"Five Cents" Watch It Now

Kentertainment · Post by **Kentertainment** » Sun Feb 04, 2007 8:06 am

Here is the film I've had people nagging me to see...well some people. Anywho, if you are new to MattHawkins and don't know about this film I worked on from Late August to Late October, here it is.

On a slow and boring day, a young man realizes a CD checked out from his local library is due back in thirty minutes. Now he must race against time and the obstacles that lie in his path. Will he make it on time? Or will he fail and have to pay the five cent fine?

Technical Aspects
I created the film to try my hand at sound design mostly. We shot this with a Panasonic AG-DVX100B in 24p, although I kind of butchered the quality with the color timing, and it was edited on Sony Vegas 5 (I've upgraded to 7 since then). Back to sound design. Aside from dialogue, all sound effects in this film (such as door knock, telephone, footsteps, cd handling) were post-recorded and placed in the film and then edited around using keyframes to sound natural. The music is also original with a percussion loop added, thus, this film is 99% our work (there is a siren that isn't ours).

Watch
YouTube Version
Myspace Version
Google Video Version (coming soon)

madcowmovies · Post by **madcowmovies** » Sun Feb 04, 2007 6:17 pm

lol At first I heard the ska guitar and threw up then it kinda grew on me. But love the movie none the less. Great acting imo.

challengerbravo525 · Post by **challengerbravo525** » Sun Feb 04, 2007 6:32 pm

good acting but no real hold on..i watched it for 3 mins then closed it

ProdigyFilmsinc. · Post by **ProdigyFilmsinc.** » Sun Feb 04, 2007 8:56 pm

challengerbravo525 wrote:i watched it for 3 mins then closed it

So you watched half of it then got bored. Holy short attention span. Back on topic, I liked it. Some of the folley was overpowerubg but not ti bad.

Zacatac927 · Post by **Zacatac927** » Sun Feb 04, 2007 9:18 pm

ok, im always loving you films... dont know why but it do.. love the use of the focus with the DVX. it really is looking good... the acting was great for the look of the film, i only didn't like the bedroom scenes, seemed to flat lighting

but i like it, very well played out... i really didn't think about the cd not in there until he started looking at it.. heh

---zacatac

challengerbravo525 · Post by **challengerbravo525** » Sun Feb 04, 2007 9:50 pm

Zacatac927 wrote:ok, im always loving you films... dont know why but it do.. love the use of the focus with the DVX. it really is looking good... the acting was great for the look of the film, i only didn
So you watched half of it then got bored. Holy short attention span. Back on topic, I liked it. Some of the folley was overpowerubg but not ti bad.

to jest gowna....a ty lubicie szympans praice!

aitec · Post by **aitec** » Sun Feb 04, 2007 10:05 pm

I liked it!

Kentertainment · Post by **Kentertainment** » Sun Feb 04, 2007 10:22 pm

challengerbravo525 wrote:to jest gowna....a ty lubicie szympans praice!

I don't even understand what that means...

Anywho, sorry to hear you didn't like it challenger, but you can't impress everyone.

Zacatac - I too am honestly not liking the outcome of the bedroom, that part was probably the most rushed so we didn't really light anything, thus I had to increase the picture brightness and it makes it look really flat. Although, the long kitchen dolly shot is probably the hardest shot we've ever done, it took us 26 takes.

challengerbravo525 · Post by **challengerbravo525** » Sun Feb 04, 2007 10:26 pm

sorry man...maybe im just caught in a united 93..24 type of film..where it leaves u on the edge of ur seat..or the toilet...depending on where u watch it....

..p.s. that was polish

angusware · Post by **angusware** » Sun Feb 04, 2007 10:33 pm

This is awesome. I didn't even know you could hire CD's. Anyway it was awesome, I loved the shot in the bedroom and the shot of him running.

youngfilmmaker · Post by **youngfilmmaker** » Sun Feb 04, 2007 11:33 pm

I like it. There were some good shots. Did you do any color correction? It looks really great. The sound was perfect.Did you ask for permission at the library if you could of film there? Any way. I liked it. Keep up the good work.

