1) As far as the black background, that's just how Undergroundfilm hosts they're movies. Since they hosts lots, I'd say that black was their best bet for a background, I think it looks fine.
2) As far as the trailer being too long, that's one thing we've realized and was the main complaint of most comments. It was pretty much our first trailer since this was our first feature and we thought we could get away with it being longer since it was online, but we've realized that the same rules apply to trailers online as they do in theatres, which, as you know, is keep it shorter, under 2 minutes I'd say. This was 3 1/2 minutes I think.
3)But as far as the film looking like crap, it was defintaely supposed to. It was shot in b&w (the part with the 13 year old girl, not really 13 though just to make sure you know that) and then edited to look very dark and grainy.
Some people like this effect, and some don't since he's supposed to be shooting with a video camera. But the whole point was to create a style for the movie. Obviously this isn't real footage, we're past the Blair Witch days of people believing that and if it were real footage the filmmakers/distributors would be immediately arrested for having their names attached to it, I'm sure.
So, since we already know it's not real, we don't need to keep that video looking digital feel. I know Shane hates the plain video look, so what he did was create a style for the movie.
You don't see it entirely in the preview but there's another girl we see for a good amount of the film that is another victim. She's presented in a little video cam at the bottom of the screen and sometimes fades in an out of the movie on the full screen. Her segments are in color, and layered with some kind of focus effect that makes it look more glowy and heavingly like. Her character also appears smiling and happy for the whole film. The other girl, Stacy, the 13 year old, gets the opposite effect/treatment, and that's what the movie focuses on more. She's picked up off the streets (not in the amateur porn classifieds like the other girl), is toyed with and threatened by the killer, and is in a much darker and dirtier place than the other girl. Not too mention she has on black clothes and black hair, versus the other girl has a white shirt and blonde hair. Everything fits pretty perfectly to contrast the two girls, I believe.
Even in this review, the reviewer mentioned this part
"Choppy first-person scenes are interspersed with a smaller, porn camera in the bottom left of the screen for much of the movie, showing one girl, happy to be having sex with the killer contrasted with the desperately uncomfortable Stacy on the main screen."
Anyways, I'm rambling a lot now, but the whole point for this particular movie was to show what it might be like for this 13 year old girl to get duped into the world of porn, only in this case, the porn director is a murderer.
Hmm, hope that all made sense.
Mike-B
