Made a short film... not looking good. Feedback?

[gibbo]

Hey guys,

I directed a short film for a Uni group assignment a few weeks ago. We just finished our 7th edit yesterday and our sound guy has just started post sound on it. We are due to hand it in soon but we have an editing consultation next week. It's basically my first short film, except for a crap little 5 minute documentary we did last semester.

I'd really love to get some feedback on it from as many people as possible, pros and newbies a like about the story in general and technical elements - basically tear it apart and be as critical as you can as I'm trying so hard to learn as much as I can from this failure! I've already had feedback from about 6 or 7 people (film people and non film people) and the recurring thing they say is that it's confusing, they don't know what's going on or there's no point to it.

I'm not gonna lie, it's pretty shit, we had a few problems, stuff like:

- We were scheduled to shoot for 2 days, 9am - 5pm but to "accommodate" some people, we rushed it when we didn't have to and did it all in one day instead (about 11am - 5pm). Because of this I completely forgot some extra shots I wanted to do on the day for extra coverage (which means we had to do some stupid cut aways for no particular reason to hide things), the POV shot across the room is shit, tilted dutch angle and too tight.

- Also, because it was a Uni group assignment, I struggled with what I wanted to do with it and what everyone else wanted to do with it. It's not really "the real world" and I didn't want to be a dictator as then I'd be responsible for any bad marks they would get.

Disclaimer:
This cut has no post sound done other than syncing it up with visuals, so sound is pretty bad at the moment. Which takes away from the story because at the very beginning, the first 20 seconds or so (just before he wakes up) there is dialogue (ADR) coming from a nurse who is in the room on the phone with someone. It's necessary to know what she says in order for it to make more sense. I really really really really wanted to make this without ANY dialogue AT ALL, but it appears we need some, hence the ADR at the beginning.

Dialogue isn't locked down 100%, but our writer came up with something like this:

"The other driver? 5 times the legal limit. The police are taking custody at the other end.

*beat*

We have no choice. We don’t have the space as it is.

*beat*

The MedEvac will be here within the hour to collect them both.

*beat*

No, just the two. Pediatrics just came through. We lost her. (thinking of having this line over the close up of the photo frame at 25 seconds, if that's not too heavy handed)

*beat*

He’s still unconscious. I only hope to God that he doesn’t wake. Poor man."


Shit, I typed so much. Sorry! here it is:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=60S5e37uVco

Thanks so much guys!

EDIT: Shit shit, typed so much, so sorry!

 

[Sweetie]

For a first year film student crew, not too bad. There's a few things in there that haven't been done.

An opening establishing shot would have been nice, but not exactly necessary. The first zoom could have been cut shorter to avoid the camera shake.

There is nothing to establish that he cannot walk and why. You might want to have that established in the ADR too.

You've already shot the footage, and unless you can reshoot, you're going to have to make it interesting with the voice overs to enhance it.

No its not too much about the ADR telling that she was lost as he was looking at the picture. Just ensure you put in appropriate music to set the mood.

I would also try to work out a way to make it... how do you say... less boring... Well... More interesting. At the moment, with it being all visual and picking rather boring mostly static visual shots.

Something you've done that a lot of people do is do scenes that require very talented actors to keep it interesting through their performance. When you have an actor unable to do that, you, as a film maker, have to work your ass off to overcome this and make it interesting another way. Either through interesting story, visuals or sound or a combination of all three. There's little point in telling a story if all it does is send someone to sleep.

Edit: Make your dialogue interesting. You're missing drama up until the last second. Your only hope Obwan is to get your drama out of your ADR with the help of some good writing. Be the best of the best. Cream of the crop. You're getting into an industry where the difference in pay checks from the best to just a professional can be millions...

Good luck.

 

[gibbo]

Thanks for the reply Sweetie! Thanks for the feedback. I hope you don't mind me asking some more question and for more of your opinions.

