The Rook Moves - a Shawn Nelson film

Shawn Philip Nelson said:
Indeed it is a family affair! My brother and my wife playing as brother and sister. Also my sister Sarah is the MUA. Make sure to check out her DVX entry 'Comatose Conundrum'.
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It was a family affair but not on purpose. Shawn has 45 people in his immediate family, all are into film, so it's bound to happen that they will run into each other on projects from time to time. ;)
 
Wow Shawn! Night and day difference from what I saw in the rough cut. Sound and music put it over the top. Props to Alan and Justin! And props to Jay for providing props. :)

Really beautiful film, in all aspects.

And the thank you to PSU in the credits... lol. Nice.
 
Amazing. As simple as that!

It LOOKED like a simple shoot, and story, and you pulled it together beautifully. I love that at the end the focus stayed on the boy rather than his sister as she walked away. The whole time I was thinking, "Please don't rack focus here. This ending is perfect as is."

This is definitely something to be proud of!
 
I'm sure you already know this, but you have an extremely talented family!

I'm a sucker for stories about "loss" and this did not disappoint. I found myself truly moved here. Your actors we're all great, but I was especially touched by the young boy's performance - he was so natural.

I love the look of this film. Shooting with the long lens was a brilliant idea. It helped create this world within a world that this boy lives in with his sister. Your entire crew did a fantastic job. I adore Justin's score; it's beautiful.

My only suggestion/question, would involve the sister touching the boy at the end - I thought that was an interesting choice and I wonder if it would have worked better if she reached out to him, but fell short of actually touching him. It's a lovely story either way and that was the only moment I might question.

I've seen all the films in every DVXfest and this is easily my favorite of yours. I think it's really quite special and you should be very proud of this!
 
Very nice work, great job all around. Location was beautiful, you scored a nice clear day. As mentioned above, the lens choice was perfect, really added an ethereal feeling. The actors did a nice job, in particular Josiah and Chantelle who connected nicely. And clearly we both have good taste since we both put Emma Pelett in our films ;-)

POTENTIAL SPOILER...

Really the only thing I might change is similar to another comment above about the older sister touching the brother at the end. It wasn't specifically that, but has to do with "touching". Early on I suspected that the older sister wasn't alive, because the brother was making her chess moves for her. But then she moved a piece herself. I would have stuck with her never touching anything, the chess board or her brother. Now, that being said, when she did touch a chess piece I said "Oh, I was wrong, she's alive..." and then you proved me wrong on that!

Overall, very nicely done.
 
I liked this one. I was a bit disappointed when I figured out that she was ghost the first time she refused to touch her piece. When you play chess you touch your piece. :) And then her nails. It was obvious you were keeping her from touching the pieces and the first thing I thought was that she was dead. I felt for the little guy though. But figuring it out soon made the couple unnecessary. But they totally work for those folks that didn't get it early. I really liked the look. Nice work.
 
Beautifully shot. The 300mm shoot was fun to see executed. Nice painterly shallow focus. It helped zone in on the boy's perspective, his focus and his own perception of reality. I dug it. I agree with a few comments about the touching/not touching. SPOILER - it was fairly straight forward to guess that the girl wasn't alive but when she touched the boy's hair it felt to me that the rules had been broken. Would love to hear your feedback on why you had that final interaction. Loved the non-rack at the end. Perfect.
 
You did a good job on this. It is probably my favorite of your entries. Nothing pretentious at all about it. It was a sweet personal story.

Let me add to the chorus of those complaining about her touch. Also, I'd have liked to know just a bit more about the couple watching the boy. It would have made them more important to the story and cut the expository feeling...
 
Your brother is a great little actor!

This was a touching short with a nice twist that i felt was revealed a little too early on.
The couple on the bench... I didn't understand the man's connection to the boy. Had he been
the boy's psychiatrist or something, there would be some connective tissue to tie it together.

But that aside, I really liked your film and thought it was shot nicely and had great sound and score.
I thought your bro was really really good.

One last thing: did you crop down to 235? My problem with your crop is that you cut off the chess pieces
in many of the shots. I want to see him interact with those chess pieces. So maybe you could animate the 235 crop here and there to pan up or down to show the chess pieces?
 
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