Edgen - "Brown Waters"

hey there -

sorry to repeat anything already out there. no time to read through all the threads at this point!

your story kind of lost me. why are there a bunch of recreational vehicles running around behind the lake? who are these guys? what is their relationship with one another? what are the implications of the dude drowning? what does it have to do with the dudes treading water? why does the one guy jump in at the end? is he sad? is he killing himself? or is he just returning himself to the river? and why should we care?

i think if you flesh these elements out, you could have a good short since you seem to have a pretty good sensibility for the rest of the stuff. and as usual, your score is great.
 
I think this was kind of unfocused. Meaning I wasn't sure what was going on. It looked pretty bad as well. the music was great though.

Keep it up.
 
Lingothree said:
hey there -

sorry to repeat anything already out there. no time to read through all the threads at this point!

your story kind of lost me. why are there a bunch of recreational vehicles running around behind the lake? who are these guys? what is their relationship with one another? what are the implications of the dude drowning? what does it have to do with the dudes treading water? why does the one guy jump in at the end? is he sad? is he killing himself? or is he just returning himself to the river? and why should we care?

i think if you flesh these elements out, you could have a good short since you seem to have a pretty good sensibility for the rest of the stuff. and as usual, your score is great.
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Lingothree, Thank you for the review!

-I guess it's hard to explain why the guy was riding around on a bunch of rec vechiles... so I won't.
-Their relationship... Just a real time moment in any given day, with any given conversation between good friends. Ever heard that guys can argue, cuss each other out and still have a beer as if nothing happened?

eh. Too many questions. I obviously failed in this film. (or to some of you that is)

Music.. Thank you. i'm glad you at least liked the score.

/j
 
conrad_johnson said:
I think this was kind of unfocused. Meaning I wasn't sure what was going on. It looked pretty bad as well. the music was great though.

Keep it up.
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thanks for the review.
I wonder how many times I have to say that it was shot with a consumer camera? I can't begin to compete with the rest of the films, but that's cool. I'm ok with that. Next time.... Next time.

Glad you liked the music. (at least) :)

/j
 
Edgen said:
thanks for the review.
I wonder how many times I have to say that it was shot with a consumer camera? I can't begin to compete with the rest of the films, but that's cool. I'm ok with that. Next time.... Next time.

Glad you liked the music. (at least) :)

/j
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I realize it was shot with a consumer camera, that doesn't change the fact that it looks bad. You should be ready to hear that. You are very talented, so I don't want to cut you down, but everyone should stop with the exuses already. ( I didn' have enough time, people crapped out, blah blah.) It just gets tiring.
Sorry, I don't want to be a turd, but everyones got an exuse. There are lots of things I had problems with with my entry too, and people have pointed them out. It happens. Oh, well. But I don't make exuses, I just take it as a learning expirence.:)
 
conrad_johnson said:
I realize it was shot with a consumer camera, that doesn't change the fact that it looks bad. You should be ready to hear that. You are very talented, so I don't want to cut you down, but everyone should stop with the exuses already. ( I didn' have enough time, people crapped out, blah blah.) It just gets tiring.
Sorry, I don't want to be a turd, but everyones got an exuse. There are lots of things I had problems with with my entry too, and people have pointed them out. It happens. Oh, well. But I don't make exuses, I just take it as a learning expirence.:)
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Bad to me... Meaning, Physically, the quality of the movie was bad. NOw.. if you said,.. your film was "Bad" meaning, I'd rather go watch CNN, then that's fine.

I realize I had problems and I'm not giving an excuse. (at least not trying to) I just wanted to know more in depth of "Why" you thought it was bad instead of just saying..

...It looked pretty bad as well.
Click to expand...

I want to grow in this experience and if you can't go into reasons, then I'm not learning anything.

So... :) Rip into if if you will! no holds bar people. I want to get better.

/j
 
The camera itself looks bad to me. Now if you played into that and maybe (now I'm not an idea man here!) some other "friend" was doing the recording (so there's a motivation behind the look of the consumer cam) then it would have worked more. The shots you did were nice, there was just a lack in quality, be it contrast or blown-out highlights, Im not sure, but something looked off. And if you know it's going to be poor quality, then give it a motivation. That's all.:)
 
There we go! That's what I like to hear :)

Contrast and blownout highlights.

I'm sure it's also due to the aweful audio and that you can hear my dumbass breathing in some of the shots, bad wind, and fumbling the camera around. My other option was to just ADR the whole thing, but... it just wasn't worth it.

Keep the comments rolling...

/j
 
Hey Justin, I'll get to a review as soon as all this insanity I'm going through right now is over with! Hey, you should swing by this weekend. We'll put you in as an extra even! ;)
 
I got the relationships but I know these guys, or guys like these guys.
Story had a powerful conclusion and nice score and some nice editing there.
I think it's too long by a 3rd and in the wrong festival (it's not horror it's just tragic).
I appreciated the natural performances and dialogue and payoff of the story. And the low fi video look didn't bother me for one second. In fact I didn't even notice it.
:thumbsup:
 
Hey Edgen.
This was an interesting piece. My friends and I had a lot of fun watching this. Very offbeat characters. Funny voices, motivaions and relationships.
The acting and dialogue delivery was ok. Cinematography, score, and editing was ok.
Liked the moral conundrum at the end.

The guy on the zipline came out of nowhere. We were in stiches.

We were a bit confused since we couldn't "figure out" the movie until that final scene.

The humor at the begining sharply contrasts with the sad, weightiness at the end. Masterfully done.
I think it'll stay with us for a while. Pretty memorable and unique tale.
 
Just finally getting the time to copy the notes I compiled in a Word doc while watching the shorts:

The CC really helped to take a lower consumer end camera & make the image a lot nicer. Fairly good camera & editing, though the acting was rough by the drunken lead, I felt. I didn’t get how this was a horror until the very end, and indeed … having to choose between who to save would be horrific, no doubt. Still room to improve the overall sound design/levels, though the score was solid & effective, & didn’t try to rule the film … a compliment considering the film was made by a composer. J
 
Some of the best performances in the fest. As Jack pointed out, they're very natural. Captured the type of guys perfectly. Was it largely improvisation?
 
I know some of you guys thought it took too long to 'get to the point' of my film, "Brown Waters"... but I've uploaded the original cut of the film.

In the next few days if you have nothing better to do.. give it a watch. This cut is with another piece of music and is actually what I based the first movie on. Some scenes are completely cut out because I didn't get a chance to capture the footage at that time. It's 9:45 minutes running time. So... for those of you liked the dry funny accents and monotone deliveries.. here ya go.

http://edgen.hostpaw.com/edgen_brown_waters_extended.mov

I also said I would release the final final ending. so I'll do that here in a few days.

yup. word is bond. James Bond.
/j
 
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