What I see happening in my group is that they don't trust me. If I suggest something they brush it aside and I have to show them an example of it being used in a film for the to except it. EG:

Crossing the line: They don't want to do it no matter what, and I say it's fine if you have a reason, especially if we show the transition of the line being crossed. But for them it's a 100% no no. So I show them some examples of it in films (Buffalo '66 dinner scene etc) and they agreed that it's fine.

Cutting from a close up to a wide: They don't want to cut from a close up to a wide because it breaks the tension and isn't as personal. I say, what tension? At this point we're just trying to break it up a bit and make it more visually interesting with more cuts so it's not as slow and boring. EG: at 3:20 when he reaches up and makes that noise, I covered that in a wide from the foot of the bed, I wanted to cut from that close up to the wide as he reaches up and makes the noise, then back to the CU as he looks around to see if anyone hears. (also got POV shots of him looking around.)

Jump cuts: Originally the slow push in went straight to the close up as he wakes up, which isn't ideal but it's all we've got. Jump cuts are 100% no no in their books. I see it in everyfilm I watch and I talk about the example from the matrix when morpheus is at the window and turns around.

POV photo: the first time he picks up the photo when he's still in bed, originally they didn't want to have the POV shot of him looking at the photo. I said I really wanted it in and they said it didn't matter because we see it later on anyway. Then along comes a guy that's good at editing and says, "yeah put that POV in" and they put it in!!

For a first year film student crew, not too bad. There's a few things in there that haven't been done.

An opening establishing shot would have been nice, but not exactly necessary. The first zoom could have been cut shorter to avoid the camera shake.

Yeah I was worried about the shake on that shot, editor and other people think it's fine but I'm not happy with it, it should be smoth. I wanted to try stabalising it in post but they don't want to. Where would you suggest cutting it? The beginning or the end?

We didn't have a dolly so I just put a dvd case under each tripod leg and slowly pushed it foward. It worked better in testing at home, but I didn;t realise it was because during testing the legs weren't extended as high. Lesson learnt.

There is nothing to establish that he cannot walk and why. You might want to have that established in the ADR too.

You've already shot the footage, and unless you can reshoot, you're going to have to make it interesting with the voice overs to enhance it.

If you notice at the VERY VERY beginning during the push it shot, the first few seconds you can see at the end of the bed there is a medical chart at the end of the bed in the tray, then later when he's crawling you can see some papers on the floor. There is a shot of him sitting on the side of the bed and he scoots over, grabs the chart out of the end of the bed, reads it, then we have a POV shot of the chart with the writing with some medical jargon saying that he's paralysed due to car crash. But they wanted to leave that shot out, I wanted to put it back in but they said that it's obvious, if you ask me I think they are too involved in it and are assuming too much!

No its not too much about the ADR telling that she was lost as he was looking at the picture. Just ensure you put in appropriate music to set the mood.

I was actually thinking of putting that line just when it cuts to a close up of the photo on the table, not when he looks at it. Because when the nurse leaves the room and the door closes is when he wakes up. She doesn't talk when he's awake.

I would also try to work out a way to make it... how do you say... less boring... Well... More interesting. At the moment, with it being all visual and picking rather boring mostly static visual shots.

They didn't even want to have that POV shot when he first picks up the photo, which I though was weird. I had to struggle to get that put in. I think it's too slow and boring and whether or not the chart shot is needed, it adds something else "happening" to break up the boredom of it! I also wanted to do more cutting between different shots to break it up. What do you think?

Something you've done that a lot of people do is do scenes that require very talented actors to keep it interesting through their performance. When you have an actor unable to do that, you, as a film maker, have to work your ass off to overcome this and make it interesting another way. Either through interesting story, visuals or sound or a combination of all three. There's little point in telling a story if all it does is send someone to sleep.

So do you think the actor could have been better or done it differently or something? Anything specific about his performance that you didn't like? (just trying to learn here!)

Edit: Make your dialogue interesting. You're missing drama up until the last second.

what would you do to increase the drama? Say, if we were to shoot some pick ups or reshoot?

