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The
next scene bring us back inside of the vast reaches of
our fine hillbilly hideaway, where it appears C-Bizzle
is going to get capped once and for all by a shotgun wielding
Skeeter. J-pimp and Pump round the corner just in time
to save the day...though they soon find out that the firearm
they nabbed is, in fact, unloaded. Skeeter chases the
three friends out of the dwelling and into the night.
Kadaking drives up with a set of working wheels and the
friends pile in and make their escape, on the way managing
to rescue a wounded Tarantino who is fleeing from Coocher,
yet another member of the local possum squad. Just as
our heroes think they are going to make a clean getaway,
Clip Clop Mc Flop arises like a spectre of death from
the shadows of the road. With a menacing grin he takes
calm aim with his firearm and completely fails to stop
the van's progress with his body; he essentially gets
turned into Hillbilly hash as our young friends wisely
decide not to wait for him to get out of the way.
In
the end the 5 friends make it back home relatively intact,
if not a little rattled by the night's experiences.
The
movie seems to end much as it began. Tarantino wakes up,
brushes his teeth, and pours himself some cereal. He hears
a knock at the door and opens it to find himself once
more face to face with the salesman from hell, who has
decided to take a more hostile approach to marketing.
It's at this point that you realize that the film isn't
over yet, but I don't want to spoil the ending for you.
Content
It is obvious that Mr. Hendricks and crew had a good time
making this film. It's always important to keep it fun
when producing something as time intensive as a film.
It
is tough to give the acting a grade in `Da Woodz' and
I'll tell you why;
- Most
of the camera shots were hand held. How does this make
a lick of difference when it comes to acting? Well, for
starters it gave the film a bit of a reality television
vibe. It was almost like someone brought a camcorder along
for an actual road trip disaster.
- The
entire movie was ad-lib: The reactions and interactions
of the characters were probably more in line with the
way real people actually talk and interact and I felt
more like I was watching real footage of people getting
jumped in the middle of nowhere than a bunch of Shakespearian
actors attempting to bring life to a screenplay. The acting
fits right in because its closer to the way actual human
beings act.
Now
that I've said this, I will say that all of the white
boys were overblown and exaggerated caricatures of Redneck
yokels.. or should I say Appalachian-Americans? Then again,
I think that was the whole point. You have your typical
hostile, menacing, and creepily ignorant characters which
work well in suspense movies of this genre. But if you
take those hostile, menacing, and creepily ignorant characters
and turn them up a few notches, it becomes overblown…
BUT if you turn it up a few notches PAST overblown it
really becomes pretty funny, which is exactly what happened
here. Skeeter, Corndog and the rest of the posse were
SO racist, SO half-witted, SO ignorant and SO enraged
that quite the comedic effect was achieved.
Our
band of brothers (no pun intended!) did a great job with
the ad-lib. These are a bunch of funny guys who obviously
have great senses of humor. I would really like to see
how much input they had in the film, because the jokes
and commentary really make the characters feel like a
bunch of real guys. Their comedy isn't canned, but rather
lies within the bounds of playful harassing between friends.
Their banter would have added more to the film if C-Bizzle's
role as the camera man had been played up more. This would
have made the handheld shots and the camera mic audio
really fit. It would still be a really unique twist on
the whole slasher flick genre, and it would enable some
of the visual effects to be toned down as well. It would
save time and money in post-editing if certain scenes
were supposed to be frantic and shaky; as if they were
shot by a freaked out camera guy who's part of the action..
This would enable the official camera man to take a break
and go get a sandwich or a smoke break, or rest his aching
neck for a while (trust me, he'll love you for it!).
Despite
all the good ideas that come into play in this film, there's
still a whole lot that gets lost due to the fact that
so much of the film is improv. Just because it feels like
a reality show doesn't mean that that's the best thing
in the world for a film. In the case of Neck of da
Woodz, it feels like a reality show that has no real
rule and no agenda, other than for it's participants to
run and scream as much as possible. (Sort of like the
worst elements of the 'Amazing Race'.) The overal improv
idea is good, but more direction and writing would have
allowed moments of improv to sparkle in the setting of
the film rather than allowing perpetual improv to muddy
up the content of the film.
Visual
Look
One
of the recurring editing themes in Neck Of Da Woodz
was to play the final seconds of a scene in slow motion,
rewind the scene fast-motion to the beginning, then play
the scene in it's entirety. I give the director and editors
props for thinking outside the box and trying for something
experimental and different, but it started to look like
the visual style of MTV's cribs after a while. This actually
adds quite a bit to the overall length of the film with
a number of scenes played 1½ times each. Personally,
I would have limited that to a few scenes because this
overall effect could really add to the movie if used in
moderation, as opposed to excess.
It
looked like most of the daytime shots underwent a de-saturation
effect with the exception of a few primary colors. The
overall effect depicted a washed-out background with certain
vibrant colors brought out in sharp contrast. This effect
can be useful at making a strong visual statement, or
to draw the audience's attention to a particular detail.
It wasn't terribly clear to me what they were trying to
accomplish with this. Again, its an interesting effect,
but perhaps a little overdone. While I applaud Hendricks'
mindset and willingness to push the envelope, sometimes
less is more and sometimes reining things in can be a
very good thing. (It's sort of like punctuation! Imagine
if I ended every sentence in a story with an exclamation
point or two!! The exclamation point soon loses it's significance!!
It essentially just becomes a fancy period!!!!)
I too have fallen into these pitfalls in previous films,
in which I have found myself tangled up in a cool idea
that really doesn't advance the plot of the film. I've
gone with a particular concept or idea, and by the time
I realized that I had bitten off more than I could chew
and that it didn't help me tell the story any better,
I was "too far along" the process to turn back.
(Or so I thought, at the time.) To quote from the upcoming
book, Fast, Cheap, & Under Control, which talks
about successfully making low budget films that have impact,
a smart director has to know when to: 'Kill your darlings!'
This means that, no matter how cool an idea, or scene,
or effect you may have or how much time you've spent on
it, if it doesn't advance the film, kill it and cut your
losses.
Another
bit of advice for future films Mr. Hendricks (and any
other filmmakers reading this critique) makes: don't try
to guess in production how a shot is going to look in
widescreen. Software like Redrock Revolution can provide
aspect ratio guidelines of your shotsthrough a laptop.
If you don't have a laptop, then use electrical tape to
crop the preview monitor to help remind you when shooting
where the top and bottom of the screen is. Trust me; it
will save a lot of trouble and heartache in editing if
the shots are already blocked for the frame aspect in
which they will be viewed
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