Lingothree - Dear Jane

Alright,
I have to say that I thoroughly enjoyed watching this one, nothing makes my day more than dead hookers.

Highlights:
the last shot. holy christ, phenomenal makeup work. I really wanted it to go away cause it was disturbing, but good job on keeping me creeped out.

I love that you developed the character from childhood, and the score really set the mood for the entire progression.

Constructive Criticism:
It would have been awesome for you to have found a child to play the little kid, I believe the point of view shots work to a certain degree, but combined with say, a long oof shot of the child being spanked, or hiding under the desk, might have enhanced the feeling of him being "small".

Other than that, the VO worked for me, I don't think it could have been delivered any other way, unless you totally revamped the script.

Good job framing to keep things hidden. I enjoyed it!
 
You're right, I'm an idiot. It's all there. And this might be the only movie in history to feature a DVX-Spanking :)
 
Okay, this film worked very well. i enjoyed the theme and the way it was executed. i loved the reveal at the end. Definitely had everything together! Good stuff, and creepy make-up at the end!!!
 
Very nice work! I loved that last shot as well; very disturbing.

At first I wasn't feeling the VO, I usually dislike it, but it works well in your film. The one big thing I'd say is that although the shot itself surprised me, I knew already that he had done something horrible to her. Maybe it came out in the VO or just in the way the shots were designed early on, but I couldn't help but feel like I knew the outcome of the film in the first 30 seconds. Overall, the writing, execution (direction) was very strong and makes this one of my favs so far.
 
hybridtheory said:
Alright,
I have to say that I thoroughly enjoyed watching this one, nothing makes my day more than dead hookers.

Highlights:
the last shot. holy christ, phenomenal makeup work. I really wanted it to go away cause it was disturbing, but good job on keeping me creeped out.

I love that you developed the character from childhood, and the score really set the mood for the entire progression.

Constructive Criticism:
It would have been awesome for you to have found a child to play the little kid, I believe the point of view shots work to a certain degree, but combined with say, a long oof shot of the child being spanked, or hiding under the desk, might have enhanced the feeling of him being "small".

Other than that, the VO worked for me, I don't think it could have been delivered any other way, unless you totally revamped the script.

Good job framing to keep things hidden. I enjoyed it!
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Thanks much for your kind words! Glad you noticed the character development, and the framing. And I couldn't agree more with you about the dead hookers.

Also couldn't agree more about the little kid (or absence thereof)...the screenplay originally called for two little kids - a little girl to be hiding in the clost from the serial killer then revealing the killer has chopped off her mom's head, and also a little boy to play young John. When we had trouble finding two kids, we decided to make the little girl in the closet into a little boy (and it's in the movies so no sex reassignment surgery required), and have that same little boy play young John (since we had never intended to show Young John's face anyway). So that boy was set to film, but had other obligations and didn't show up. We wanted to wrap things up - and had to return the lights - so we wrote that actor out altogether, replaced with entirely POV shots (for Young John) and a teddy bear held by the small hand of an 18-year-old PA.

So long story short - I agree we should have had kids, but we just got lazy. I thought about searching the streets and asking one of the many neighborhood kids if they wanted to be in a movie but I figured a. if I told the parents what the movie was about they would turn us down b. if I didn't tell the parents what the movie was about, they'd think I was a pedophile ("hey sonny, wanna be in a movie? in my basement?").
 
desperatecomfort said:
You're right, I'm an idiot. It's all there. And this might be the only movie in history to feature a DVX-Spanking :)
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Bad DVX! :-BlackEye(DBG

And you're not an idiot. If I didn't make it apparent enough through my writing and direction, then I didn't make it apparent enough.
 
msconce said:
Okay, this film worked very well. i enjoyed the theme and the way it was executed. i loved the reveal at the end. Definitely had everything together! Good stuff, and creepy make-up at the end!!!
Click to expand...

Thanks much! When can I come look at your closet full of HVXs?
 
*** ("hey sonny, wanna be in a movie? in my basement?"). ***

HAHAHAHA --> Got the same response when asking people to be in my film. I being 41 looking for 20 somethings to play the parts. my favorite question .Sir what kinda movie is it?
 
Geoff_R said:
Very nice work! I loved that last shot as well; very disturbing.

At first I wasn't feeling the VO, I usually dislike it, but it works well in your film. The one big thing I'd say is that although the shot itself surprised me, I knew already that he had done something horrible to her. Maybe it came out in the VO or just in the way the shots were designed early on, but I couldn't help but feel like I knew the outcome of the film in the first 30 seconds. Overall, the writing, execution (direction) was very strong and makes this one of my favs so far.
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Thanks much! Glad it's one of your favorites.