I suggested other characters in the story, or elude to them. Here's a few Ideas I had:

When he's crawling across the floor, he pauses and we hear a helicopter approaching (the medivac that was mentioned at the beginning), that kinda raises the stakes and sets a time clock for him to do what he has to do.

Have someone about to come in, maybe they can open the door and then are called back for something as he freezes and stares.

At the beginning during the ADR, have the nurse say something like "don't worry, we have an officer stationed outside the door. He's not going anywhere". In my mind I hoped that would make the part when he reaches up and makes the loud noise more tense, because maybe the cop heard it and is about to enter?

I also wanted to add this in:

Just after the POV when he lowers himself out of the bed, I wanted to put a sort of reverse POV/reference shot (dunno what it's called) as well from the other bed, but they hated the shot a lot. I thought it was OK, it's just a bit shaky and not level (the camera OP had a headache and didn't say anything!) but with some stabalising it should be OK, and breaks it up a bit. Here is s screenshot of that particular shot, which would slot in just after the POV shot:

http://i46.tinypic.com/a4okg0.jpg

EDIT: Just realised that he's holding the picture in that shot, and in the POV he's not, so would it be really bad to use the same POV again after he picks up the photo and looks to the other bed, then that reverse shot? or not include the POV the first time he looks up (without the photo) and then just add the POV when he looks up with the photo (so we kinda think for a second, "what is he looking at?")

Your only hope Obwan is to get your drama out of your ADR with the help of some good writing.

Any suggestions?

Be the best of the best. Cream of the crop. You're getting into an industry where the difference in pay checks from the best to just a professional can be millions...

Good luck.

Thanks so much for you time and feedback, it gave me more to think about. Editor is extremely happy that vision is locked but in my mind it's not. I just hope in my mind that during the editing consult the editing lecturer suggests some changes, or agrees to some of the stuff that I want to do!

Sorry about the ranting and raving, I just need to vent because none of my friends nor my wife understands filmy type stuff and they don't really know what I'm talking about and don't see the frustrations! If they don't agree to some of the changes I've made I'm going to put all their names down in the credits under Director because I don't want to put my name down on something I'm not happy with!

 

[Zensteve]

Looks like there's still some work to be done on this. Glad to read you're up for the task.

Step 1) Knock this shit off.

not looking good
crap little 5 minute documentary
this failure!
it's pretty shit
Sorry!
they don't trust me
Shit shit, typed so much, so sorry! 
**every instance of "I wanted to do X, but [I]they[/I]..."

Step 2) Know your story

Your film is missing a lot of it. But the kernel is in there.

At the end of 4:40-ish, we have seen a man realise his world has changed, reflect on his loss, decide on a course of action, reinforce his conviction, make a journey, accept responsibility for what he is about to do, deliver justice.

That's a lot of things to accomplish. As is, you could probably cut this down to 90 sceonds or so, from 4 1/2 mins. It would be a very short film about unbridled veangeance without context, but yeah.

Are you adding in the ADR to salvage what you have, or was that originally planned? If it was originally planned, why isn't a rough version of it included in the cut? If it's an afterthought... yes, it would help tremendously in adding context to your narrative, but the film will still be far too long (judging from the previously-mentioned text samples).

Don't do anything else until you know exactly what you want. You'll be wasting time for people, randomly throwing 'sgetti on the wall. Once you know exactly what you want, you can direct people to make that happen. See what I did there?

Step 3) Slow down, chillax & finish your film.

Make it to the best of your ability, and know that you'll be stepping into the next with a wealth of learned, hands-on experience to make it even better.

 

[Sweetie]

Take a deep breath, this could take some time

Crossing the line: They don't want to do it no matter what, and I say it's fine if you have a reason, especially if we show the transition of the line being crossed. But for them it's a 100% no no. So I show them some examples of it in films (Buffalo '66 dinner scene etc) and they agreed that it's fine.

