Teresa Decher presents "I Would Rather"

I thought that there were some very cool moments in the storyline, like when she receives the "help!" text message (a great moment in and of itself), which is then followed by her friends disbelief. I also liked the bit at the end. All-in-all I'm not sure the story worked for me as a whole though.

Great images. Good acting. Thought the score was very appropriate.
 
Probably the best acting in this fest.

They made this short feel very realistic, and also like a TV show or something.

Great job, I loved this piece.

Robbie
 
Nice work here. I didn't get the ghost aspect (which I read from prior posts) and got a little confused with the story but regardless, I was interested and intrigued throughout the piece.

Cinematography was good but inconsistent at some times... maybe this was intentional?? The poker scene in full is broken down into three sections; I like section one the best being very dark, greenish/blue, very little light in the background if any at all. Section two is more warm, more naturally light... and then section three is fairly bright and evenly lit between foreground and background. What was the motivation here?

I also feel like some of the static wides through me off since so much of the film is handheld. Just a thought, but what I might have done is literally sit on the floor or a chair, put a pillow down and the camera atop it. Let it breath a little; don't force the movement but without even trying, there'd be some subtle movement in the shot. In my experience, they cut better with handheld work sometimes. Sometimes I'll do both a lockdown stick shot and a handheld mimic just to have the options.

Also, the first minute of the film is the best in my opinion. The acting and cinematography here are much more cinematic than the rest of the film. Not sure how you guys feel about it, but it's just something I noticed.
 
I definitely echo Geoff's questioning for the static wide shots. -- I feel like it was a missed opportunity for some really jarring, unsettling imagery.

I also feel like Teresa's screams for help were not NEARLY strong enough to be wedded with the shadows and light play coming from underneath the bathroom door. It LOOKS like she is being pushed and shoved and moved around... but it sounds like her killer is only walking at her slowly... I don't know... it sort of pulled me out for a moment.

Lastly, I would have liked to see a flip on the girl's faces on the carpet. I don't think it worked so well having their faces line up perfectly between each cut. Maybe you already tried this and it didn't work for you... but I can only imagine good results and even found myself crossing my fingers that you would be doing so once I saw the first reverse.

High production value here. Really nice sound, acting, eeriness. I totally bought into the "that's really not funny Vivian" bit. BRILLIANT. Seriously. I went back and watched it again.

Powerful acting there. Great casting.

Awesome, work.
 
"static wide shots"...are you just talking about the two identical hallway shots?

second, big thanks to everyone who's complimented on the acting. The actors deserve the accolades, they are very talented. As director, I consider that my number one priority, so if that works, I've done my job, the "look" is secondary (though integral to the overall feeling). Thanks to those who complimented on the look, the blocking was a joined effort between myself and the DPs and the DPs did an awesome job lighting it, along with our gaffer Steve.
 
shawneous said:
"static wide shots"...are you just talking about the two identical hallway shots?
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Yes. Those and the establishing shot of the house. They are the only non moving shots in the piece excluding the closeups of the girls on the floor. And it's not that there's anything particularly wrong with them being static, it's just that those are the types of things I notice without thinking about it.. I'm feeling a certain cinematic flow and those shots threw me off a bit. If they'd been dolly shots such as the dolly out from the bathroom door bit, I think it'd flow better for me as well. I think the lack of movement in only one shot between a bunch of handheld shots is what makes it stand out.

Look at 3:20 in, when Teresa character is falling and the guy is stepping forward. (used throughout, the low shot on the floor) It's semi-loose; probably balanced on a sandbag or the DPs knee... it's good because it's not so evidently handheld yet has a solid feel to it... then that rising shot above the two heads come yet you cut at precisely the right moment, the moment when the camera starts to almost stop moving... it almost rolls to a stop and then you cut to your non-moving closeups. In this area, it all feels right to me and the locked down shots fit in perfectly.
 
Nicely shot. Great lighting as well. I thought the story was a bit melodramatic. The music while very good pushed the melodrama over the top for me. The dialogue flowed well, but felt too constrained to the structure of the question scenario. This is well enough, as you chose the structure, but it was a little too ridged for me.

The level of your cinematography and lighting was top notch.

Joshua Rheaume’s credit as Blood Maker is classic.

Well made flick.
 