Kentertainment · Post by **Kentertainment** » Mon Feb 05, 2007 6:03 am

youngfilmmaker wrote:Did you do any color correction? It looks really great. The sound was perfect.Did you ask for permission at the library if you could of film there?

Plenty of color correction. The interior shots were desaturated a bit and given a tanish tint to sort of bring out the mundane afternoon, but once outside, the contrast was brought up a bit just to make things more lively for the hurried dash to the library.

And thanks about the sound, it was definitely a new experience and I am liking the outcome, although I realized well after the final render that I could have used some sort of breathing noise while he was running.

The library was used with permission, it closes at 6:00 on weekends so we just sent them and e-mail letting them know we'd like to film there and we'd be there for an estimated 30 minutes to and hour. I go to that library all the time and I went into a room I'd never been before. It was magical.

angusware wrote:I didn't even know you could hire CD's

Are you referring to borrowing them...from a library? Does Tasmania have libraries?

Anyway, thanks everyone for the comments and questions, keep them coming.

angusware · Post by **angusware** » Mon Feb 05, 2007 6:08 am

yeah, from the library. Tasmania is a bit behind because it's an island and people seem to think that entitles them to not give us stuff at the same time as the rest of Australia.
I haven't been into the library for years though.

Nba185 · Post by **Nba185** » Mon Feb 05, 2007 11:12 am

No problem with the acting and directing. The story is a little tiny weeny boring. But overall well done

Freddie · Post by **Freddie** » Mon Feb 05, 2007 12:37 pm

very nice, enjoyed it

could have a better story, sure, but it was very good. acting, directing, sounddesign and angles were great

Zacatac927 · Post by **Zacatac927** » Mon Feb 05, 2007 8:47 pm

Kentertainment wrote: t. Although, the long kitchen dolly shot is probably the hardest shot we've ever done, it took us 26 takes.

it was worth it... it turned out great

Ornsack · Post by **Ornsack** » Mon Feb 05, 2007 9:32 pm

I enjoyed that!

My only real critic about it was that I was expecting a fast paced film along the lines of that Frustration film that's on here. Maybe it's the pic of Sean running, I dunno. But once I got that out of my head I quite liked the pacing of it.

Oh and try doing a digital stabilization of the kitchen shot, which was otherwise pretty damn good!

But yeah, nice lil' film

Kentertainment · Post by **Kentertainment** » Tue Feb 06, 2007 7:02 am

Thanks for the lovely comments! Image stabilization never crossed my mind, thanks for the heads up, something I will try next time something like this happens. By the time we finally got done with that shot we were ready to punch some holes in the wall. The thing that was awful about it was the fact that we'd get to the last line then either a huge noticeable camera movement would occur or Sean would stumble on his line and our boom operator was standing on the fridge during that shot and with two great takes we saw his feet. Here is a pic to show you the setup...

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v639/ ... G_0008.jpg

angusware · Post by **angusware** » Tue Feb 06, 2007 7:36 am

I like your dolly.

joe · Post by **joe** » Tue Feb 06, 2007 8:53 am

Just looked at the set up pic. Does your tripod have any more height in the legs? Just wondering bc the center column is much less stable than the triangular setup of the legs.

Joe

camiziodeltoro · Post by **camiziodeltoro** » Tue Feb 06, 2007 2:10 pm

very good, very good...

Kentertainment · Post by **Kentertainment** » Thu Feb 08, 2007 7:54 am

joe wrote:Does your tripod have any more height in the legs? Just wondering bc the center column is much less stable than the triangular setup of the legs.

Yeah, it's just one of those mistakes you make and learn from.

