As much as I enjoy watching and critiquing movies, I would much rather be the one making them. When it was announced that we would be required to make a short film for my Bachelor of Media University degree at Adelaide University, I jumped at the opportunity to finally be behind the camera. But having never made a short film before, it was both a daunting and exciting experience to be appointed director and writer (as well as co-editor and co-sound designer). It was also a great challenge since we had a budget of $0 and only a few weeks to complete the film before submitting it for grading.
The final product, which is entitled Elevator (how original!), can be viewed below. It’s a thriller about a young couple, Alex (Edward Gilmore) and Sarah (Briony Kent), who get caught inside a malfunctioning elevator. What starts as in inconvenience becomes a nightmare as the elevator starts to act more and more irrationally, actively denying their avenues of escape, forcing them to question whether there’s something more sinister at play.
Whilst there is an array things I would love to re-script, re-shoot and re-edit, I’m ultimately quite proud of the film given the restrictive circumstances surrounding the production.
By sharing this video, I realise the roles are being reverse: the critic is allowing himself to be critiqued! It’s only fair as I’ve dealt enough of it, now it’s your turn. My only ask that you if you are to leave a comment, please make it constructive criticism. You certainly have plenty of ammunition!
Thank you to the nine motivated classmates I had the pleasure to work with.
I’d particularly like to thank the actors Briony Kent, Edward Gilmore and Tess O’ Flaherty for willingly contributing their time without pay. Given they were not a part of the video production course, they were under no requirement to contribute at all. Yet without hesitation, they gave up hours upon hours of their free time and I am dearly thankful for it.
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Filming on location. What am i saying…the entire film was on location! |
Constructing a makeshift dolly. It didn’t work. |
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Thanks for watching Blake! I’m glad you enjoyed it
Posted on June 23rd, 2009 at 8:18 am
Bravo. Seriously. I really enjoyed it.
Posted on June 22nd, 2009 at 7:02 pm
Thanks blake! Glad you enjoyed it.
Posted on June 23rd, 2009 at 8:52 am
I'm not really used to watch shorts, but I'll try to make a comment: Good job on the script and the directing, Anders! I didn't understand the meaning of the picture of the guy lying on the grass prior to watching the video. However, when the latter was done, I thought you did a great job in unmasking the real sense of the scene in the elevator. Finally, the cast did a good job!
Posted on June 24th, 2009 at 12:29 pm
Thanks so much Anh Khoi. I'm glad it made sense in the end. It was always a concern of mine that people would be too put off by how little sense it made leading up to it. But i thought that since it was only 8 minutes long, people would stick with it till the end and realise that there is a little bit of “creative” sense in it.
I'll pass on your comment to the cast. I agree, they were great, especially given they did it for free, but I'm sure they'll be glad to hear praise from someone else!
Posted on June 24th, 2009 at 2:26 pm
Well done Anders! I really enjoyed that
As far as constructive criticism goes, the first thing I noticed was your sound design. While solid, I think you could have done far more in post, making the volume in varying shots match up. Also, be careful for peaking while shooting. There were only a couple of instances on that, just make sure your sound guy is vigilant!
I want to know:
What camera/lenses you used.
What editing software you used.
Overall, a really solid effort my dear!
Posted on June 24th, 2009 at 10:26 pm
Thanks for the comment Reb!
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Completely agree with you on both points though. The sound design issue relates to a few things; not enough time and using bud earphones to edit
The sound spike issue was a problem for the simple reason that we didn't have a sound guy 90% of the time. He didn't show up for 3/4 shoots….so we are kinda lucky we had sound at all!
But yeah, agree on both points and thanks for the comment!
Posted on June 24th, 2009 at 10:55 pm
That took me at least 15 mins to load I reckon… but quite impressive! I know how hard you guys worked on that and it came out trumps! I'm not going to be too critical, but I'll say I noticed the volume differences in scenes too (only slightly though, no big deal).
Interesting narrative, the cast were all pretty good… good work!
Posted on June 25th, 2009 at 11:05 am
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