First, I want to suggest two films on IFILM.COM. (An article on how to use this in the classroom is in progress, but this article is simply to introduce the beauty and usefulness of these films.) I suggest watching Home Early first. I am not suggesting this first because it is either the best or worst film of the bunch, but because it shows clearly what I have been trying to say. The surprise of the film (which of course I will not reveal), is relatively simple, not because the event is any less important to the characters’ lives but because part of it is so common. The feeling when the surprise is revealed, however, almost takes the audience away from itself. I agree that the situation is somewhat clichéd and that the acting could be better, but I challenge you to make a better three-minute film.
The film I want to suggest most highly is a seven-minute film, of which the most negative criticism I have is that it is a seven-minute film: The Last Confession. The character who offers the “confession” is so well developed that I want to see the rest of his story. I do not mean that I need to see a lot more of the story that is developed here because this idea is covered with the exception that I would like to spend more time with the character when he picks up the child and when he visits the gravesite. (Please do not assume by this explanation that you already know what the film is about. I’m trying to make sure I don’t ruin the plot in this article. No, the child does not die. Please see the film.) In this sense, so much anticipation and potential are led up to, but the scenes are so short that the film cheats itself out of some of its potential cinematic poetry by not giving us more time with the character. If this film were extended, though, I would like to see what the main character does with this new insight. How does he deal differently with the life he had before the incident? We see some glimpse of his change just after telling this story when he makes the face at the laughing girl, but we have also seen so much about the death that he has seen and so many great images of loneliness that I want to see him do something afterward. As a comparison, there are so many of these sudden awakenings that lead to a heroic life where the sudden awakening is just too much. Phenomenon, for example, was a physical change, and while I believe it turned into a
