Official Rejection

12.27pm – I have a little opening today as I got some timing wrong with posting back the Netflix movies and the next movie is being shipped today. So, seeing as the director of this movie [Paul Osborne] has been so supportive of my blog, I’ve decided to review his movie, Official Rejection, today! I’ll do it after lunch so I don’t get interrupted. My apologies if the review is a little off but I’m still not feeling 100% well today.

5.28pm – I’m so happy that I liked this movie. There’s nothing worse than writing a bad review for someone who’s been so nice. But hurrah! I really enjoyed it! I think it helps that I love films and want to be in the film industry. Also, Scott Storm is really funny and makes the whole thing more entertaining.

It’s a documentary so don’t expect Hollywood-like camera work or stuff. Its better than some of the camera work I’ve seen most people do, for instant the camera doesn’t actually shake that much which is great. Don’t want a Cloverfield when its just about film festivals. Anyways, the fact that it’s a documentary makes me feel like I’m watching TV without adverts. I’m just ignorant to documentaries and I only link them with TV so my apologies!

I loved that guy’s shirt whose name I’ve totally forgotten who wrote that book. But anyways, his shirt says “Your movie sucked anyway”. I want one! I feel bad that I don’t remember his name as he was just bursting with personality and stuff which is something you don’t normally get when you interview people for a documentary. You see these people and they talk about the chosen subject and you don’t feel connected to them at all. But with a lot of the people interview in this one, I felt a connection because these people had freaking personalities and obviously love what they do.

I loved the cartoon titles, they were cute and funny. ‘Film Festival Basics’ made me feel like I was in class but it, thankfully, didn’t have that dreaded class feel where you watch a tape in class and the people are so unbelievably cheesy that you just switch off and start doodling on your work. Not that I ever did that, mum and dad…

“This is the stuff you don’t think about when you’re making a movie” which is exactly what this movie is about and is so fantastic because it does NOT gloss over anything about the post-production. I found it to be very insightful and as a kind of warning if I ever were to make it into a film festival for some reason.

I confess, when all the festivals were rejecting the movie they were trying to ‘sell’, I found myself going “well, maybe the film was just shit, move on, get over it” but then I think of the only film I’ve ever made that got ‘shown’ and how pissed off I would have been if it hadn’t been, after everything I went through. So now I feel bad about thinking that.

I mentioned it before but I’ll mention it again, Scott Storm is so freaking funny in this movie/documentary. He’s the director of the movie they’re trying to ‘sell’ and he totally makes the movie watchable. He has this fantastic personality and perfect comic timing that makes you just want to hang out with him always. He’s just awesome.

This movie is filled with great advice for wannabe young filmmakers and I’ll be forcing people I know who are these people to watch this movie just so they know what shit they’re in for! If you are a student and you’re doing a film degree of some description, watch this movie, you will find it incredibly insightful.

Paul Osborne’s [the director] 3 year-old son is adorable. I love kids so a little sprinkle of a kid in this made me like it just that bit more. Bit of the cute-factor! Also loved it when he was giving out the cards that say ‘my dad wrote the movie Ten Till Noon and all I got was this stupid card’. Its cute but its also a fantastic advertising tool! No one can turn down a kid handing them a card, especially one that jumps up and down in celebration when you take the card!

I think the main reason this film worked so well, especially with me, was that you almost become friends with the people in it. You go on this journey with them and you laugh with them and laughter is so important to me. I wrote a few funny things down that you probably won’t find funny until you watch this documentary which you will. You will watch it. “I hope to show my breasts to get people to see the movie”-the big guy. “ Always drink Phill’s coffee!” “I broke the Riverside coaster!!!” Its just memorable crap that I could imagine remembering with my friends.

I love that this movie showed that there isn’t any competition or hard feelings if someone else’s movie gets into a better place than yours does. They work together! They help each other out and its so lovely and reassuring to see.

I liked this shot where you see that someone has written an ‘advert’ in the snow on someone’s car. Clever!

Ok, there was one person that really pissed me off which was that guy who had that stupid sticker on his forehead that was stapling posters of this independent film festival everywhere. The woman filmmaker had a point, that they should put up all these posters of their festival OVER THE TOP of the posters of the actual independent movies. Its ridiculous and hypocritical and just shows that they don’t give a shit about the movies, just want as many people to be there and as much money as possible which is bullcrap. There are other ways of doing it rather than vandalizing the filmmaker’s posters.

I loved the part about the swag and it made me think of my first [and only] swag bag. I entered a film challenge back in my hometown in England where we were given a title, genre and prop and 5 days to make a 3 minute movie which would then be shown to everyone. I went through a bit of hell trying to sort it out because Laura is bloody useless sometimes!!!! Sorry, anyways, I made a great movie with my great friend Jane who is great because she let me throw sugar, flour, eggs and cake mix at her face and hair. Anyways, I won nothing [which is ridiculous as my film got the most laughs but still didn’t win the ‘most laughs’ award. I’m not angry about it…] but got a swag bag which was actually cooler than the shit the people in the movie got! I got a bottle of shiraz, a Batman shirt, a DVD about motorbikes, an energy drink [which tasted like 10 year old cola], stickers, lollypop [which I gave to my brother because the freaking wrapper had come off in the bag so I was like ‘I ain’t eating that’ but my brother did] and… a glow-in-the-dark Wii controler cover [gave to Sarah because she was the only one I knew who had a Wii] and… some promotional postcards and leaflets from other people that I feel bad about not actually looking at them. So yeah, my swag bag for a small town film competition was far better than what the movie makers in the film got at a professional film festival. They got loads of stuff about Riverside and only one cufflink that had a picture of Riverside on it! Made me laugh!

When they finally won an award [a proper one that they could hold], Storm’s like “this is cool, hope I don’t drop it” then he pretends to drop it but the screen goes black and you hear the sound of glass shattering and even though I know it wasn’t real, my hand still shot up to my mouth in shock.
I’ve realized that I’m practically a programmer. I just watch movies and determine whether I like them or not. I guess I’m just as much of a looser as they are, haha!

Oh my God, there’s this whole part about this festival in Chicago which just kept getting worse and worse and I totally felt for the guy who wanted to get his movie shown and how terrible the organizing was. And it was terrible. My God, I felt the pain those guys went through. You have to watch it to know what I’m on about and understand how much pain you will feel. A taster; the list of films and directors [I think that’s what the list was of] that they sent out was 3 years old. And one of the directors was actually dead now. Ridiculous.

I really enjoyed this movie and I think that if you’re planning on being in the film industry, whether you want to go indie or not, you should watch this. Its very informative and you’ll have some laughs along the way.

45/212

Kate
xoxo