Geoff_R said:
Yes. Those and the establishing shot of the house. They are the only non moving shots in the piece excluding the closeups of the girls on the floor. And it's not that there's anything particularly wrong with them being static, it's just that those are the types of things I notice without thinking about it.. I'm feeling a certain cinematic flow and those shots threw me off a bit. If they'd been dolly shots such as the dolly out from the bathroom door bit, I think it'd flow better for me as well. I think the lack of movement in only one shot between a bunch of handheld shots is what makes it stand out.

Look at 3:20 in, when Teresa character is falling and the guy is stepping forward. (used throughout, the low shot on the floor) It's semi-loose; probably balanced on a sandbag or the DPs knee... it's good because it's not so evidently handheld yet has a solid feel to it... then that rising shot above the two heads come yet you cut at precisely the right moment, the moment when the camera starts to almost stop moving... it almost rolls to a stop and then you cut to your non-moving closeups. In this area, it all feels right to me and the locked down shots fit in perfectly.
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Dang dude, you're good! Seriously. That is a fantastic explanation, I appreciate it.

To be fair to our awesome DPs, those static shots were done entirely by me and the gaffer Steve on a pickup day with only Ken as additional crew. I thought I could get away with having them be static because they were transition shots, but you got me.

On your earlier comment, I appreciate how you noticed the three distinct styles I gave to the table scene :). The lighting setup was perfectly identical. For the first two scenes they were shot entirely with an 80mm f2.8 Zeiss prime, then for the third one we switched to the 18-50mm Red zoom. I then really pushed the three scenes in three directions in post. Will post more later.
 
Acting was good, very natural and the whole thing flowed.

Visually I felt some of the hand held stuff in the downstairs bathroom (when the second girl goes down), ended up a bit tight. And when the guy comes out from hiding with the first girl, there seems very little contrast in the shot, seems a bit too crushed down. Also shot at 4:21, and some others had a little too much movement that didnt seem really motivated.

On the first shot down the hallway I felt the cut lasted a bit too long, after she enters bathroom left, nothing happened til the next cut.

Really good sound, levels were great and very nice mix.

Acting was the stand out in this short for me. I was getting into the story, but the end payoff didnt quite do it for me.

Very good overall from me.
 
first off, really well made film. not sure if im a big fan of all the camera movement but it plays. liked the lighting a lot! the acting is good, really liked it where we first see vivian look at an empty spot where her friend was sitting. creepy, cool! but then it sort of falls empty. and i lost the story. for me it didnt keep the suspense anymore. maybe make sammy's death scene more dramatic? i loved the closed door but it almost made it seem too distant for me. maybe thud the door so that she is being stabbed up against it or something, and have her scream! really scream! bang! bring it out a lot more here.

i read the previous posts to see what the story is about and i can't say i got that at all from what i saw. not sure how to make it fit better either, other than maybe when the two girls are lying in the bathroom, the first one that got killed gives a smile or something to vivian. some cue. or maybe one of the friends at the table can say to the girls, " glad to have you back," or " what took you so long" , not sure.

strong effort! good film.
 
The lead in this was beautiful. I really don't remember what the hell she was talking about or anything about the story, (I think somebody died or something) because I was just staring at her. .....okay seriously, this is one of my faves of the fest. nothing to complain about here. You could have kept the camera on her for 6 minutes and I would have been happy. and her performance was on point as well. nice job.
 
After seeing the grabs, I was looking forward to this one. I'm pretty much going to echo what was already said. Some really strong shots in here, the lighting worked really well, especially the shots when they got to the bottom of the stairs. The acting was really well done. Not much more I can say. Probably one of my favs. Good job!
 
Hey,

Just caught the piece. I enjoyed it. I thought the acting was very good with no holes as far as I could see. The lighting was very very nice and I thought the pacing and music really helped make this piece creepy and tense when it needed to be and nice like a get together in the scenes around the table.

The story left me wondering what was going on. It seemed like there were elements in it that wanted to be more than what the audience was given. With that said I don't want to even venture a guess as to what the actual story is or what actually happened. In that sense it might be more confusing than it needs to be. But that's just me.

Thanks for showing. I thought all of the technical aspect of this piece were very nice. The narrative just didn't sell me. Thanks again for sharing and hope to see you guys team uip again.
 
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