I see this all the time. Not specifically in filming. It's something that some people learn to deal with over time. At my best guess, you lack either leadership skills, confidence, people skills or a combination of them. There is also a chance that you lacked enough preparation in pre-production.

Cutting from a close up to a wide: They don't want to cut from a close up to a wide because it breaks the tension and isn't as personal. I say, what tension? At this point we're just trying to break it up a bit and make it more visually interesting with more cuts so it's not as slow and boring. EG: at 3:20 when he reaches up and makes that noise, I covered that in a wide from the foot of the bed, I wanted to cut from that close up to the wide as he reaches up and makes the noise, then back to the CU as he looks around to see if anyone hears. (also got POV shots of him looking around.)

Jump cuts: Originally the slow push in went straight to the close up as he wakes up, which isn't ideal but it's all we've got. Jump cuts are 100% no no in their books. I see it in everyfilm I watch and I talk about the example from the matrix when morpheus is at the window and turns around.

POV photo: the first time he picks up the photo when he's still in bed, originally they didn't want to have the POV shot of him looking at the photo. I said I really wanted it in and they said it didn't matter because we see it later on anyway. Then along comes a guy that's good at editing and says, "yeah put that POV in" and they put it in!!

There's a few lessons to be learned from here. Some are going to be good, some not so good.

First lesson. You heard of the saying, give a thousand monkies a typewriter and eventually one of them will come up with something great.. (well you know the saying I'm thinking of). Every director has their own style, their own vision. Lucas, Speilberg, Cameron, Scott, Bay will all do things different from each other. Does that make one of them right and the others wrong?

One thing hit this home to me more than anything else. Project Greenlight. To enter the competition, the directors had to shoot some nonsensical dialogue scene. From thousands of directors, no one that I know of did it the same.

I have some opinions of what happened to you: In my opinion, both are right but aren't for everyone.
A). The director should get their way. It's their vision of what's being brought to the screen. That's their job.
B). The director puts together the best team possible and should trust his team to put together the best version of his vision based on their experience and expertise in their field. The director should trust his team members know what they're doing and will do their job better than anyone else.

I like both. There are heaps of other opinions on how directing should be done. It comes down to your style and works best for you. If you're a control freak, then don't bring people who will question your every move. If you're the kind of person who picks the best people and trusts your team, then that's your style. If you're like me, you're in between.

I prefer to have it done my way, and then is time permits, allow for alternatives to to be shot and choose the best option in editing. This has multiple benefits and problems. You might get a better idea than you had, and your film improves due to it and your crew gain extra confidence and more satisfaction from their work. Something might happen and the extra coverage may save your rear in post. It might get bickering/fighting/lowering of morale happening if people don't get their idea shot (which will happen if too many people decide they want something done their way).

Yeah I was worried about the shake on that shot, editor and other people think it's fine but I'm not happy with it, it should be smoth. I wanted to try stabalising it in post but they don't want to. Where would you suggest cutting it? The beginning or the end?

I have to say that I only took a single quick look at it. From memory, the shake was in the last 2 seconds or so. Just remove the last 2 seconds and you should be golden.

Try a cheap skateboard, preferably one that you can drill holes into in case you need to make some adjustment or want to bolt the camera to it. Steal a trolley. You were in a hospital. Those beds are on wheels right? What about a Wheelchair? There are so many options available. Not perfect but better than a monopod on a DVD case, right? I know it sounds really, really stupid, but it can get you a little extra production value without the added expense of a dolly/steadycam. Hell if the camera isn't too heavy, look up a PVC mount where you can change it to have a curve in it. It will look really stupid, cheap and idiotic while you're on set but who cares? You're doing whatever you have to do to get what you want made, the best way possible. Do whatever it takes to get the best shot possible. If that means you have to throw your cameraman out of a moving car to get the shot... at least consider it.

