Night

As a citizen of a free nation I have the constitutional right to speak freely; which is what I had done on Aprill 20,2007. But someone found my words offensive and my post was deleted, and I was censored. So here is a more generic, sanitized, more "PC" revision that contains only what was meant as praise for Byron Miller.

While "Night" may not be a prime example of stellar celluloid, at least give credit where credit is due; Mr. Miller could've been like so many wannabe filmmakers and sat around and talked, and talked, and talked about making a movie. Instead, he got off his butt and had the balls to follow through, despite all of the adversity. The film's, so called, cheap look was not the result of any lack of talent, it was the lack of money. Byron is, in my opinion, a true artist who created something from, for all intents and purposes, nothing. I'd like to see the Nay Sayers who feel it's necessary to tear apart anyone else's creative efforts do better on their first outing. Many a first film is hard to watch by some. Too many people, who have no true idea what when into making this movie, or any movie for that matter, are far to quick to criticize. While the Nay Sayers may be correct about the cast and crew being comprised of friends and family; these Nay Sayers need to realize that many of those friends and family are, in fact, entertainment industry professionals, as well. Read the cast and crew profiles on IMDb.com and see for yourselves. I,myself, worked on "Night" and I have been a working professional in the entertainment industry for many years. "Night" was produced in association with my production company, Glass Asylum Productions, LLC; and I designed and created all of the effects. If studying Make Up Effects under the greatest living make up artist, Dick Smith; being a member of the Universal Orlando Prosthetics Department, and having 6 films (4 for make up) to my credit, makes me an amateur, then I guess I am.

Many of the professionals involved did so, not because we were expecting to make the next Academy Award winning "Best Picture" film, we did it because we saw something special in what Byron Miller was trying to achieve. We saw his talent, that many were and are blind to, and we believed in his unique vision. Always keep in mind that what you set out to create, and what you end up creating are rarely the same thing, be it due to creative differences, lack of budget, etc.

We, with Byron at the helm, decided we were gonna make this movie, even if it meant doing it on our own. That's exactly what we did; we weren't gonna be a bunch of whiny babies sitting around crying that we didn't have any backers. We said "F*ck it, let's do it ourselves!" Ya know what, we did just that and it's out there!

All My Best, Daniel H Ingraham; Executive Producer, Glass Asylum Productions

There seems to be a backlash against us "stuffy Brits" and our abilities to enjoy low budget films. Well let me put the record straight, here and now. I am British and I enjoyed this flick !!!!

Night is about two cops who foil an attempted robbery at a store. An innocent bystander is shot. Only thing is she does not die. Mike, one of the cops attempts to find the woman as he really can't understand how she survived. He soon realises that she is head of a vampire clan and he is soon welcomed into their fold. His police partner, Jimi, can't understand why he has gone missing and sets out to find him.

Yes it's low budget but it really made an effort to entertain. There is lots of action and everyone involved seem to enter into the spirit of the thing. I found some of the camera angles interesting and the general mood of the piece was good. Most low/no budget films have endless talking due to not having any budget to stage action scenes. At least this tries to provide entertainment rather than long speeches. A good coherent story as well. Music is also very good Techo/Rock. Only thing I did not like was the over dubbing of the voices, as this was very obvious due to the words not really matching what was being said on the screen. Having said this I would rather this than not being able to hear the words at all, which is a common fault in low budget films.

That last guy was a jack ass.

Miller is God!!! I say Night is destined for cult classic status.

Keep on keepin on with your Bad Self Mr Miller.

The world is full of nay sayers and ne'r-do-wellers.

Some people just can not be pleased.

So why try.

Just keep making movies for people who can appreciate your art.

Again I say all Miller touches turns to gold.

And at the very least Night is WAY better than any of the Matrix sequels. Even the last reviewer must concede that much.

Buy/rent it and see what I mean.

OK so I am not some stuffy Brit with a pole lodged firmly up my bum.... That may prevent me from writing a well articulated rant on how much I hate a certain movie. But at the same time, not being a limey starched-underpants type allowed me to thoroughly enjoy this film. Sure it was produced on a small budget, that just means it has a phenomenal bang for the buck! As Byron C. Miller's introduction to the film making world, I think it is an amazing first step forward. And if he has a chance to work with a bigger budget the complaints above about the less than Hollywood studio production qualities (lighting, sound, sets, etc) would be negated. I honestly had fun watching this movie. I especially enjoyed the musical soundtrack that emphasized and flowed with the action in the movie. I also enjoyed the fresh approach that was taken on doing a vampire movie. There are probably more movies on the subject of vampires than anything else, and 99% of them are the same re-hash of the same story time and time again. Night is different, fun and thought provoking. I would recommend this movie and hope to see more from Mr. Miller in the future.

Take a time proved (or time-worn) genre, vampires, and attempt to give it a slightly different slant. Treat vampirism more as an alternate life-style that seems to suggest there is a difference between murder and killing for survival. Pretty ambitious stuff on a $7000 budget.

Mike is introduced as he interrupts a burglary in progress. He accidentally shoots a young woman in the chest but amazingly she doesn't die. Needless to say it piques his curiosity and he looks for her. He must be an excellent detective because he finds her quickly. She is a vampire and she turns him. In the meantime Mike's friend is trying to find out what's up with his best friend.

Most of my complaints are on the technology side. Obvious video with what appears to be a camcorder, poor audio, bad lighting. Of course, many of those problems would not be issues today due to improved camera choices. Even in SD, a DVX at 24 or 30FPS, would give us a better quality image. Spend $1000 of your budget on a decent set of lights (that you can use in your next movie) and adjust your on camera's white balance. Use an off camera mic and hopefully and a sound guy.

The acting was hit or miss though I have definitely seen much worse even with higher budgets.

The sets looked cheap. Surely if you can find actresses to do sex scenes and partial nudity you can find friends with access to better sets.

The directing was competent though I would suggest being more conservative with the use of the skewed angles. Sometimes less is more.

There is a lot of nitpicking that we could do but it wouldn't contribute anything to the review. Give the director a better camera, use quality lighting and sound, and tone down the "tricks."

I am interested in seeing his later efforts.