several of these were /nice/, but none of them really felt /great/.
"gilbert" was an enjoyable character study of a man at work, worth watching again.
"prebloc" was also a character study, but in a fictional character. the short builds up tons of
suspense only to let it fall away on a note of irony.
"bitter sweet" has a very /wu wei/ feeling to it; the main character has very few lines other than
saying "no," and yet convinces the entire remaining crowd of a massive and elaborate story fueled by
their fears. but as an investigation into this phenomenon, it is relatively superficial.
of all of these shorts, "luckiest one" is the only one to show some degree of variety, some
variation in emotional content from slacking to joy to sorrow to resolution. sean donnelly did a
good job writing it, but i felt that the play choreographed its own ending much more than it really
needed to. there's thus no central feeling of struggle or drama and only a passing feeling of
resolution, partially burdened by the fact that we /don't/ know where it goes from there. it could
go pretty much /anywhere/.
the "lilah" character study felt somewhat mediocre, to me. i mean, since it doesn't have a writer, i
can't say "you should have done this or that better" -- you get whoever you get, and they'll come
out however they come out. but i really kinda felt bored with this piece, until a gem at the end,
where there is a sort of supernatural beauty to how she's playing with the cameraman's emotions.
"watch lilah bleed" is easily the worst of the tape. it's essentially a stop-motion music video done
with dolls. unfortunately for the music video, the music is generic techno angerpop, something not
worth the ten minutes spent listening to it. the music only provides two real lines on which to
build the story, a voice saying "there is no god" and another voice saying "it's aliiiiive", with
which andersson builds a faux-gory film in which one doll decapitates another (first line) and then
revives it from the dead with electricity (second line). i'm an atheist, so i suppose this was all
supposed to intellectually flatter me, or something. whatever. protip 1: if you start with crap
ingredients, you're gonna cook a crappy meal. protip 2: if you try really hard to be edgy, it comes
off as insincere.
all together, this mixtape is not a must-see. while i like the fact that vodo is moving forward, i
was hoping for much more from the free world. i suppose video-oriented mix tapes will have to wait
until we have a bigger community of filmmakers working for the free culture.
it's going to be difficult, i think. the great popularity of the mix tape came from home users, not
content-providers like vodo. it's not really a mix-tape culture until everybody has the means to
mash together whatever little video clips they've enjoyed and then share it with their friends.
"gilbert" was an enjoyable character study of a man at work, worth watching again.
"prebloc" was also a character study, but in a fictional character. the short builds up tons of
suspense only to let it fall away on a note of irony.
"bitter sweet" has a very /wu wei/ feeling to it; the main character has very few lines other than
saying "no," and yet convinces the entire remaining crowd of a massive and elaborate story fueled by
their fears. but as an investigation into this phenomenon, it is relatively superficial.
of all of these shorts, "luckiest one" is the only one to show some degree of variety, some
variation in emotional content from slacking to joy to sorrow to resolution. sean donnelly did a
good job writing it, but i felt that the play choreographed its own ending much more than it really
needed to. there's thus no central feeling of struggle or drama and only a passing feeling of
resolution, partially burdened by the fact that we /don't/ know where it goes from there. it could
go pretty much /anywhere/.
the "lilah" character study felt somewhat mediocre, to me. i mean, since it doesn't have a writer, i
can't say "you should have done this or that better" -- you get whoever you get, and they'll come
out however they come out. but i really kinda felt bored with this piece, until a gem at the end,
where there is a sort of supernatural beauty to how she's playing with the cameraman's emotions.
"watch lilah bleed" is easily the worst of the tape. it's essentially a stop-motion music video done
with dolls. unfortunately for the music video, the music is generic techno angerpop, something not
worth the ten minutes spent listening to it. the music only provides two real lines on which to
build the story, a voice saying "there is no god" and another voice saying "it's aliiiiive", with
which andersson builds a faux-gory film in which one doll decapitates another (first line) and then
revives it from the dead with electricity (second line). i'm an atheist, so i suppose this was all
supposed to intellectually flatter me, or something. whatever. protip 1: if you start with crap
ingredients, you're gonna cook a crappy meal. protip 2: if you try really hard to be edgy, it comes
off as insincere.
all together, this mixtape is not a must-see. while i like the fact that vodo is moving forward, i
was hoping for much more from the free world. i suppose video-oriented mix tapes will have to wait
until we have a bigger community of filmmakers working for the free culture.
it's going to be difficult, i think. the great popularity of the mix tape came from home users, not
content-providers like vodo. it's not really a mix-tape culture until everybody has the means to
mash together whatever little video clips they've enjoyed and then share it with their friends.
