The Indian Boy -- Landfill Films

B

Brian P. McQuilkin

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Production Notes and Crap:

I started a thread for Monsterfest, had a script written…and then a buddy of mine said he was also entering and asked me to help him, and with the other time constraints I had, I dropped out and shot and edited my buddy’s entry. Which he never entered. Gotta love it.

So the day after Thrillfest is announced I decide that I’m going to try and enter this time. But hell if I’m going to start a thread and hype anything until I not only have it shot but completely finished, because for some completely unreasonable reason I’m convinced that if I threw my hat in publicly then the whole thing would have fallen apart.

Not to waste any time, I banged out a script at work. Most productive thing I had done all week. I re-worked it over the next week or so. The biggest question in mind about it was one that I guess few others have with their own projects: is it really a thriller? I don’t know. It’s a dialogue-heavy piece. And I employ the use of a gun, which from what I read on another thread means I’m using a crutch. At least I’ll get a good parking spot.

The plan was to shoot in a t2i. Another buddy of mine just purchased one and wanted to shoot something on it. He had been playing around with it for a few weeks, and I gave him a list of test shots to try out and let me look at (this lens at this aperture and that ISO) and they came out really well, but when we got on location he couldn’t figure out how to change the ISO from 6400 and the camera was doing all sorts of funky things that we didn’t want it to do. Turned out all of it was user-error, so nothing against the t2i (or my buddy, who just hadn’t enough time with the camera). I had brought my DVX100a to record the audio onto, so we wound up shooting on that.

Our boom guy, who has been booming for me for a couple of years now, was off his game a little and wound up moving around a little during shots. The Octava is notorious for picking up handling noise, and the guy who I had monitoring sound didn’t think that all the thudding he heard would wind up on the tape (he’s helped produce almost everything I’ve shot over the past few years, and has done so admirably, but never did anything with sound before). Whose fault was that? Mine, of course. It was the first time I didn’t monitor sound myself because I wanted to concentrate more on the actors and the scene than the technical end of it since I was already running the camera.

Yeah, skeleton crew, 2 actors – I wasn’t making a big production of it. Just out to have a good time shooting something. One of the actors, a great guy named Bob Lanoue, hurt his back prior to the shoot, and when I had him lie on the ground for one of the scenes he didn’t have to put much into acting hurt. If you’re shooting anything in the Georgia area, look this guy up.

We also shot under a flight path of a local airport. Great choice of locations. Don’t go location scouting on a Sunday morning, because it will never tell you what an afternoon sounds like.

I managed to work around most of the boom noise in editing, but there was one crucial line that an actor delivered that had boom noise all over it, in every take. And with no time to re-shoot, I’m stuck with it. Ce la vie.

Still had a great time putting it all together. So now I will throw my hat into the ring, open myself up to berating for all the technical problems, the heavy-handed dialogue-burdened script, the crutch-gun, crass remarks that it really isn’t a thriller, etc., but hopefully at least one person out there will enjoy it, or, short of that, at least not fall asleep while watching it, and freakin’ kudos to me if I can make that happen.

As a post script, I’ll add this: I hate the title. But it’s the only one that makes sense with the story. Wish I could come up with something as provocative as No Country for Old Men, but what the hey – I’m just a shmuck from Georgia with a camcorder.

And if you read this far, you really need to get back to work.
 
niice, hey good luck. i expect a beating myself :) but I'm passionate about learning and so I dove into the fray. And have been having a real blast with this project!
 
Thanks guys! I've watched these DVXfest shorts for the past year or so, always wanted to participate. And now that I have uploaded my flick...well, it was fun making it.
 
Just make a film that embodies the parable/fable, but don't tell the actual tale in the film, let the film tell it, which it does in spades. The gunshot was great, the wound not so much. I did hope for another ending, but I couldn't think of a better one. Overall good job.
 
I really liked the dialogue between the two characters. Very simple in execution, but was very effective. Good job.
 
*spoilers*

Two guys in the woods, one with a shotgun the other with a shovel. My eye keeps tabs on the time counter because I'm waiting for this to be over. This is a "conversation" between two men. There's no beginning/middle/end. The shotgun take-away happened way too easily and too fast to be believable. It's a simple story and while some simple stories come out to be the best stories, this one did not have tension, suspense, just a tremendous amount of dialogue with no one to root for. Who's the good guy and why should I care? The audio is crisper than some of the ones I've just watched, but I wish there was more meat to this bone.
 
