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Budget
$1700 for a twenty minute movie shot on film is a very reasonable budget. Most indie filmmakers would spend more than this on a twenty minute movie shot on video, and it wouldn’t look half as good. According to Doran, most of the money went towards film stock and processing, as expected. The rest of the money went towards paying a makeup person and a PA (everyone else worked for free), and towards the ever-present expense on all indie shoots: feeding the crew. Doran was able to get the lights for free thanks to a friend at a production house, and it seems like his costuming and equipment expenses were minimal.
Lasting Appeal
Although Westsider kept me interested throughout the multiple viewings it took to write this review, I don’t think it’s something I would rewatch otherwise. There isn’t much depth to the story or the main character, and that’s usually what keeps me coming back to films over and over. As a result, I probably wouldn’t show this to my non-filmmaker friends.
However, I’d definitely show this to fellow filmmakers, if only to illustrate how beautiful Super8 photography can be when shot by someone who obviously knows what they’re doing. I think this film could help inspire a lot of filmmakers to move away from the desaturated and muted tones popular in indie films these days, and could perhaps swing them back to using the brilliant color palette found in the Technicolor films of the past. Now if only we could figure out a way to replicate these colors with affordable digital video….
Overall Comment:
It’s great to see someone take a chance and shoot an indie movie on film, especially when it’s so easy these days to get great results digitally. Doran definitely has a knack for the technical aspects of filmmaking, but his future films could be improved by avoiding overused plot devices and surface-level character development. In all, the impressive visual look of Westsider, combined with the spot-on narration, has created a very professional calling card for director Charles Doran. I’m looking forward to seeing what he can do with a deeper and more ambitious script.
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Content |
6.0 |
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Visual
Look |
8.5 |
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Use
of Audio |
8.0 |
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Use
of Budget |
9.0 |
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Lasting
Appeal |
6.5 |
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Overall
Score |
7.6
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Ryan Graham is the director of Livelihood, a critically acclaimed ultra-low budget zombie comedy. He also runs 37.5 Productions, a post production company specializing in giving a Hollywood sheen to independent films. In his spare time he is the lead guitarist for The Dirty Marmaduke Flute Squad. |
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