Thoughts on Shorts
What makes a good short film?
Not that I think there's a formula. But there must be some basic criteria. What gets a short accepted into a film festival? What is considered "success" for a short? When do you know your short has hit the big time?
Don't misunderstand -- I like shorts! I've enjoyed about half of the shorts I've seen so far in the PDX Film Fest. But I think I lack the critical faculties to appreciate them fully.
Thoughts? What is the soul of a short? What makes or breaks a short? How is watching shorts different from watching longer films, and how is it different from evaluating and enjoying a drawing or an installation or a tapestry?
Categories
PDX Film Fest 20060 TrackBacks
Listed below are links to blogs that reference this entry: Thoughts on Shorts.
TrackBack URL for this entry: http://www.urbanhonking.com/cgi-bin/mt4/mt-tb.cgi/2016
these are all really difficult questions because not only are u asking the difference between a short and a feature, but youre also asking what makes a good experimental short film...
firstly in my opinion (for what its worth which may not be much!) the feature film and the short film are vastly different entities. a feature plays with escapism, suspension of disbelief, seduction and emotion over a longer time period which has become the norm for good reason. It allows time for the traditional 3 act structure to play out and draw its audience in (although the necessity of the 'traditional 3 act' is another debate in itself!). It allows for both invovement and engagement, as characters or places or relationships are established and explored.
Compare this to a short. A short has between 5 and 15 minutes normally to pack a punch. It has no time to establish a scenario and introduce us to a situation or characters. We often arrive bang in the middle of an action which is usually never revisited, put into context, explored or explained. The narrative structure we are all accustomed to (beginning middle end) can either be adhered to and presented in truncated form (i say truncated meaning issues of preoccupation necessarily become 'reduced down' or less in depth), or the short itself becomes the form- it explores a transcient experience perhaps.
In many ways this is why the most 'succesful' short films are comedies. An audience can go away feeling satiated in one respect- something was 'got' from what they just saw, and they werent asked to engage to deeply in the process of getting it.
but then theres the experimental short. Many films are not looking to engage the audience in the way that fiction films do. theyre looking either to explore the structure of the medium itself, implode narrative or visual devices, implode techniques, experiment with form/technique/material/narrative/content/genre...
to conclude quickly so i can go make myself a cup of tea... experimental shorts are not necessarly looking to entertain...and so its no wonder theyre not all found to be entertaining... what is one man's idea of beautiful, curls another ones lip (i speak from experience...)
and just to clarify.. when i say an action in a short...
'is usually never revisited, put into context, explored or explained.'
i meant to the extent to which a feature film can offer solutions or problems within its 90 minutes or whatever...
I never really thought about the comedy hook for shorts, but one of my favorite moments of the films last night was the High Plains Winter film when after all these long wind howling shots of cold bleak places was interrupted by a horse pulling a man on skies! It was like getting slapped by comedy, and I liked it.