Final Project

Hi All,

Here is my final project for my first semester of film school. For those of you wondering how exactly our projects are graded, I took the liberty of attaching my professor's critique. As always, please let me know your thoughts.

David,

Here are my suggestions for improvements:

1. I would have made a big head trim in the black and white shot of the lifeguard running to save Jesse. It is so obviously the same guard, and this is implausible since the near drowning supposedly took place in the past, most likely somewhere else.
2. You should have stopped them from over acting. You did not need the performances to be this broad. It does not make it any funnier. It just makes it look obviously staged. Broad humor has to have some reality to it, otherwise it looks like bad acting.
3. After Jesse gets caught trying to wear a disguise and you show him back in the lockerroom, the shot is too short. Also it would have been better if you had changed the angle, because it too obvoiously is the same shot you used before.
4. Jesse’s pov coming up from behind the trash barrel is a confusing shot. Only at the end of the shot is it clear to the audience what they are looking at. Zemeckis taught me never to shoot a mystery pov shot especially if the camera was moving because you see the camera moving if you do not know whose pov it is. I think this would have been better if you had done a shot of Jesse from between the barrel and his eyes. Of course you would fake this by removing the barel.

The action of Jesse saving the guard was well shot. You did an excellent job of putting the camera in the right place to cover the action. In addition you shot enough coverage to keep it energetic and disguise the fact that it was staged.

Overall this is a very good assignment. Not great or exceptional. So I am going to give you a B plus for it.