I kind of wrote the beginning to give away the end. Or at least to provide an overly strong allusion. But maybe that came across a little too strongly. A master of suspense and surprise I am not!
 
Michael_Petro said:
*** ("hey sonny, wanna be in a movie? in my basement?"). ***

HAHAHAHA --> Got the same response when asking people to be in my film. I being 41 looking for 20 somethings to play the parts. my favorite question .Sir what kinda movie is it?
Click to expand...

That's where it is very helpful to be a woman. So when you ask another woman "Wanna be in a movie? Willing to take off your shirt?" you have a far better chance of getting an "ummm...okay as long as it's tasteful," or "ummmm...okay as long as you get me drunk first", instead of a slap in the face.
 
Lingothree said:
That's where it is very helpful to be a woman. So when you ask another woman "Wanna be in a movie? Willing to take off your shirt?" you have a far better chance of getting an "ummm...okay as long as it's tasteful," or "ummmm...okay as long as you get me drunk first", instead of a slap in the face.
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I doesnt hurt that bad after awhile :)
 
Coming back to this one- I can't help it.

I didn't cover production values but yours were pretty damned nice. The dummy strung up looked good enough for what it was worth. The dolly shots going on. The costumes and coordination of outfits.

I'll probably come back and comment a lot more, but just thoughts as I remember the final part.

Also-- For a short, you really brought out reasonings. Opressed childhood could've made him like that, or he could've just been like that from birth. It's a question that you ask in real life but rarely in shorts do you have enough information to apply that same question. Did the god-fearing parents turn him that way?

Sheesh. This one rocked.
 
Kholi said:
Coming back to this one- I can't help it.

I didn't cover production values but yours were pretty damned nice. The dummy strung up looked good enough for what it was worth. The dolly shots going on. The costumes and coordination of outfits.

I'll probably come back and comment a lot more, but just thoughts as I remember the final part.

Also-- For a short, you really brought out reasonings. Opressed childhood could've made him like that, or he could've just been like that from birth. It's a question that you ask in real life but rarely in shorts do you have enough information to apply that same question. Did the god-fearing parents turn him that way?

Sheesh. This one rocked.
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Aw gee - thanks!

Feel free to come back frequently with more compliments!

I'm confused, though, about what you meant "dummy strung up" - are you referring to that final shot? And are you inferring that the actress looked like a dummy, as she was strung up like a puppet? Or did you think that was a dummy and not a real person?
 
Whoa is that a real actress? That's freaky. She looked so ... dead. I assumed it was a dummy!
 
Kholi said:
Whoa is that a real actress? That's freaky. She looked so ... dead. I assumed it was a dummy!
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Nope - real thing. Check out the start of my thread for some before and after picks of Molly, the actress at the end. She was in makeup for a good 7-8 hours for that 15 or so second shot. The makeup was amazing, I mean absolutely jaw dropping. We were really sad that we weren't shooting on HVX and that we didn't have a closer-up shot once we saw it completed. Crist make it appear as though her breast had been ripped off, and her heart ripped out. He also made her appear very dead - layers and layers of makeup - bruising, veins, petechia.
 
NICE. It took me going back and looking at it to see her move. I guess I wasn't looking for little things like that on the first two times I watched it.

Another point for you.
 
Kholi said:
NICE. It took me going back and looking at it to see her move. I guess I wasn't looking for little things like that on the first two times I watched it.

Another point for you.
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Uh oh - now I'm drawing attention to the fact that she moves a bit.

She hadn't eaten all day and nearly fainted from being strung up in a hot room, so we looked past those little goofs.
 
This is also one of my early faves having watched prob. around 6-8 so far.

I'm not a huge fan of the horror genre usually, so I like when there are other elements to it to make it appealing. I prefer the type of stories that delve into the head of the characters vs. just "oooh crazy stuff happens for no reason". And in this case I thought that was cool - though the mother bit is definitely very "Psycho"-like, which isn't a bad thing.

Again, good job overall, particularly makeup and shot compositions.
 
bigteethproductions said:
This is also one of my early faves having watched prob. around 6-8 so far.

I'm not a huge fan of the horror genre usually, so I like when there are other elements to it to make it appealing. I prefer the type of stories that delve into the head of the characters vs. just "oooh crazy stuff happens for no reason". And in this case I thought that was cool - though the mother bit is definitely very "Psycho"-like, which isn't a bad thing.

Again, good job overall, particularly makeup and shot compositions.
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Thanks a bunch. I totally ripped off psycho and ed gein's mom for the characterization of my own. And while I was into Hitchcockian reference, I threw in some birds for good measure.
 
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