The Negotiation!!!!

Unexpectedly hilarious

This film is charming! I like the key plot element of the noise gate allowing the whispering. I feel like what let’s this film down a little is a little lack of clarity as to what each of the plot beats were, and I feel that the performances lack some enthusiasm. You’re having a good time, which should always be the priority in 48, but I feel that the zany dialogue like this is more funny when the actors say them totally seriously. For example, although they’re self aware about the comedy, the performers in Saving Christmas are very straight faced with their outlandish multiverse/quantum theory type dialogue which for me really sells the comedy.

Toot Toot have finally flown too close to the sun, and while I personally vibed with this film deeply, I may have been the only judge who did. They all need to watch more youtube poop and look at more shitpost memes.

I would have loved to have included this in the city finals, and it feels stupid and arbitrary to give it a proper balanced critical review, I guess I should still throw in my thoughts.

This film is weird and marvelous and strange, and while I'm not especially familiar with Microsoft 3D Movie Maker, I am familiar with this aesthetic and it was a downright joy to watch it make it's way into my crop of 48Hour films.

If I was to realistically give one piece of feedback, I'd say that your choice to go with intentionally shitty microphones to record your drunk actors was maybe a misstep - and a great case-in-point for how audio is more important than video, because those $15 microphones prevented a lot of audience comprehension, and while I understand respect wanting to be authentic to the 12-year-old version of yourself who would have made a film like this, I do wonder if clear audio would have helped anyone watching follow the story closer. I'm legitimately not sure anything else needed to change.

Challenge for next year: Half of me wants to say "do what you want" and half wants to implore you to get back to your previous level of quality, but I know better than to mess with artistic genius.

It was so wonderful to hear from Michael last night about how Toot Toot was formed with the idea of taking out the Incredibly Strange award, and how great to see them take it out last night, congrats!

So yea maybe this years entry was just a littleeee bit beyond it's comprehension, but I think as AJ mentioned, that was less to do with the story and more to do with the audio just being a bit of a distraction. That gripe aside, this was everything I'd want from a Toot Toot film.

You guys are a cornerstone of Chch 48hours culture, you continue to break down the barriers of film making and inspire all of us to make sure that having fun is at the center of our weekends, and by all appearances, you guys had just the best time putting this together, that's all we can ask for at the end of the day.

One day you will actually win Chch by the way, the perfect storm will come and it will knock all our socks off, I'm sure of it. In mean time, just don't stop being who you are.

This reminded me of a lot of games I used to play on various early Windows OS back in the mid-90s on extremely overpriced desktop computers. As such, it also reminded me of how frustrating that experience was so "The Negotiation!!!!" is one of the more irritating films I've watched (and rewatched) this year! But that doesn't mean it's a bad film of course!

Good humour that is oh, so typical of Toot Toot and the overall silliness is rather infectious. Certainly, when snippets of your film played in the various categories at the CHCH final I'm pretty sure a lot of people were thinking "Why didn't we see that one tonight?! It's better/funnier than some of the finalists!"

Overall, for me, it just felt super long and rather repetitive. I totally respect the very intentional work that went into it and as always, a team that first and foremost makes the film they want to make in the competition rather than make a "competition film" will always have my love. Your style is something a lot of people really look forward to so why change it?