Wilted Rose

Oh, after rewatching this film my mind just got blown that Cowps Productions and HS Films are effectively the same team! Amazing work everyone, it is bloody impressive to make one film in 48 Hours let alone 2 finalists in your city so I tip my hat to you!

Hear we had the classic 48 Hours 'one shot' film as a newcomer to the town introduced himself to a woman and asked her if she needed help, before each character bonded with each other through their expository backstories.

Well done on your second place in Gisborne, it is technically impressive to pull off this sort of film, though I did notice several instances of wind warble on the soundtrack in the first half of the film. The camerawork was nice, and the film was cleanly shot despite being shot near sunset.

As a horror film it did not work for me, there was zero tension for me personally which I think is a must even in a subversive approach. A leisurely character piece that was more a romance than anything for 90% of the runtime could honestly not be further from what I would imagine for the genre. Personally even the ending was a bit iffy as it just seemed like a jealous angry boyfriend annoyed that somebody else come to his love's grave. Were there heavy hints of domestic abuse, and potentially murder? Yes, and this sort of topic could have hit so incredibly hard, but instead the 'shock' ending where you were supposed to piece everything back together didn't quite work for me sorry.

Story: 1.5/5
Technical: 2.5/5
Elements: 3/5
Overall: 2/5