Chromaticity

Working as a reverse PLEASANTVILLE, a churchgoing housewife locked out of the picket fence dream life she always wanted in the 1950s gets her eyes opened to the apparent wonders of 2022 in all its stark living colour.

I felt like the team could have really capitalised on their WIZARD OF OZ sendup by having the protagonist show some emotion at the change of scenery, and how the status quo has been turned upside down.

Women negotiating power broking business deals and incels disrespectful to Elvis were just begging for some more powerful story beats. I get the strong contrast of swapping time periods, and the film mostly looked and sounded fairly decent, but I also felt things ended abruptly and we were missing Act 3.

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

Not too much more to add that Steelpotato hasn't already covered. While I think the time-period swap was well-executed largely through some clever costuming I wasn't sold on the couple being married given their age. This same swap could have been done with a naive teen from the 50s which could have resulted in even more situations & conflict in the present day. Regardless, I think our lead does a fantastic job in the role, so well done, Emily.

As pointed out, the ending is very abrupt so developing a satisfying conclusion is something to work on next time!

Some strong stuff from this team - a really clear vision, a strong idea, and some effective editing.

The biggest issue with the film is it seems to end just as it's getting interesting, and I'm not sure the fish-out-of-water adventure really reached its full potential. A woman going from the 50s to modern day should be a story full of more observations than just walking through a park and meeting a couple of people. What does she think of the city? How does she cope with culture? What's she gonna do next?

As stated above as well, age-appropriate casting (or the lack thereof in this case) has always been a bit of a bug bear with judges and audience members, myself included. I think as well, the characters didn't need to be married. I think the story would still work if the lead character was just a teenager in this world as well.

Challenge for next year: Some good storytelling chops on this team, I'd recommend studying story structure and seeing if you can squeeze some more satisfying beats out of whatever you make next.