Journal Entry - 18/10/06 - Short Films

Welcome folks to yet another exciting installment of my journal!

Let us take a moment to sit and think about short films...................


Thought about it? Good. The reason i have asked you to do this is because i have been assigned the task of making a short narrative based film with my group mates. When you sit and think about telling a story in just 2 minutes you realise it is quite a hard task so i have been watching some award winning examples on t'internet. Some have given me inspiration, some have confused me and some have just bored me. Later i will elaborate on which ones, but for now lets ponder some more shall we?

After being given this task i went away feeling as if it would be fairly simple, upon some reflection i decided i was actually very wrong. This is a very challenging task. The fact that i have to work in a group has presented some frustrating problems, for one reason or another people have not responded to my e mails too quickly and ive had problems getting all my group together which obviously means less time in which to come up with an idea. But despite these teething problems i am confident once weve all sat down and banged heads we'll come up with a splendid concept and will deliver a decent film.


Another difficulty for me with this module is that my creativeness is perhaps not as developed as i would like, i find it hard to just come up with ideas and get easily frustrated at that fact. I have always been a very technically minded and somewhat efficent person, its hard to make the transistion into being a bit more artistic and creative but it is one i'm enjoying learning. The seminar we had with Dominick Shaw was an intriguing insight in how to improve this skill.


Now back to the films, my first port of call was www.depict.org this website features short 90 second films that were in a competition.

One of the films that i watched is entitled 'Pemba'. It is a short film depicting an african child making a football out of a condom and string. I like this film because it shows how something we take for granted in the western world brings happiness and joy to the children in a way we cant imagine. It is a powerfull message using very simple images. The use of the condom is quite a powerfull image because it immediatly gets your attention and raises curiosity as to what the boy will use it for, when you see that it is a football it brings home the message of the abject poverty these people live in and how such a small thing can make them happy.

To watch this film please click the following link : http://www.depict.org/cgi-bin/WebObjects/Depict.woa/wa/representation?object=5830


Another short film i will talk about is quite a famous example, in fact it won an oscar for best animated short film in 1997. It is entitled 'Geri's Game'. This film is a joy to watch from a visual perspective, it is entirely 3d computer animated. In terms of message and narrative it is a nothing more than a bit of light hearted fun. It depicts an elderly man playing chess in a park, seemingly with himself. It is a fun little film and in terms of the animation is extremely well constructed. For my own short film i like the idea of a fun light hearted story as i beleive it is hard to generate more deeper and meaningfull stories in just a few minutes. So this may well be something i bare in mind when thinking of my own short narrative with my group.

You can now sit back and watch the film by clicking on the player below.....






Thats it for my blog on short films, thanks for reading and continue to check back as the blogs come thick and fast over the coming weeks as i delve more and more into my course

Farewell and Have A Nice Day

David Walker