Short Film Treatment

Logline: Jacob owes money to a loan shark. Loan shark captures his girl friend. Jacob is given a time allotted to get the money or his girl friend will be killed.


Beer cans on the table, trash on the floor and clothes hanging on the couch. Man is still asleep with despair.
He dreams of his girlfriend being taken away from him and receiving the threat of her death.
Man awakens from dream sad and depressed.
Man thinks of how he must get the money to pay off the loan shark.
He decided to rob his neighbor's house.
Man breaks into his neighbor house.
He is able to break open the bank and steal the money.
Neighbor opens the front door just as man is about to open it.
Man is forced to put neighbor to sleep out of panic.
Man calls loan shark and tells him that he has the money.
Loan shark tells man to meet him at his house in the remaining time left or else.
Man runs off to meet Loan shark.
Man makes it to the house.
Girlfriends voice is behind the closet door.
Loan shark assures man that he'll give her to him for the money.
Man gives Loan shark the money and opens the door.
Girlfriend is lying in the chair, wrapped in rope, with tape recorder next to her.
Girlfriend was already killed.
Man looks back at Loan shark.
Man is shot.
Man wakes up from dream.
Girlfriend comforts him and tells him to go back to sleep.

Volleyball Segment Critique

I basically came up with this idea because I thought it would be interesting to do a segment on something I probably would never want to do. I was able to interview the volleyball players I knew, such as Anissa and Gabby, and they were able to give some pretty good responses to our questions. Our questions were somewhat direct as to the individual itself, but somewhat general as to the team as a whole. I envisioned there to be many intense shots that would accompany the music's pace and that the b-roll for the interviews would match what was said exactly.

For the interviews, I basically just chose the upper spirit court and the front of the school. I thought that by keeping it simple, it would ensure the simplicity of the film but show intensity. I think the b-roll was good. There are a lot of shots that look up to the subjects and many of the b-roll shots accompany what the people say in their interview well. We had a lot of trouble with the positioning of the people because we wither placed them with too much headroom or in the direct middle of the shot. Many of the shots, such as the b-roll shots, were smooth, such as there was no shaking of the camera and their was no focus problems. There was only one problem we had with lighting and that was during the b-roll when I tried to focus on the players but weirdly it got dark and I was forced to zoom out to regain the light. The audio in the interview came out as expected with little to no errors.

We didn't believe that a voice-over in the beginning was necessary because we let the intensity of the screen shots and b-roll explain everything. Out segment was pretty much informative because their was information about their team, their expectations, and how they operate their practice. We only used a voice-over in the very end as a way of ending off the piece on a suttle tone. I wanted to people to remember our piece with that "wow" feeling mainly because of our opening's quick pace shots.

The interviews and the b-roll match very well. Whenever a person talked about a certain thing, there was a shot of their practice that supported their saying. We used basic title sequences from live type with the Capuchino colors. In the beginning, we used screenshots of the players to build up the viewers anticipation, then added b-roll of their practice that was also a montage of shots. In some of the interviews, the people said some interesting things but we couldn't find any b-roll to accompany it so the interview seemed somewhat long. Throughout the segment, their was no continuity errors and it seemed very fluent with the interviews and b-roll.

I honestly loved the beginning of the segment. The building of anticipation, in my opinion, was the only good part of the segment and the b-roll that accompanied it was very exceptional. If I had more time, I would redo all the interviews and ensure that it would actually look like interviews. After doing this segment, I realized that I need to review my notes on how to position people in interviews and also to ensure that the lighting in my b-roll is not too dark.

Character In Time

This picture of Obama explains a lot about time. All over Obama's body are things he has to deal with, such as the Haiti disaster and the Iraq war. Within his 4 year term, he's expected to solve all of these issues and bring the U.S. back to its feet politically, economically, and socially. As portrayed, Obama's doesn't have enough time to solve all of these issues and it will be a struggle for time. The emotion in his eyes show that their is no hope of accomplishing this or even defeat. His hand on his mouth may mean that it will be too difficult to accomplish this. The words all over his body vary from small to large, meaning minor to major crisis’s. As shown, there are a lot of major crisis’s that will need more than 4 years to solve, not including the minor ones. Overall, this image displays how Obama has to deal with these difficult problems in order to ensure that the U.S. stays a float.