watch PARANORMAL - J. E. Falk - An Encounter (Film)

[danowl]

"PARANORMAL - J. E. Falk - An Encounter" is the new found footage shortfilm by director Danny Tristan. He was inspired by true events of his good friend and "PARANORMAL"-actor Jens Messtorff.

WATCH FILM ON YOUTUBE: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ki6zDgiUxcA

Please visit and like the official fb-site: http://www.facebook.com/falkspuk

Maybe you would like to share the film. Thanks!

ENJOY!!

 

[mus]

Man, those PA activity movies get a lotta fan films, don't they?

 

[danowl]

Man, those PA activity movies get a lotta fan films, don't they?

This is not a fan film.

 

[ChimpPhobiaFilms]

Welcome to IndieTalk!

First off, not bad. There were some things I really liked about this. I especially liked the furniture moving.... that was awesome.

I personally find the found footage "genre" to be dead. The gimmick has been beaten to the ground and no unique spins have been put on what could be a potentially awesome style of filmmaking. But it' overused and I feel that your film isn't very original, but rather sterile and predictable. Trust me, the film isn't bad (in fact it's not too bad), but I feel like I've seen this short film hundreds of times.

 

[danowl]

Welcome to IndieTalk!

First off, not bad. There were some things I really liked about this. I especially liked the furniture moving.... that was awesome.

I personally find the found footage "genre" to be dead. The gimmick has been beaten to the ground and no unique spins have been put on what could be a potentially awesome style of filmmaking. But it' overused and I feel that your film isn't very original, but rather sterile and predictable. Trust me, the film isn't bad (in fact it's not too bad), but I feel like I've seen this short film hundreds of times.

Thanks for your honest review!

 

[mus]

This is not a fan film.

It was a joke

 

[FantasyFilmProductions]

I stopped watching at 6 minutes...

The art of this kind of film is to not make it look contrived...It kind of did a little when the lens was found safe in a towel in the bathroom...it was exactly where he said it would be and he went straight to it after expressing that he was concerned at where it might be...why concerned if it is in a nice towel?

Secondly after scenes where basic stuff like the door slamming or the chair moving ( which was quite boring ) happened, the guy would either not notice, as in the case of the door slamming (didn't notice...come on!!!) or the chair moving which causes him to do this little awkward pause...but in both cases he comes to turn off the camera...why? Why would he not leave it on to catch more stuff, or come to the camera, clearly worried and comment on what he has noticed, then leave it running...fade to next scene...I feel like you have not paid attention to each scene or maybe at least just not enough attention to detail. Plus the whole intro where he does this long winded chat about how he has made a film over the last few months, but then describes himself as an amateur film maker that is going to leave the camera rolling for some weeks in because he expects to catch something sooner or later again feels contrived, not at all like a man concerned or interested in what is happening.

Lastly, the way that these films work best, is that generally there is 3-5 non scary scenes where it is just normal, nothing weird happens, and then into the next scene, and wham theres something weird...then more normal scenes to relax the viewer again, then wham...Not the wham of something in every scene from start to finish.

I think it has potential, but you must do it right, and you must consider these things a lot more. Step out of your own head for a second and consider the key elements to a film such as this.
Otherwise it will be just another bad attempt at a genre style that has been dragged over and over and over and over by others. Do something new and unique.

Sorry if this seems rough but truly, if you can get around these issues (which I know you can quite easily) then, you may have a great film.



edited to say...a shot of the outside of the house wouldn't go astray either...if the outside of this house does not lend itself well to that, then go and shoot another house as dusk is coming on so you can cut to empty outside scenes of the house when things get a bit stale. And don't forget to get some footage of the cat. Seriously!!! You will know exactly where to put the cat shot when it comes time to edit. The cat may be your biggest seller on the idea that something weird is going on.

 

[PhantomScreenwriter]

Firstly the found footage concept is difficult to pull off as the viewer already enters into it knowing they are watching something that has been written, shot and edited. The thing too with paranormal activity (referring here to the term itself not the movies) is that a lot of things like doors slamming shut or opening by themselves are inherently unbelievable because the audience knows that it has been planned that way and it's a practical effect...having said that though one of the strengths of this is that while watching it (and then watching the behind the scenes), I was very happy that all of the effects we see on camera were done without CG.

Secondly in the case of this film's execution I think that there are moments of nothing happening or at least not happening until much later in the shot that could be trimmed down but ultimately that's just a subjective element. I liked the end where Jens has the chair he's sitting on pulled out from underneath him and he ends up lying face down on the floor, and then he's dragged - that for me was the best part of the movie.

Getting back to the concept of found footage I don't think any new ground is going to be broken in terms of audience belief that what they're seeing is real (as opposed to being staged to look real) until there are random events occurring that members of the crew filming the found footage themselves didn't know about beforehand, and that only perhaps the director knew in advance would occur. I think randomness and spontaneity is the key in making these found footage films a bit more believable.