Lebotimizer_1 · Post by **Lebotimizer_1** » Thu Feb 08, 2007 6:27 pm

was that the same cover as i want money? ah well never mind acting was good story was boring

Darzeth · Post by **Darzeth** » Fri Feb 09, 2007 3:57 am

Wow that was great. The ending just got me i was like hah didnt expect that.

Lawriejaffa · Post by **Lawriejaffa** » Fri Feb 09, 2007 8:26 am

hmmmmm...

Well, the film is great compared to most posted on this forum and so im gonna provide u a critique based on the 'what id think if i saw this broadcast on tv' review

Cos if u were rhys and u made this id be like totally bowled over

haha

*ahem*

Overall I thought this was a film shot with technical competence, mediocre (but acceptable) sound, weak story with awkward pace and relatively poor characterisation (for the lead) The acting was (great for the repair man) and pretty average (if not below average) for the lead (if we are comparing this to a professional standard!) - obvioulsy the repair guy was great

In general the current edit/ and or music choice helps to underwhelm the suspense of the story, it does not enhance it - its all a bit too relaxed and colloquial (did i spell that right!?) for it to be enough to keep us on the edge of our seats. That is where this film falls apart, because despite it doing so much right, it MUST have pace and suspense to get us interested in whether this guy can make the deadline.

So lets start with negatives first.

1) Radio voices at the start sound like teenagers and or utterly unbelievable radio people (even cr** DJ's sound like DJ's! these sounded like ur mates.

2) Utterly wrong decision to have ur lead dump his girlfriend in the nagging convo. If you want to establish ur character as being a victim of circumstances spiralling out of control, then he should be the victim of being dumped to add to his woes and chaos not the other way around. By having your character angry and dumping his girl, makes him both unsympathetic to the audience and has him in control of a situation which is really (or seems like it to any ordinary audience) far more relavant than a library fee. So if he has his relationship so easily covered why should we care about the consequences of him failing to get the cd back to the library? The scene i think is a fatal flaw in letting the audience connect to this character...

3) Acting - the lead - I think the chap playing the lead needed to show more in his body the tension building as he tries to make this deadline. A lot of his postures (outside and inside) the car are relaxed - with shrugs and half hearted angry shakes etc (not that convincing.) Also the slightly camp demeaner of his voice acting again makes the scene (of him dumping the girl) and him being angry slightly unconvincing (only slightly cos he does an overall okay job) Im not criticising the actor incidentally, but more what i think, to be a lack of specified direction for him.

4) Music - The music choice i think is pretty terrible, its like a drunk teenagers twiddling on his friends guitar (okay joking aside.) The music can be used to build the suspense of the deadline more. I think this is required, as your story is not subtle enough to get away with the ol' offbeat indy comedy (with offbeat silly music.) Its a classic gag that is delivered quite weakly and could REALLY use the music to enhance it. (Almost all of ornsacks videos can provide examples of ridiculously yet appropriate placed music for kitsch comedy.)

5) Underwhelming - it is in general underwhelming, perhaps the edit could be tighter, and with more appropriate music (and some new and more exciting ADR for the lead) - the film uses ADR i think anyway?

The positive elements i liked were,

1) The cinematography, with attempts at focus pulling, and lots of dolly (or track shots) was very nifty (perhaps a tad too many dolly shots lol no need to show off too much!) The camera/dop/director/whoever that did the camera work has a good eye for some great shots (particularly striking is the running shots on the road.

2) Post - Grading - colouring etc, gives the film a unique look that was attractive and i think presented quite a slick presentation so well done on that!

Overall - I think most audiences would find this film fairly forgettable, it takes an old joke and delivers it quite weakly BUT it is a competent film and i think its indicative of the fact that you are becoming more ninja-like in ur filmmaking. The next stage has to be to get more 'professional' or 'better' actors for the whole cast, and to be more aware of the writing and execution of scripts into ur film and edit, than just the techncal parts (cos thats what let this film down.)