My Life With(out) Her

I haven't blogged on here in ages, using my new Tumblr blog to do some reviews here and then, but I wanted to use this space to talk about my latest short My Life With(out) Her which I wrote, directed and edited for consideration for the Virgin Media Shorts Competition. It was a competition that grabbed me straight away, with the amazing prizes on offer, recognition from other quality filmmakers and a difficult challenge in fitting a film into a 2min and 20seconds timeframe, a challenge I grabbed with both hands.

Things didn't go too well at the start for My Life With(out) Her. On the first day of shooting, hours before we were about to roll, the original actress called up and cancelled. I was devastated, and I had to shoot a week later with a new actress. However, I believe this was a blessing in disguise, as this extra week gave me some time to rework the script and work in some ideas I didn't have before, and I got to work with a brilliant actress who I hope to work with in the future, Brydie Blakeley. I also worked with my friend Kieran Milward, who I had worked on in previous short films and knew how to work with him, making filming a lot easier and smoother.

When we finally got filming, it flowed quite well, and my lovely girlfriend who was the only other person helping for the majority of the shoot, let me use her house to film. I brought along my homemade dolly consisting of some guttering and tennis balls, and began shooting a film I was very excited about since the idea had formed a few weeks previous. My proudest shot of the film comes towards the end, where we see our male protagonist doing a spot of running. The shot is so smooth, as we found a nice piece of road, and I sat in the back of my car while my sister drove down it. It's actually possible to see Rosa Payne (my girlfriend and assistant director) in the background. The ending shot was done in my own bedroom, and once it was filmed I was very happy with the final result.

Kieran Milward in My Life With(out) Her

I was so eager to get to the editing stage, I put off some other editing I was doing that was actually paying to do it. I editing the majority of it in one day, I was that keen. The music was courtesy of a fantastic idea by famous musician Moby, through his website MobyGratis, where he lets student or Indie filmmakers use his unused music for their projects. A brilliant idea, and I think the song I chose works incredibly well.

I have received praise for my work for the story it tells, and I'm glad people are seeing it. I won't go into it, as I believe there are a few meanings in the story and want the viewer to make their own mind up. I'm proud of my latest short My Life With(out) Her, and am excited about the recognition it's getting. Despite a few film festival rejections, it is up for Best Music Film at Cannes In A Van in a weeks time, and even if I don't win, it's still a victory in my filmmaking career.