dee4j

Great fun to do. Loved our kids' comments. Ready for our starring roles now, Mr. Demille! Seriously, we look a lot more poised in the final cut than we did during the shooting. This is not a spoiler: the opening scene with the "hand" chair was shot in the cleaner space and better lighting of our neighbor's yard across the street. We probably shot 15 minutes of different poses to get that 15-20 sec montage of the family. We also got along fairly well during the filming, despite the pressures to "hit the marks" and "Don't look at the camera, kids!" It helped that they were making possible a trip we wouldn't have made without the show. Hopefully we make RV trips look as simple as they are.

For a "timed" competition project, this film shows real promise: an "open" feel to the scenes, despite deliberately tight camera angles, a thoughtful if not novel premise, and a decent conclusion. What's missing is any nuance to the delivery of every actor with more than two lines. Their entire air seems to be "look at me, how well I act"; instead of that effortless inhabitance of the character evidenced by actors with a lot of experience...or a lot more talent. Find a day job, guys. Also (without giving anything away) I ask you to watch the actors in the third major scene missing their marks, and the cheesy (hammy?) conclusion. These are MAJOR flaws in a very short film, evidencing either a lack of production values or production talent.

Despite some awful editing, missteps in plot, obvious fluff scenes, this is actually not a "bad" movie. What makes it uncomfortable to watch is the now aging and overweight Seagal unable to do *any* of his own stunts! The terrorists are hopeless zealots but not unbelievably so. The CIA stuff is trite but not untenably unrealistic. The cast does what they can to keep the plot moving along...and it's usually enough. Seagal's dialog (in breathy monotone) is what too often slows down the action. Timothy Carhart is perfectly cast as the female agent's supervisor: he's the *real* question-mark re good guy vs bad guy. But then most of the actors turn in credible performances. Unlike some "B" movies I didn't feel the need to turn this one off halfway thru.