The Good, The Bad, and The Aussie

When Russell the lamb gets russelled, his owner is driven to the depths of Hornby to find him and bring him back to potentially win a show prize with her woolly friend.

I liked the nods to New Zealand with the salloon serving tomato sauce and milo, whilst the friendly Aussie rivalry that is at the centre of the pavlova debate was subverted well.

The ending was a bit abrupt, would have loved a stronger resolution given that the film started out with exceptional opening footage when the lamb was nabbed. Confident performances but sound quality was up and down throughout. Editing just needed to be a bit tighter with some more urgency to get Russell back, I felt; lots of of medium and long static shots made affairs on screen present as theatrical more than cinematic in my opinion.

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

Some cool work here and great kiwi flavour. The shootout scene was quite fun although I didn’t quite understand why she gave back the lamb in the end.

Full marks to a school team for embracing Pavlova Western as a genre - the New Zealand references and Western tropes are so thick in this film - I'm surprised a team of Zoomers have this much knowledge of kiwiana from the past 45 years and this level of national self awareness. I suspect someone's Gen X dad perhaps had a wee pass of the script? ;)

Nonetheless, this is a very fun time, my interest may have been piqued by the kiwi flavour, but I was completely won over by the little baby lamb. This is the X factor most teams find themselves missing in their films, and while you have kids playing adults, and you dressed up different houses to look like bars or police stations, having an actual lamb be the macguffin for your film was hilarious.

In fact, theres a shot at the end of the film where the characters are in a stand off and this little lamb bleats, and it just creates one of the most absurd 48Hoursian tableaus - imagine seeing that shot out of context - a bunch of teenage girls dressed as cowboys, aiming nerf guns at each other while a leashed baby lamb looks around completely confused - this is high art.

Great shadow work at the end too, I absolutely love seeing shadow work in 48Hours. Great ride off into the sunset as well.

Challenge for next year: Really the main feedback would be to keep getting better at the technical side, and maybe explore beefing up your production value outside of the lamb - this film would have popped in the milo and marmite bar was filmed in a real bar, for example. This film has a wonderful sense of humour and I'd love to see this team (and this baby lamb) back on screen next year.