Soxalot's Kingdom

Oh I hope this makes it into finals, this is just too good! A lovely little film that exemplifies how creative people can be with their ideas in 48Hours.

A really cute story, great filmmaking techniques at play and effective editing. Also love the detailed end credits sequence.

This was fun, very silly but totally leaned into it and pulled it off.

A mixup between foot coverings and we were quickly presented with a TOY STORY meets ROMEO AND JULIET as a couple of socks came to life after a puppet show.

The puns came thick and fast here, tacking the wacky and absurd and really trying hard to sell the world the socks lived in as breathable and believable when their owners are not around.

Overall the script was good but I found the sound design let the film down a bit, coming across as garbled on more than one occassion. Whilst the clever dialogue was easily audible I also thought the spatial direction of the voice acting felt at times as more coming from off camera than out of the socks' 'mouths'.

But then I'm pondering was that a commentary that the whole piece was like an ongoing puppet show? That would potentially have really worked; perhaps the cameras were not done, but with a conclusion that belied that (which worked very well, it must be said) the sound was probably the biggest issue for mine.

I liked the love at first sight and genuine development of the relationship through actions and script, but I genuinely found it a hard sell to emotionally relate to the socks. Perhaps just personal taste, but the lack of emotional features to the characters for obvious reasons, when emotion was the crux of the film, meant that for mine it just fell a bit short, narrative wise.

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

I saw a sock on the footpath today while I was walking and immediately thought it was soxalot on an adventure. What a fun little movie. I loved the big toes touching/socks kissing moment.

A simple story told very well, and one with a cute idea at its center.

Strangely - this isn't the only Sock based love story I've seen in my tenure as City Manager, though that other one didn't have googly eyes.

The way the world is built here is so fun too, and the riches-to-rags story was a fun one.

While the filmmaking has a lot of ingenuity at times, there were one too many moments of jankiness where we'd clearly be able to tell we'd moved from video to jpeg, or we could see the wires pulling the socks from off screen - and I also felt that Soxalot's personal journey to see how the other half live was one expressed through words and characters explaining their feelings instead of him just seeing how different the lower class or socks live - there's a more elegant way to tell this story which doesn't have your hero virtually explain their feelings to the audience.

SOXALOT'S KINGDOM is cute and creative, but I wonder if the image of a sock with googly eyes is just no match for the emotions on a person's face - I think the best part of the film is actually the shocked little girl at the end, and while the voice acting is good, I think I found it harder to resonate with the characters - I'm not a big "inanimate object come to life" guy, which is weirdly common in the comp.

Challenge for next year: There's a lot of charm and heart to this team and I'd like to see that come back in a film which is a bit more challenging. Take me outside, take me to some exciting locations, but keep that heart!