If you notice at the VERY VERY beginning during the push it shot, the first few seconds you can see at the end of the bed there is a medical chart at the end of the bed in the tray, then later when he's crawling you can see some papers on the floor. There is a shot of him sitting on the side of the bed and he scoots over, grabs the chart out of the end of the bed, reads it, then we have a POV shot of the chart with the writing with some medical jargon saying that he's paralysed due to car crash. But they wanted to leave that shot out, I wanted to put it back in but they said that it's obvious, if you ask me I think they are too involved in it and are assuming too much!

It's only obvious if you don't understand the medium. The only thing that was obvious in that clip was he was unable to walk. He could have been injured then, before, he could have been on a local and just unable to move his legs. I didn't see on the medical chart where it stated that he, so I guess I'm not supposed to enjoy the short. One more thing, the medium is audio visual and is also entertainment. Your job as a film maker is to take the audience on the journey. It's entertainment, making the audience work for it isn't always smart. But then again, it comes down to your style.

They didn't even want to have that POV shot when he first picks up the photo, which I though was weird. I had to struggle to get that put in. I think it's too slow and boring and whether or not the chart shot is needed, it adds something else "happening" to break up the boredom of it! I also wanted to do more cutting between different shots to break it up. What do you think?

It's one option. But I suspect even if you did that, it'd still be boring.

Take Jerry Springer for example. Why is he popular? Because conflict is interesting and entertaining. It's different from most peoples dreary life. It doesn't always work well, but conflict is what makes most stories interesting. There is no real conflict until the end.

So do you think the actor could have been better or done it differently or something? Anything specific about his performance that you didn't like? (just trying to learn here!)

That's really hard to say. It might have been a bad day for him. It might have been going too quick for him. He might be just one of those actors. You might have picked the wrong shots to make him interesting. Picked the wrong lighting.... or simply he might have been given a part that was boring and he wasn't Tom Hanks who might have been able to make it interesting. Was the actor pretty much expressionless throughout the whole performance? If so, that's probably more your fault than his.

For example, the first shot with the zoom in, is just wrong in my opinion. He's dead center all the way through and not off to one of the thirds. A difference in camera angle or camera movement can sometimes mean the difference between ordinary and boring to different and interesting.

Regarding Drama. I used the wrong word. When I said Drama, I meant Conflict.

Conflict could be along the lines of the cop stopping his brother from coming into the room to kill him and him being arrested. The cop denying entry to the lawyer for whatever reason. The nurse arguing with the doctor over who gets to go on the medivac since there's only 1 spot. Only 1 person is going to get fixed up.

I'm sure you'll have more questions, so shoot away.

Sorry about the ranting and raving, I just need to vent because none of my friends nor my wife understands filmy type stuff and they don't really know what I'm talking about and don't see the frustrations! If they don't agree to some of the changes I've made I'm going to put all their names down in the credits under Director because I don't want to put my name down on something I'm not happy with!

Until you're at the point where you own your work, whether it be good or bad you're not ready to be the director. It can be someone's fault, but when you're the director, it is ALWAYS your fault. As the director, you're the captain of the ship. If you make something that doesn't work, you need to talk away with the question, "What should I have done to prevent this from happening?" "What do I need to learn or do in the future to ensure this doesn't happen again?" Until you take it from that perspective, you're a kiddie wannabe. You're not truly ready for the responsibility of the directors chair. Talent or no talent, without people skills, without planning skills, without conflict resolution skills, without sales skills, without leadership skills you're going to tank your directors career before it starts.

Don't be a pussy. Learn from it. Own it. Be the part. Harsh words I know. I hope it motivates you to do great things.

Out of interest, where are you located in Australia. PM me if you want to keep it from being public.

 

[gibbo]

Take a deep breath, this could take some time



I see this all the time. Not specifically in filming. It's something that some people learn to deal with over time. At my best guess, you lack either leadership skills, confidence, people skills or a combination of them. There is also a chance that you lacked enough preparation in pre-production.



There's a few lessons to be learned from here. Some are going to be good, some not so good.

