Finding One's Trueself Critique

Rational:
Me, John, and Waris did our version of a romantic comedy.  Our working plan was to use Waris's script and produce a film.  We decided to use John as one of the main actors, while  me and waris were the directors/ cinematographers.  We wanted to create a film that was funny, but at the same time romantic.  I tend to prefer comedy, thus this movie contained components of comedy.  I also enjoy action movies, thats why we put the fight sequence into the short film.  We wanted to be as authentic as possible, and we tried, but since this was our first movie it wasn't a spectacular film.  The audience that I believe that this film is intended for are teenagers, for there are some questionable and semi-inapropriate content in the film (especially the condom scene).  I thought this movie was a good idea, for the amount of casting was low, and the locations were all available.

Commentary:
In this film I was the director, cinematographer, actor, and editer of the film.  Although we did all share the roles of directer, I shared the role of cinematographer with Waris Allie.  Some problems that I had as cinematographer were crossing the 180 line, poor movement of camera, and lighting issues.  We solved some problems in the edit, or we redid the scenes.  We redid some scenes up to 5 times, and sometimes we were just getting in different angles, and shots.  Lighting was a very hard problem to tackle, for lighting throughout John's house (location of the boys house) was poor, and sometimes we were filming at night or during the day.  When we filmed as the sun was going down, continuity was a problem, for the lighting was different in some shots.  As an actor I had problems with costume.  We didnt decide that I would play the role as stalker ex-boyfriend till the day we started filming. I didnt have the attire to wear, so I just made the most of what I had.  It turned out well, but it would have been better if the costume was better.  The main problem that arose in our film was the days that we were all available to shoot.  We didnt start filming to late, and sometimes we were all busy.  Anissa was a main actor that we didnt have available after the first day of shooting  Thus changes had to be made and we got rid of the last sequence, but that didnt matter too much since it didnt have a major impact in the outcome of the film.  It was good that we had Anissa, because without her we wouldnt have had a film at all.  John had to beg her to act, and we were all glad that she was able to do so or else we wouldn't have had a film.

Script/ Narrative/ Story

I felt that the story developed well in the beggining, but when we transitioned to the shcool it seemed a little akward.  The middle worked out perfectly, but the end felt a little too rushed for me.  For the theme of our movie it was good that we had our actor "Ms. Tuite" state "the theme for today is finding one's true self can lead to happiness".  I think this transfered over to the audience well, for it was stated towards the beggining of the film.  I think that the dialogue was as concise as possible.  It became a little generic once Ms. Tuite stated the theme, but i believe that this helped the movie.  And without this part it would seem odd why John fell asleep mumbling the theme to himself.  I believe later in the movie the climax after John got knocked out was unique and effective, for the dream sequence was pretty funny to many people.  We decided to change the script and put it into a dream, for it seemed to racy if it was real life.  In my edit though I restated the dream to ask the question maybe the dream wasn't really a dream, or the dream might actually ocur later on.

Casting/ Acting

Our actors were a vital part of our film, and I think all their performances were outstanding.  The ex-stalker role was supposed to be played by Daniel Afieaki, but it didnt work our so i became the ex-stalker.  It wasnt as effective with me as the exstalker for Im not as big, nor did i have the clothes, but I think i didnt a nice job in making it work.  I think that John played a good role as the shy kid who didnt really have a life, and his whole life was a boring routine that occured over and over again each day. I think that Anissa played a great role as the troubled girl who was also a kick ass girl that could beat up even scarey people.  Her fight scen was very nice and it was way more realistic than my fight scene.  That was a major problem with my scene was that I punched over John's head which looked horrible.  I think that we just had problems portraying our characters to display the emotions that they felt.  Some acting seemed a little over exagerated and slightly akward, but it seemed to flow nicely in the edit. Although we argued throughout the production, our arguing bettered the movie in the compromises we made as a team.  Once and a while an actor would look at the camera, or messed up, but that was usually fixed in the edit or retaped. 

Staging and Props

A major problem with our set was that it was the hottest day of the year when we decided to shoot our outside shots.  This caused for a lot of anger and short tempers for the heat was extremely intense on all of us.  I think that all our props were good.  Such as when we had John working on his homework he was holding a pen and was looking down at a piece of binder paper.  He was also working at a table and that provided good staging.  For the bathroom scene it was an actual bathroom, and we used a toothbrush. The scene where he was getting up, wasnt the best staging, for he was getting up from pink sheets which seemed odd since he is a boy.  But he told us that he actually sleeps in the bed, and that the pink sheets were his sisters who went to college.  For our outside scenes during the day they were all good, for the lighting was prefect and there wasnt any cloud cover. 

Lighting/ Titles and Credits

Lighting in our movie was a major problem that we struggled with throughout the movie.  Lighting inside the house was difficult, for there wasnt light everywhere throughout the house, and the lights at our location gave off an orange glow that seemed unproffesional. Lighting was also a major problem when we did our night scene at Allen elementary school.  The only light that we had was the street light, and it didnt fully illuminate John and Anissa's faces.  As they skip off into the night the camera looses them against the darkness, for there was no lighting as they got passed the street lamp.  I think that the title was very nice and I used live type to create it.  I beleive that it was effective, although it didnt seem extremely professional.  The ending credits were effective, for it scrolled down and was similar to many professional movies. 

Sound/ Camera Operation

I felt that the camera operation was executed effectively throughout the scene.  Some shots seemed a little ametuer due to the crossing of the 180 line, and some zooming that was a little too jumpy.  The panning and tilting were all smooth throughout the film, which was very nice in adding to the quailty of the film.  This shot in the picture to the right was effective, for it showed the main character's apparent love for each other in the close up on their hands holding onto each other.  Then fading to black and white was nice finishing touch.  I added the sound of the camera snapping, to add to the idea that this moment would be remembered by both the main characters forever.  Music was a hard

Editing

Editing for my film took a long time.  I had added filters into the beggining when John looked at Anissa, for it was unclear who he was looking at and what made it worse was that Anissa and Kristen (the girl next to Anissa) were both wearing yellow.  I enjoyed the editing process the most, for i got to control the whole movie and how it would look like in the end.  I also decided to use the Pow filter in the fight sequence, for my punch unrealistically went over John's head and created a highly unrealistic effect to the film.