate it when naked black men show up in my blue misty room. There is a sign that distinctly says "No naked black men" I don't see how it can be misinterpreted.
Ben: someone needs to take the colored gels away from this guy.
Jebus: might not want to help the crazy lady
Jebus: 100 years? what was her first deal? shes a horrible bargainer
Ben: 500. ok ... 100. SOLD .... sh*t.
Kuhn: i love to twiddle the focus
Ben: thoughts?
Kuhn: I just don't feel like I've mastered it yet...
Jebus: i get to live slightly past the average lifespan of a human!! sweet here's my soul!!
Ben: i'm going to live til im 101
Ben: just out of spite for the number 100
Jebus: lol
Kuhn: not terribly well acted
Kuhn: the resolution/compression choice didn't help.
Ben: btw brad, for some reason justin and i's names are green and yours is pink on my screen.
Kuhn: but this filmmaker could totally get better and kick ass
Jebus: i didnt get the guys motivation. when someone is freaking out and tries to cut you and is running into walls, you dont normally stand there and still try to help
Kuhn: the same color here
Kuhn: he's a sensitive man
Jebus: yeah, i chose a different color...
Ben: ok then
Jebus: when you do a short that is basically one long convo you want to make it more interesting than one shot. i suggest the clean slate strategy of an assload of dolly shots.
Ben: lol, next sauce?

puck, this was weird. regardless of what i said in the session, you used color very effectively here, although know that reds and blues like that are very susceptible to blockies in compression. I felt like the piece as a whole could have used more shot selection. Perhaps even have the devil control her movements a bit. that would have been creep-sauce. I think if you tighten down a couple loose screws, your production value and story could be off the hook.

Glad to see a finished puck film, but miss the willy wonka glasses. :beer:
 
good movie.

spoiler


to show the "devil" or not to show the devil character... i liked it better when you showed him. i'd have liked it even more if he got into her face and confronted her even more. make it real ugly and uncomfortable. really liked the tension your film brought as it is, you got quite the vehicle here to go even further with that feeling if you go for broke ( my two cents!) . loved the daylight shots you got, liked the night shots too. liked the music a lot as well. you got the best titles i've seen so far too.

i thought she acted very well. the devil wasn't shown enough for me to judge, for what i saw i think he did fine. the musician was okay.

cool film!
 
Thanks Hoz. I kind of tried to walk the fine line of revealing too mch. It was actually a really difficult decision to decide on doing the rack focus that clearly shows the "Spectre" (as he was called in the script) or not to show him, but in the end I thought the reveal built to the tension and pushed the story along further... maybe a bit more makeup next time and get him naked regardless of if he's cold or not..either that or get a space heater. If it's Tom Marshall, then definitely not space heater: you know actors.

As for the actors i did have... well they did exactly as I requested and made adjustments accordingly. If anyone finds fault with my actors then you can blame me, cuz they gave exactly the performance I was asking for. They are terrific actors and you'll be seeing them in more of my Toronto based work.

keep the reviews coming!
 
So I can't get Kholi, but instead Kholi 2.0. Thanks for the review Ben (and company) broke my heart listening to you guys rip my film to shreds.... mainly because you were voicing a lot of the concerns I had with the edit (damn you all to the deepest layers of HECK!).

Glad you found it freaky in the end.. well wierd. I have an alternate edit all lined up based on your reviews (and a few others) so we'll just have to watch for the DC after the fest is over.

Oh and the Willy Wonka glasses havent't gone away. The re-edit/re-shoot of Act 2 is almost done.. waiting for foley and score now and I'll post a link when that's up.

Thanks dude(s).
 
I enjoyed this. It had a good story, nice cinematography, a great score and good acting by the devil - he was very Puckish/Shakespearean. I imagine your name "Puckthemad" has some reasoning behind it?
A very solid entry, thanks.
Jason
 
the beginning was confusing to me - missed the calendar reference first time around. The photography was great, loved the contrasts and the colors. good actress
 
Guess you must have blinked Dick. ANd I tried so hard to hold the shot for the right amount of time.... Glad that you dug the film. We had a hell of a time setting up the lighting and gels for the main set piece... think we took about 4-5 hours (great rehearsal time) and then spent about 20 minutes shooting, but it was totally worth it.

