06 May contained locations
howdy hi,
sorry I’ve been a bit late with this blog…been slaving away in the Northwest on my parent’s remodeling job. it’s a great exercise in humility to work completely outside your element from time to time. and dang, manual labor is exhausting. even the easy stuff I’ve been doing.
anyhoo, I was introduced to this piece, COST OF LIVING by Film Critic Hulk in this essay about the State of Short Films. it’s a really good example of what I was writing about last week in regards to a “contained location.”
there’s pretty much just two spots in this movie – the cafeteria and the tunnels. and who knows how much “tunnel” they actually had to shoot in. for all we know that could have been one stretch that they repainted and relight to be different areas.
it reminds me of a feature that I was an assistant editor on. it was a low-budget horror film that took place entirely in an abandoned old mental asylum (naturally). of course, the extra creepy thing was that the location really WAS an old mental facility. but the point I wanted to make was that the “movie location” had multiple floors, while the actual location was single story. a lot can be accomplished with a little art direction and a line or two about “the stairs” or “level B” or something similar.
another thing I like about this film, is even though it is about a “monster outbreak” it’s really more about the two character’s friendship. we are invested in what happens to them because their relationship is interesting and compelling. the monsters really don’t matter that much…
but if I say any more, I’m going to start spoiling things. so without further ado:
-Luke
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