Eve

A small group of survivors take shelter inside a bunker, slowly running out of supplies in a post-apocalyptic world. Complications arise when the group is divided by questions of morality. This film's cinematography was really nice, and had a nice grade to it too. Thought the moody and industrial-type locations suited the film well also. For me, this film suffered from pacing issues, despite some nicely edited sequences. The film's setup seemed rushed, and a lot of (perhaps unnecessary?) information was conveyed through a voice over and flash back sequences. Story is king, though, and I felt it could've done with trimming in some areas, and further exploration in others. Audio was another biggie for me. As a disclaimer, it was mixed well, was of quality and clear. They also had a nice intro narration. With that said, I thought the constant music track in the back ground dominated too much, and lost it's effect. Less is more. I also had an issue with the ADR. Again it was clear, but acting-wise lacked some of the emotion necessary (especially for the ending sequence). It didn't quite match the atmosphere or urgency of the setting. I did love the film's special effects and graphics, they were very polished. You can tell this team definitely knows what they are doing technically, and you can't fault them on that at all.

Bombs are dropped which makes living in the open undesirable. A small band of survivors are holed up inside a building and have additional troubles on their hands including a dead body, a lack of food and water, a visitor at the door and a growing sense of paranoia. This short was nicely shot, used an appropriate colour grade and produced a quality slow-motion sequence. While the dialogue recording was for the most part good, the music was a bit loud in places. For me, the acting was a bit stunted and the film itself got a bit tedious, as really, nothing much happens to make us care about the fate of the survivors.

I just picked this one out randomly and watched it in the Screening Room, and I was pleasantly surprised. There’s a nice sense of claustrophobia to the piece, and it’s very nicely filmed. It’s an interesting-enough setup for a post-apocalyptic tale, with enough information to make it feel plausible, but no more than is necessary. This said, I had a few issues with the film. The performances were quite variable in quality (even within a single actor’s performance), and sometimes served to undermine the reality being constructed. The most effective moments acting-wise were when we saw just the small character reactions, when we saw the anxiousness and despair flicker across their faces. I also think that there were simply too many characters onscreen, with a cast that felt like it could have been about the right size for a single location feature-length film. I would have liked maybe one or two fewer faces, and for us to get to know the remaining ones (and their relationships and tensions between each other) a little better. The use of music and soundscape was definitely atmospheric; however, I felt that it overwhelmed in places, and it was pretty much ubiquitous throughout. I would have preferred some moments of silence to offset the busier scenes, and this also goes for the voiceover, which was probably a bit intrusive and unnecessary, at least sometimes. And finally the writing itself. This was a script packed with interesting ideas, but somehow they didn’t seem to come together coherently. In fact, it was more like the beginning of a whole bunch of different ideas, and again I felt like there was a feature film lurking beneath the surface. So I guess the thing here is to try and tell a short film story, not the cliff notes of a longer one. All in all this was a great setup for a film, let down by a confused and/or uninteresting execution. Still, lots of promise here, so I hope you guys are back for more next year.