Make It Count

I’ve talked before about my Top Three Pet Peeves of Short Films:

1. Bad Acting – Please, guys, there is so much wonderful talent available. Take the time to *cast* your film.

2. Bad Sound – If you can’t hear the movie, what’s the point?

I’d like to talk about #3: It’s Too Damn Long.

So you’ve made your short film and you’re in the editing room and you’re on the fence as to whether or not to cut something, be it a line of dialogue or a character beat or an entire scene, and you’re going back and forth because it MIGHT be cool or it’s KINDA funny or it SORTA works …

Cut it.

What’s that line from RONIN? “Whenever there is any doubt, there is no doubt.”

Cut it, cut it, cut it.

Here’s the thing I’ve found: no one really knows what a short film is. I’ve asked countless folks how long they think a short film is, and the answer is always different: “5 minutes”, “10 minutes”, “A half hour”, “I dunno, shorter than a feature.”

Really, the answer is “as long as it needs to be”.

Key word there being “needs”.

I saw a short film recently that opened with two girls dancing at a club, and we followed them in the bathroom and watched them do some drugs, and we learned their names and watched them kid around for a bit … and then the movie cut to something else entirely, forgetting completely about the two girls. They were never referenced again. We spent at *least* a minute with them, and they were never heard from again – why were they there in the first place?

Cut them.

I saw another where a guy was trying to get back together with his ex-girlfriend … and then we cut away to a TV show he was creating on a public access channel. We saw this guy starring in the show, telling us all about his life … and had no bearing at all on the getting-back-with-the-ex storyline.

Cut it.

It’s difficult, because you’ve spent all this time storyboarding the shots, and shooting the scenes, and editing them together, and you want everyone to see *all* of the fruits of your labor. You’re proud of your stuff and you want to show it off, dammit.

But is every shot absolutely necessary to tell your story? Does every scene build character/advance the story/deepen conflict? Does every edit logically lead to the next? Are all of your characters vital to your story?

No?

Cut.

Here’s a fun exercise: invite your friends over to watch a rough cut of your film. After the screening, have a no-holds-barred critique session. Really discuss the fine points of the movie – are there edits that could be smoother? Transitions that could be made clearer? Dialogue that could be cut? Chances are, after the session, you’ll be a little depressed … but take a week or so to digest everything. Try to go back and look at your film with fresh eyes. You might surprise yourself with how much shoe leather you can get rid of.

Be objective. Be merciless. Take the time to service *the movie*, even if it means cutting the stuff you spent extra days shooting – your audience won’t miss the boring stuff. I’ve heard this many times in film festival audiences: “Yeah, that was a pretty good fifteen minute short … but it would have been an *awesome* ten minute short.” Brevity is the soul …

With a short, you have a limited amount of time to tell your story.

Make it count.

Danny