Evie Koop (funny, I never realized her name was one letter way from "evil" until i just misspelled it) was a great find. I actually found her on the Toronto craigslist, and she had just the right look I needed for this film. Great experience working with her too.
 
Hi puck

Just watched this and thought it was a fun flick.

Oh, I just got the calender shot after reading the post above.... Not to spoon feed the audience but maybe if you had her circling the new date at the end of the short it might have clarified that and also clarified that she had done the trade once before. The way it was edited made you think it was the guy that had circled it at the time (which is good) but I didn't leave the short going 'ooohhh it was her', if you get me. (But I am thick!) EDIT: Ignore that, how would she get hold of a calender for 100 years in the future! lol - maybe a computer screen then. doh)

I liked your compositions and I liked the story. Did he give her hearing back at the end? She seemed to be talking and listening to the devil in the alleyway and my thought was that her betrayal gave her another 100 years with all her senses back? Am I close?

Liked the lighting and colours, you created a nice mood. I prefered it more when you didn't see the devil. I thought he worked better out of focus and I liked what you were doing with that because most people who 'show' the devil can ultimately dissapoint the audience. Unfort for me, the same happened here. I prefered him as a misty figure, and when he was revealed I just didnt find him alluring or threatening anymore. Having said that I think nailing a devil is really hard as everyone has different views on how it should be portrayed.

I thought the start of your short was very cinematic. You created sympathy, and told the story, purely visualy with no dialogue. Totally dug it.... from them on it became more of a conversation piece and I thought some of the visuals lost their power.

Still I enjoyed it a lot and it shows a lot of potential for future work. Nice idea, well executed.
 
Thanks Darkline. Yes she did have her full hearing and voice back at the end. You got the gist of it right off the bat.

We were definitely going more for the tension and let things be revealed. We actually re-wrote the dialog several times so there was no fluff, just points that continued to drive the story forward and set up character at the same time. Spoonfeeding the audience isn;t out thing, but giving little clues along the way... seems to work for some.

Glad you liked the cinematic elements of my story telling. I've been trying very hard to develop a style and tone for my work and I think I'm definitely getting there, especially effectively using lighting and colors as well as blocking to make a more cohesive onscreen image.

I'll definitely have to address the "conversation piece" angle and the next cut after Twilightfest (the DC) should address the long piece with no cuts. I thought I had designed the shot to be interesting enough for a long take, but need to work on that a little more.

Thanks for your input and glad you liked the story.

Keep em coming guys.
 
This one was very atomospheric and featured some really cool lighting.

Personally I loved the interaction with the 'devil' character, even moreso as soon as he actually appeared onscreen. My initial impression when it was just the voice was that it was bordering on melodrama, but as soon as he materialized I thought it worked damn well. His presence really sold the interaction.

Nice work -- I'm definitely looking forward to more from you!
 
Thanks for the critque and glad you enjoyed the story, both visually and narratively.

Mario will be pleased that you liked his work on this. I'll pass on the compliment.

Side note for everyone who has viewed and critiqued: the spectre is not the devil per se. He's just another demo who has services to offer for the right price, and definitely has no interest in souls. There's a line we cut that I had fought to keep, but it was one of the fluff lines that didn't advance the storyline, so it got cut early in the rewrite.

Gaby: I could offer you my soul.
Spectre: (scoffs) What would I do with a soul? You don't even use yours and would hardly miss it. No. Give me something... something of great value to you...
Click to expand...

Maybe I should have kept that line instead of ruthlessly excising it. Oh well. Too late now.
 
Award for best version of Satan goes to you. Mario Rigby was great! Loved it when he was just some creepy out of focus shape in the background. Kind of a frightening lingering retinal burn of a pretense. Oh and with a voice like rusted nails. It worked to even greater effect when we saw him. Great job creating that character.

The film worked for me as a 'deal with the devil' tale. I'm not sure all of what you were going for with the audio levels worked for me. Not really enough for me to say good nor bad. But a gutsy move to do it.

Really liked the film and looking forward to more.
 
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