Aweee now this was kinda interesting - I mean the performance (from our victim ultimately) was quite absorbing! I think the problem for me was the handover of the shotgun and what felt like a very forced delivery of the Indian tale. I think it would have been more entertaining had the man not been shot - and that the parable was told - then broken by the bald mans actions.

That irony (and more intensity and suspense in general to make thay pay off more worthy) would have been worth considering. However I enjoyed it buddy :)
 
Great scene! Liked it a lot. I have to agree with Lawrie that the character handing the shotgun back to the man who said he was going to shoot him just seemed too forced or convenient. Had the victim given some explanation as to why he was giving it back -- "Look, look. I know you're a good guy. You gotta good heart. You're not gonna do this. I know you're not gonna do this." - Something that ramped up the tension a bit more (Who's right? This guy got a heart of gold?), and would have at least let us understand more why this guy would hand the gun back to him. But what I love is that we don't know what the real deal is between the two characters. That's left for us to make up on our own. We don't know what the $8,000 was for, who lent it to whom, and so on. I think, in terms of thriller, this should find its way to the finalists.
 
this was pretty cool, i like the woodsy location and i dug the actors and most of the dialogue. the actors stumbled on their lines here and there, but it also made their performances a bit more natural, so it's all good. i liked the simple premise and i think you pulled it off well. good work.
 
Thanks for feedback! And I agree with and appreciate the critisisms. I had never done this style of film before, so it was very much an experiment that I learned from. Many of the things mentioned were issues that I wrestled with myself, including the "bad" guy telling the parable, the take-away of the gun (which originally was written as the "victim" hitting the other guy with the shovel, but the actor hurt his back and I didn't want to risk making it worse by swinging the thing, though he was comfortable doing the whole knee-to-the-groin thing and grabbing the shitgun), and the handing back of the shotgun (which I wanted the action of him handing it back to explain his thoughts, which were that despite their current situation, he still trusted the other guy enough not believe that he would really pull the trigger -- if that was lost on the screen then that's my fault as a story-teller). And of course the wound -- yeah, once I reviewed the footage I regretted not taking more time and paying more attention to how it looked. As far as who was the good guy and who was the bad guy, as Charli mentioned, I didn't want either of them to be completely "bad" or "good", but to create a certain amount of ambiguity that I see did not work for everyone.

I just saw this morning that viewing had opened up -- look forward to watching everyone else's entries over the next couple of nights! And again -- thanks for the feedback!
 
I generally try to give constructive criticism but this movie was so boring that it would take a few novels of constructive criticism to make this entertaining. Fist off I am not introduced to these characters at all so I have no connection with them in the least. Furthermore the whole film is one long conversation with lots of exposition. Why the heck he gave the gun back to the guy he took it from I have no clue except to think that the main character was retarded and deserved to die. That elephant gun would have blasted a whole through the guy, it would have had tremendous recoil, and it would have made a much louder sound. The acting was verging on unwatchable. I applaud and salute with every fiber of my being, with every strand of honor I posses, and with complete humility, myself, for having the stamina to sit through the entire six minutes.
 
filmcritic there is no reason to act like an ass in your reply to this guys film. Just remember, you haven't even produced a film here and have yet to make even 50 posts in this forum. The Director of this film has proven himself among his filmmaking peers in this contest while your stupid comment proves why your is more deserving of your offensive criticism than Landfills film. Rest assured I will not be the only filmmaker in the contest thinking this either.
 
Some people need to hear the truth, even if it hurts. Maybe this will help him decide to take some classes or read some books. As to the questioning of my credibility, I have worked on several features and shorts. While I have just recently joined this site I have not just recently joined the filmmaking community. This is something you need to learn. Experience on this site does not equal real world experience. I'm glad people are trying to make films but they need to learn the basics before they enter a competition where they will be scrutinized on every little detail. I am not even scrutinizing his film that closely because honestly it lacks in some serious big picture fundamentals. Maybe I am a bit harsh but that is the type of world we live in and he should better prepare himself if he wants to compete or make a living through filmmaking.

- In truth this film is nowhere near the worst that I have seen. At least he understands cutting from shot to shot rather than whip panning. But he needs to learn more about framing, lighting, composition, and screenwriting. I think this film suffered most from a lack of experience and understanding as to what is entertaining to an audience. Which is essential, along with the dialogue. I am not the first to say it was boring.

Ok so for the arguments sake, here is the sugar coated version of what I said.

****This is not the worst film I have scene, you understand how to cut shots and hit record. I liked the end POV shot the best.

Does that make everyone happy?
 
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