Review

REVIEW

Many of my decisions in my production process were driven by financial restrictions. I had absolutely no money and I was about to start a new part-time job so my time was also limited. This did inspire me to film the footage from my fake horror film “The Very Dead “at Lanjore farm because, the actors lived there, it was in a secluded location and there was many areas that would look broken down and abandoned when shot at night, thus hiding all the more “liveable” areas and emphasising the more rustic elements of the scenery.

The fact that I don’t see myself as the most proficient camera operator would work to my advantage because the footage is intended to look amateurish anyway. This made for an easier shoot because then I didn’t have to concentrate on making the shots look professional.

 I shot “The Very Dead” on Z1 in an attempt to give the footage a more “ VHS “ kind of look and I then shot all the interview footage on a DSLR, to almost distinguish between analogue and digital, overall it was an attempt to exemplify the two separate time periods

I found the editing extremely difficult, with no collaborative partner, I was left to try and trust my own instincts which didn’t always work. I had scheduled the shooting days and had written the voice over dialogue to fit in between those scenes, the problem was that I had neglected to come up with anything visual to go over the voice over dialogue, in my haste I took photographs and references from the internet and from my own personal archive to try and “pad out” the voice over sections where it was needed. Although a few of them have been useful and have since remained, a lot of them, in retrospect, were thrown in to give visual aids to some of the jokes in the voice over dialogue. This only served to add a self-knowledge to the material which was not in keeping with the original mission statement of the project, for example, this is a comedy set in the context of a retrospective documentary as This is Spinal Tap is set within a documentary format, so essentially, I was unintentionally taking the film out of its own reality. The film is meant to feel authentic, which is exactly what Neil Rose said about the film when I was discussing the soundtrack for the film with him.

It took me several attempts at an edit and several screenings for my peers and my lecturers before I finally realised what was wrong with the film and why it wasn’t working. After adding some more information in terms of title cards, I finally hit upon the idea of shooting more “horror” footage and using that to add more action and to put the voice over behind as well as writing and shooting a new scene which detailed why the film failed upon its release.

It was at this juncture that I decided to bring on another editor to the project, someone who was not a part of the filming and had no input into the creative process up to that point. He would view the film with a fresh pair of eyes and he could make changes to the film to make it more cohesive for an audience.

After this, I was advised that my cut was actually working okay, but maybe I should trim the film near the front, to get to crux of the story quicker. I found that if trimmed back any of the jokes that weren’t serving to drive the story forward, it made for a far sleeker film. In fact when I screened it for the summer show, one of my peers who had seen my original cut made a point of mentioning that it the changes made it a much more enjoyable experience. The screening was a massive success, people clapped as soon as the credits rolled and they laughed at all the jokes at the right time, which is exactly what I wanted.

Ultimately, the film suffered sometimes because I was too close to the project, having someone else on board from the start would’ve been helpful. I would’ve loved to have been able to experiment with some special effects and make-up and maybe use some different locations for the interview segments if possible. Timing and budget was a factor for definite, yet I must take responsibility for the film’s shortcomings. I must accept that viewing it now, there is a better more fleshed out film in it somewhere, if I had the time, resources and patience, that film would become a reality.

On the positive side, it went down very well with audiences, I enjoyed filming it for the most part and I think it stands as an ambitious project which shows that I make brave creative choices sometimes.

It made people smile and I think it stands as a celebration of the projects that I have taken part of over the last three years.