Content
The
chief problem that The Ethereal Plane ran into
was in trying to show too much on too limited a budget.
There's nothing wrong with implying things if showing
them is going to be problematic. However, since this relates
to the visual look of the film, we'll specifically look
at these issues in that section.
From
a general content regard, the editing could stand to be
tightened, especially in the dialogue situations in the
beginning. In order to keep an audience interested, camera
cuts need to streamline conversations rather than showing
them exactly as they actually occurred. There were a number
of situations where a cut would go from one character
to another, and the second character would pause for a
second or fumble before saying his or her line. This causes
flaws in acting and drama to become very noticeable, whereas
a faster editing style prevents people from paying attention
to things you'd rather them ignore.
The
characters of Damon Taylor and Harrison are quite believable
for the majority of the film, even when they act alongside
some of the less compelling characters in the film. Harrison
especially manages to bring a nice touch of comic relief
and manages to deliver his speech on the origin of life
on this planet in pretty believable manner, which is impressive
due to the length and depth of the speech.
On
the other hand, Kayla's character is a bit problematic.
It's difficult to believe in who she is because the character
stays strangely bewildered for most of the movie. It's
hard to believe that she is a friend Harrison would have
entrusted the machine to, as she doesn't seem to be connecting
with the danger she's in or with the gravity of the situation.
Finally,
after the film concludes, bloopers from the film start
playing while the credits are rolling. While these blooper
reels looked professional and would have been appropriate
in a slapstick Jackie Chan film, they are very out of
place on a film that is designed to be a sci-fi/action
adventure film; it ends up having the viewer take the
film less seriously because it wraps up on a comedic note.
[Note
to the Director: I would strongly encourage you to,
instead, put bloopers in the extra features of the DVD
and not as part of the credits, unless your film was intended
to be a sci-fi parody. If that's the case, then some editing
changes and alternate audio effects need to be implemented
in the rest of the film to show this.]