First lesson. You heard of the saying, give a thousand monkies a typewriter and eventually one of them will come up with something great.. (well you know the saying I'm thinking of). Every director has their own style, their own vision. Lucas, Speilberg, Cameron, Scott, Bay will all do things different from each other. Does that make one of them right and the others wrong?

One thing hit this home to me more than anything else. Project Greenlight. To enter the competition, the directors had to shoot some nonsensical dialogue scene. From thousands of directors, no one that I know of did it the same.

I have some opinions of what happened to you: In my opinion, both are right but aren't for everyone.
A). The director should get their way. It's their vision of what's being brought to the screen. That's their job.
B). The director puts together the best team possible and should trust his team to put together the best version of his vision based on their experience and expertise in their field. The director should trust his team members know what they're doing and will do their job better than anyone else.

I like both. There are heaps of other opinions on how directing should be done. It comes down to your style and works best for you. If you're a control freak, then don't bring people who will question your every move. If you're the kind of person who picks the best people and trusts your team, then that's your style. If you're like me, you're in between.

I prefer to have it done my way, and then is time permits, allow for alternatives to to be shot and choose the best option in editing. This has multiple benefits and problems. You might get a better idea than you had, and your film improves due to it and your crew gain extra confidence and more satisfaction from their work. Something might happen and the extra coverage may save your rear in post. It might get bickering/fighting/lowering of morale happening if people don't get their idea shot (which will happen if too many people decide they want something done their way).



I have to say that I only took a single quick look at it. From memory, the shake was in the last 2 seconds or so. Just remove the last 2 seconds and you should be golden.

Try a cheap skateboard, preferably one that you can drill holes into in case you need to make some adjustment or want to bolt the camera to it. Steal a trolley. You were in a hospital. Those beds are on wheels right? What about a Wheelchair? There are so many options available. Not perfect but better than a monopod on a DVD case, right? I know it sounds really, really stupid, but it can get you a little extra production value without the added expense of a dolly/steadycam. Hell if the camera isn't too heavy, look up a PVC mount where you can change it to have a curve in it. It will look really stupid, cheap and idiotic while you're on set but who cares? You're doing whatever you have to do to get what you want made, the best way possible. Do whatever it takes to get the best shot possible. If that means you have to throw your cameraman out of a moving car to get the shot... at least consider it.



It's only obvious if you don't understand the medium. The only thing that was obvious in that clip was he was unable to walk. He could have been injured then, before, he could have been on a local and just unable to move his legs. I didn't see on the medical chart where it stated that he, so I guess I'm not supposed to enjoy the short. One more thing, the medium is audio visual and is also entertainment. Your job as a film maker is to take the audience on the journey. It's entertainment, making the audience work for it isn't always smart. But then again, it comes down to your style.



It's one option. But I suspect even if you did that, it'd still be boring.

Take Jerry Springer for example. Why is he popular? Because conflict is interesting and entertaining. It's different from most peoples dreary life. It doesn't always work well, but conflict is what makes most stories interesting. There is no real conflict until the end.



That's really hard to say. It might have been a bad day for him. It might have been going too quick for him. He might be just one of those actors. You might have picked the wrong shots to make him interesting. Picked the wrong lighting.... or simply he might have been given a part that was boring and he wasn't Tom Hanks who might have been able to make it interesting. Was the actor pretty much expressionless throughout the whole performance? If so, that's probably more your fault than his.

For example, the first shot with the zoom in, is just wrong in my opinion. He's dead center all the way through and not off to one of the thirds. A difference in camera angle or camera movement can sometimes mean the difference between ordinary and boring to different and interesting.

Regarding Drama. I used the wrong word. When I said Drama, I meant Conflict.

Conflict could be along the lines of the cop stopping his brother from coming into the room to kill him and him being arrested. The cop denying entry to the lawyer for whatever reason. The nurse arguing with the doctor over who gets to go on the medivac since there's only 1 spot. Only 1 person is going to get fixed up.

I'm sure you'll have more questions, so shoot away.