See, traditional narratives in films of course ask the audience to suspend disbelief about what they're seeing so they don't get taken out of the world of the film but the found footage genre cannot try to approach suspending an audience's disbelief because it needs to do something different than that.

 

[AudioPostExpert]

See, traditional narratives in films of course ask the audience to suspend disbelief about what they're seeing so they don't get taken out of the world of the film but the found footage genre cannot try to approach suspending an audience's disbelief because it needs to do something different than that.

I can't agree with this statement. Traditional narratives do indeed try to suspend audience disbelieve and make them feel part of the world the filmmaker is trying to create. Exactly the same is true of these types of found footage films. The only slight difference is that the narrative is of an amateur self-filming some real unexplained/unusual events. The world one needs to create in a found footage film is therefore one of apparent reality from the POV of our amateur's camera. But you're still creating a world and suspending audience disbelief to make them feel it's real, or at least real enough that they become emotionally involved it, just the same as with any narrative film.

In narrative film, the same as with any storytelling medium, what defines whether it is good or not is not so much the story itself but how the story is told and for me this my biggest criticism of this film. The actor presents the story in the style of a documentary narrator, not in the style of someone to whom these (apparently real) events are actually happening, which is fine for the introduction but not for the supposedly real time events. Too often when something happens there is either little/no response from the actor or a dispassionate third person narrator's type response and when there is actually some display of emotion it is mostly unconvincing. As a documentary it is far too slow to be interesting and as a narrative there is too little emotion or convincing emotion for the audience to empathise with or feel emotionally involved in.

Making a good found footage film might appear on the surface of it to be relatively easy, particularly as far as some of the technical aspects of filmmaking are concerned, but from the storytelling aspect they are actually very difficult to make well, at least as difficult, if not more so, as traditional narrative films.

G

 

[PhantomScreenwriter]

I can't agree with this statement. Traditional narratives do indeed try to suspend audience disbelieve and make them feel part of the world the filmmaker is trying to create. Exactly the same is true of these types of found footage films. The only slight difference is that the narrative is of an amateur self-filming some real unexplained/unusual events. The world one needs to create in a found footage film is therefore one of apparent reality from the POV of our amateur's camera. But you're still creating a world and suspending audience disbelief to make them feel it's real, or at least real enough that they become emotionally involved it, just the same as with any narrative film.

In narrative film, the same as with any storytelling medium, what defines whether it is good or not is not so much the story itself but how the story is told and for me this my biggest criticism of this film. The actor presents the story in the style of a documentary narrator, not in the style of someone to whom these (apparently real) events are actually happening, which is fine for the introduction but not for the supposedly real time events. Too often when something happens there is either little/no response from the actor or a dispassionate third person narrator's type response and when there is actually some display of emotion it is mostly unconvincing. As a documentary it is far too slow to be interesting and as a narrative there is too little emotion or convincing emotion for the audience to empathise with or feel emotionally involved in.

Making a good found footage film might appear on the surface of it to be relatively easy, particularly as far as some of the technical aspects of filmmaking are concerned, but from the storytelling aspect they are actually very difficult to make well, at least as difficult, if not more so, as traditional narrative films.

G

That is a fair point. The thing I wanted to get at was that I believe for a found footage film to work it has to be approached not as a film pretending to be of real footage or to even suspend an audiences disbelief. It needs to have random, unexpected occurrences happening in real time that are not rehearsed at all or known by anyone except a select few to be planned on the day/night of filming.

This is how I believe a found footage film should be approached and handled in order to make it unlike anything released before in this genre. I will use a supernatural story as an example.

• The contracts of everyone involved would state that not one shred of information about the filming is to be told to anyone, not even members of their own family and not even telling them they are acting in anything at all (this would mean lying or being deceptive)
  
• The writer comes up with the basic story - a house that's supposedly haunted by spirits and the owner of the house organizes a seance.
  
• The director takes that basic story and adds elements that aren't in the story and that won't be told to anyone else in the cast or crew - someone smashes a window, throws something into the room etc to scare the actors unexpectedly. The director would then act as if they are just as surprised as everyone else even though they knew in advance it was going to occur and it was never in the screenplay.
  
• After filming has finished more touches are made to the film that no one besides the director, writer and editor knows about.
  
• Once the film has been edited together it is passed on by a "plant" to a member of the press who then releases the footage to the world.
  
• In my opinion if a found footage film did all this very elaborate and of course very difficult thing to accomplish, then and only then maybe could the found footage film fool people into thinking what they've seen is real.
  
• Basically the film wouldn't be released theatrically. It would just be uploaded to the internet by the media and shared among the public like a viral video.
  
• Then after a certain amount of time the truth is revealed - it was just a found footage film that was completely orchestrated.

I know this is complex and it would be very difficult to find people willing to go along with this and to not have the film released at a cinema like Paranormal Activity et al are. I know that this may sound ridiculous and insensitive especially the fact of lying to members of your family about the filming and pulling the wool over the eyes of audiences who view the finished product. There may even be real legal consequences so I'm not endorsing this to be actually done. It is just a very extreme example of how to do a found footage film that is unlike any ever done before.