It's a Small World With Big Dreams

We started class on March 18 by receiving our grades on our box-o-footage short films, and there seemed to be some issues with some of the files, because those who did not receive a grade needed to submit them via email or youtube.com instead of what they previously turned in. I was included the no-grade footage, but I had no problem putting it on youtube and sending the email that weekend. Next, we watched a short independent film called The Last Summer, by Corey Womack, and it's his Honors Thesis as well. He was our guest filmmaker for the evening, and though he had a director for his film, the script and its revisions were all possible because of his idea and his hard work on it. Afterwords we had a question-and-answer session with him and I found the most interesting aspect to be that it was autobiographical about leaving his small town to go off to college and how trapped he felt there. I actually related to the story in a way, and how routine and boring things can become in a small town if you never find something bigger and better someday. Living in a small town myself, the movie reminded me of my own experiences in my rural town before coming to Conway and UCA.

After we finished the question-and-answer we all gave Corey a big hand for his hard work and great film, and moved on to discuss with the groups who had just filmed and watch some more educational but entertaining videos. The two groups gave a few key pieces of advice, like the fact that the sound editor and editor weren't really needed on set, and that it only made scheduling and getting together even harder for everyone. Next, we watched a few "creations" that were mock-trailers or mixed-up trailers. "Scary Mary" had to be the most disturbing since it turned Mary Poppins into a scary horror trailer using its footage. They also turned The Shining into a happy film using editing in a mock trailer. We then watched another 4 Minute Film School Episode that told us more about mis-en-scene and how to achieve the right look for our films. Alfred Hitchcock also had an interesting take on building tension and gave us the hypothetical situation of people playing cards with a bomb under a table, and never allowing the bomb to go off, but instead waiting until the last minute to have someone throw it out the window. That was the best way to build tension and suspense in a film, according to Hitchcock.

Lastly, we broke into our Short Film groups and our director brought a revised script and a good-looking storyboard for us to look at and discuss. He gave me plenty of ideas about camera angles and how he expected to film all the scenes. We are the last group to film, so we have a few more weeks to polish it up beforehand. Now, all we have to do is worry about scheduling and making deadlines. Even with the extra stress that will come our way, to tell you the truth, I can't wait.