Until you're at the point where you own your work, whether it be good or bad you're not ready to be the director. It can be someone's fault, but when you're the director, it is ALWAYS your fault. As the director, you're the captain of the ship. If you make something that doesn't work, you need to talk away with the question, "What should I have done to prevent this from happening?" "What do I need to learn or do in the future to ensure this doesn't happen again?" Until you take it from that perspective, you're a kiddie wannabe. You're not truly ready for the responsibility of the directors chair. Talent or no talent, without people skills, without planning skills, without conflict resolution skills, without sales skills, without leadership skills you're going to tank your directors career before it starts.

Don't be a pussy. Learn from it. Own it. Be the part. Harsh words I know. I hope it motivates you to do great things.

Thanks for all the tips. I did learn a lot from it.

I guess I just need to read more and make more stuff, and it will come in time!

Out of interest, where are you located in Australia. PM me if you want to keep it from being public.

PM'd

 

[Cracker Funk]

Looks like there's still some work to be done on this. Glad to read you're up for the task.

Step 1) Knock this shit off.

not looking good
crap little 5 minute documentary
this failure!
it's pretty shit
Sorry!
they don't trust me
Shit shit, typed so much, so sorry! 
**every instance of "I wanted to do X, but [I]they[/I]..."

Step 2) Know your story

Your film is missing a lot of it. But the kernel is in there.

At the end of 4:40-ish, we have seen a man realise his world has changed, reflect on his loss, decide on a course of action, reinforce his conviction, make a journey, accept responsibility for what he is about to do, deliver justice.

That's a lot of things to accomplish. As is, you could probably cut this down to 90 sceonds or so, from 4 1/2 mins. It would be a very short film about unbridled veangeance without context, but yeah.

Are you adding in the ADR to salvage what you have, or was that originally planned? If it was originally planned, why isn't a rough version of it included in the cut? If it's an afterthought... yes, it would help tremendously in adding context to your narrative, but the film will still be far too long (judging from the previously-mentioned text samples).

Don't do anything else until you know exactly what you want. You'll be wasting time for people, randomly throwing 'sgetti on the wall. Once you know exactly what you want, you can direct people to make that happen. See what I did there?

Step 3) Slow down, chillax & finish your film.

Make it to the best of your ability, and know that you'll be stepping into the next with a wealth of learned, hands-on experience to make it even better.

+1

I couldn't agree more. I think there's some quality work on display here, and I agree that the best solution is to cut it much more tightly. Off the top of my head, I think Steve's estimation of 90-seconds is pretty spot-on, maybe upwards of 2-minutes.

Gibbo, the student film thing can be difficult, and I fully understand the difficulty in finding common ground among teammates. Honestly, I fault your professor, for not providing more structure. I took part in a class similar to this one, in the sense that each member of a filmmaking team had equal say, and we all got the same grade. The result was that there were too many cooks in the kitchen, and the end-result was muddled.

By contrast, I also took a class in which each student directed their own film, and they alone received the grade for the assignment. At the same time, we were all required to work on at least two other people's assignments. This class was way more enjoyable, and the films produced were not just of higher quality, but also in higher quantity. In filmmaking, somebody has got to be calling the shots, no pun intended.

As to your video, I actually think the opening shot is great. I think you should lengthen it, if that is an option. I definitely wouldn't cut it shorter.

I do agree that the actors' performance isn't super stellar. I do think you need those shots in which he laments over his loss, but perhaps they should be more succinct.

I don't think we need an explanation for why he can't walk. He just survived a tragic accident, that's all we need to know.

I'm not entirely sure I like the ending. As an audience-member, I'm not convinced that his revenge is justified. I wonder if the film might be more powerful if we end it on a question-mark. End it right after he grabs the pillow, but before he makes his next move, make the audience wonder if he acts on his anger. We know what he wants to do, but does he do it? The absence of an answer might force the audience to question themselves, and what they might do in that situation, instead of being force-fed a moral lesson.

Regardless, should you get the audio worked out, I think you should get a good grade on this one, and deservedly so!