meekia

Too Tedious lah, ooi~

To:
Jacen, director of ZOU PENG, from Hosaywood
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Good Ol' Jacen!

How have you been? It was with high expectations that I logged on to hosaywood.com to watch your latest independant Internet film. Perhaps my expectations were too high.... Zou Peng, your first film with girls, was disappointing.

The casting was intriguing for 60 seconds, but the lack of shot variety (close-ups, pans, dollies etc.) and character development, exposed either a lack of resources, or imagination...
(Or...horror of horrors...BOTH?????)

The cinematography of Zou Peng can be described in 5 words: Wide Shot plus Looooooong takes.
(I decided against throwing "American Idol" Simon-ish adjectives in there.)

With wide shots, you need visually engaging actors and attention-grabbing/retaining visual stimuli. Zou Peng's characters were merely sitting around blabbering! Most of the delivery was natural, but plain water having a bland taste is also very natural.

As an Internet film, Zou Peng uses computer screens as its main presentation medium. A variety of close-ups and extreme-close-ups would have, in the context of PC screening, served the director's vision more appropriately, and delivered the character's emotions more effectively.

Speaking of story and emotions.....the long takes in Zou Peng are not justified. This is because, instead of emotional arcs that provide plot payoffs and cathartic epiphanies after our invested attention, we are subjected to muddling meandering conversation. ARGH!

Jacen, "Tak Giu" showed us your potential but "Zou Peng" showed us your inexperience.

There is a Chinese saying: the deeper the affection, the more intense the criticism.

We really, REALLY love your gungho, can-do, just-do-it independant filmmaker spirit, and your uniquely Singaporean sense of wit.

We love you and hope you will shoot better films! We NEED you to shoot better films because we film buffs aren't doing it. Instead of going out there to shoot and edit and craft stories ourselves (with our knowledge), we film buffoons are sitting on our fat asses typing out critiques with "act cheem" English words.

SO WE NEED YOU!

Please understand that my honest critique is attached with brimming hopes of another, much more polished hosaywood production.

You can definitely do better than this, man!

Go for it, because I certainly look forward to it.

Cheers!

posted by audaciousjoy @ 3:25 AM