The Modern Independents 2

 

In today’s post, I wanted to center your attention toward two independent films I find very well made and have a good message in their stories’ subtext. Come Morning and Foolishly Seeking True Love are two films that also meet the qualifications that were published in the previous post.

Come Morning tells the tragic story about Frank and his 10-year-old grandson venturing into the woods and while hunting incurring in an accident that forever changes their lives. The film was directed by Derrick Sims and produced my Fable Motion Pictures. It was shot in rural Arkansas and released in 2012 with a production budget of US$46,000. You can find their trailer and technical information on their IMDB profile page at http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2016168/. The movie has outstanding cinematography, great performances, and a provocative story. Filling all the qualifications of a great independent film, Come Morning thrives in gripping the audience to their seats and leaving you thinking about life once the final credits start to roll. I recommend this film not only to movie buffs but also to regular people who like to watch great content that is not being distributed in conventional theaters.

 

The next film is the short Foolishly Seeking True Love. Although a short film, the movie encompasses good performances, great cinematography, and an interesting story. The narrative tells the adventure of a man named Handsome and a woman named Belle who encounter each other during several points of their lives. The story reveals they are meant to be together and displays very comedic moments of how no matter how much they try to stay apart, destiny pulls them back together. The overall style of the piece is inspired by the world wide acclaimed film “Amelie” where the narrator is a participative character. The film was directed by Jarret Lee Conaway starring Guerin Barry, Harrison Boxley, and Heath Finn. You can find more information about the film through their IMDB profile page http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1513769/. I recommend this film again to movie buffs and film students so they can see the work of an excellent crafted motion picture.

Filmmakers with almost no budget are now crafting great looking films given to the availability of innovative technologies and fast resources through the Internet. I believe it is our job as upcoming filmmakers to not only raise the bar, but also be an example for other new coming filmmakers.

The Modern Independents

While watching the independent film, The Deposition, I came realize good films need to have three important elements: a great story, powerful media (visuals, sounds, and music), and great actors. Sure, you will probably want to add more or subtract a little to this statement; however, here are my reasons why I think this is true.

First, the story has always been the main element and reason in creating a narrative film. You can’t make a good narrative film if you don’t tell something worthy of your audience’s time.

Second, we have to accept that the Internet, Hollywood, video games, and music videos have turned this generation into a group of intolerant people toward bad quality and inexpensive-looking products. I am sorry, but even if you make a film with great actors and an excellent story, mainstream audiences will never value your film as much as they should. They want to be wowed and to be entertained. Yet, this doesn’t mean you can’t create a good movie only with good actors and a great story. It just means that if you add powerful media to your project audiences will respect it more.

Third, actors represent the story’s characters, but they also represent humanity. You are talking to creatures who will be watching your film that know exactly how anger, happiness, loneliness, despair, and love feel like. Some of them have their different points of view about these, but in reality we all go through these emotions and life situations. Therefore, if your movie has actors who cannot perceive, absorb, and react to on-screen situations, which in the real world would be obvious, you will lose the audience very quickly. They will probably not step out of the theater or shut down the computer as it is with a bad story, but you will have a zombie watching your film instead of an emotional and living participant. 

Now, what does this have to do with The Deposition? Simple, I believe this movie has a great story and outstanding media. However, the performance is somewhat inaccurate in many parts of the film. There is not enough anguish, dread, and hate in the story. The story is about an interracial couple that soon, after falling in love and marrying, suffer the consequences of a terrible accident. The survivor, the man, is then accused of murder, but his memory loss impedes him to argue against their town accusations. As he struggles to turn around his fate while still surviving the town’s hatred spree, he quickly learns that the man who caused the riot against his incriminations lied about everything. Adam sets out to kill his antagonist for revenge.

In my opinion, when you deal with racism, murder, and social intolerance in a story, the film needs to feel as if the main character has no escape, no hope, and no absolution. You need to feel that destructive powerful energy, not only at a psychological level for the main character, but also between him and other characters. I believe this movie-lacked tension and lost credibility given to its actors. They were not terrible, but they were not captivating, and films like this need to be captivating. However, the story, soundtrack, cinematography, sound, and music in the movie where excellent.  I recommend this film to new filmmakers so they can see clearly what works and doesn’t work in a film. Overall, I believe “The Deposition is a good film, and I recommend this film to be a exemplary beacon for today’s arising filmmakers.