My review of Hughes the Force

After a week of interview clips promoting Hughes the Force, it seemed only fair that I weigh in with a proper review.

Like I said earlier this week, a good film cannot exist without a strong concept.  That holds true of both short and feature-length films.  Fortunately Hughes the Force has a rather novel concept that should appeal to anyone who grew up with the films of the 80s. Two high school geeks, Henry (Justin Okin) and Simon (Nathaniel Weiss) are determined to go to the big end-of-the-year party.  Simon in particular has a major crush on Jennifer, but in order to get into the party, they need a hot girl.  To that end, the guys decide to make their own hot girl, Weird Science-style and bring a Slave Leia action figure to life (Taylor Treadwell).

The idea of a John Hughes/George Lucas mash-up is so clever, I'm rather surprised it hasn't been done before.  As a geek for the works of both filmmakers, I found it to be an irresistible hook.  Naturally, that's what director J.C. Reifenberg and his team are banking on.

But the filmmakers are just riding on a strong premise - they bring some production savvy to the mix as well.  By soliciting the services of a local Star Wars costuming guild, Reifenberg and his producers populated the film with costumes and characters that couldn't have appeared more authentic if they were stolen right off of Skywalker Ranch.  So much of what you'll find on YouTube seems to be hastily-shot, cheaply-produced garbage.  From a visual standpoint, Hughes the Force can stand with the better of the fanfilms in release.

The value added elevates the film and really helps sell the magic used by the Leia genie, coming in a scene where she transforms the patrons into a Barney's Beanery into beings one might expect to find at the Mos Eisley cantina and Jabba's Palace.  Among the crowd are pool-playing stormtroopers, a Boba Fett, Darth Vader and even a mostly-naked green Twi'lek dancer. (For the layperson, that's the first character to meet her end at the hands of the Rancor in Return of the Jedi.)

Another bonus: the bar scene features cameos from a couple of Star Wars-affiliated actors.  The performer behind the Chad Vader videos lends his voice, while Star Wars: The Clone Wars actors Catherine Taber and James Arnold Taylor appear in costumes as characters they've only played in voice - Padme and Obi-Wan Kenobi.  The later straight-up steals the film, playing Obi-Wan with a relish that would make one think he'd just signed a contract for an entire trilogy of movies in that part.  Brief though his appearance is, I found myself wishing he could come along for the rest of the adventure.  Kevin Smith also makes a fun cameo that probably is even funnier if the viewer is unspoiled.  (Ooops... sorry about that.)

So did Hughes the Force reach the heights of my gold-standard, George Lucas in Love?  Not quite.  At over 30 minutes, the pacing is a bit of an issue.  Even though Reifenberg explained his rationale in our interview, I did still find myself yearning for a brisker pace at times.  I suspect it's less of an issue when watching this film with a group of like-minded Star Wars fans.  So if possible, gather your friends and watch this as a group.

I also felt that the characters showed the strains of carrying such a long short.  Had there been greater contrasts between Simon and Henry's characterizations, this could have been alleviated somewhat.  After a while, I couldn't escape the feeling that the characters were rather similar in a way that may have inhibited some comedic chemistry.

As for Leia herself, while I can't deny the logic of Reifenberg's explanation in our interview that this Leia isn't really Leia, but just "the embodiment of their perfect woman put into a plastic action figure," I would have liked to have seen Leia written with a little more of her trademark spitfire.  Treadwell plays the character with a bit of a flirtatious side, but a little more sass and spunk could have enlivened things even more.

Still, Hughes the Force is worth checking out.  It's clearly a labor of love for everyone both in front of and behind the camera.  There's little doubt that this was made by talented people passionate about what they were doing.

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From the filmmakers press release:

Hughes the Force is available for download at www.hughestheforce.com and on SiT - SModCast Internet Television.

The film will be freely available to all for download in a number of digital formats for both PC and Mac, as well as mobile versions for Android and iPhone. 

Also available are Blu-ray and DVD files complete with menus and bonus content for burning to your own discs. 

A galactic number of bonus features, including: 

· The Making of Hughes the Force featurette – behind-the-scenes footage from the set and interview clips with the Director J.C. Reifenberg, Producer Ruark Dreher and actor, James Arnold Taylor. 

· Commentary Tracks – multiple tracks featuring the lead actors and the production staff covering a range of topics including the writing, cinematography, production work, and acting. 

· Pop-Up Video Track – behind-the-scenes trivia throughout the film.

"The best thing I could have done for my career from a networking perspective."

Part I -
Part II - Stalking Kevin Smith: Getting celebrities to make a cameo in your film
Part III - How long should a short film be?

In this final segment of the interview, director J.C. Reifenberg talks about his goals for Hughes the Force.  Then he takes a few notes from The Bitter Script Reader, discussing a few character and thematic issues.  J.C. also talks about how this film "was the best thing I could have done for my career from a networking perspective.  It's already paid off three time what I invested into it."




Readers, if you'd like to see more web interviews and more of the puppet, it's very important that you go to YouTube, leave comments, subscribe to the channel and "Like" the videos.  That kind of engagement really helps us out.

More videos will be coming over the next several weeks.

How long should a short film be?

Part I -
Part II - Stalking Kevin Smith: Getting celebrities to make a cameo in your film

"Student films come in three lengths," one of my film professors once told me.  "Long.  Too long.  And entirely too long."

When working on my own short films, I've done my best to adhere to that mantra.  When I'm making something meant to be shown on the internet, my goal has always been to be even more merciless and efficient.  I have several friends who are also students of that school of thought, and as someone who's known a festival programmer or two, I'm also aware that a longer film faces greater obstacles in getting selected, as it eats up time that could go to two or three shorter films.

Does that mean that shorter is always better?  I don't know.  It's usually my preference.  Then again, there are people I've talked to like Joshua Caldwell, Director of Digital Media over at Anthony E. Zuiker's Dare to Pass, who very firmly believe that the paradigm is shifting and people are becoming more accustomed to consuming longer content on the web.

In this segment of my interview with Hughes the Force director J.C. Reifenberg, we discuss length.  When I started watching the film, I didn't know what the running time was.  I figured it would be about 10-15 minutes.  Very quickly, I noticed the pacing of the individual scenes was slower, closer to what one would find in a TV show or a movie than in a typical short film.  As it turns out, the film is a little over 30 minutes in length.

That wasn't J.C.'s intention when he started.  In fact, he was determined to make it under ten minutes at first.  How did things evolve and why did he decide that longer was better for this particular story?  Watch below.




Part IV - "The best thing I could have done for my career from a networking perspective."

Stalking Kevin Smith: Getting celebrities to make a cameo appearance in your film

Part 1

When you're making a short film, one tactic you can use to get people interested in watching it is by having a celebrity or two appear in your film.  Even a small cameo can be useful in getting some buzz generated, as that star's fanbase will follow them.

When it comes to Star Wars fandom, there are few more famous superfans than Kevin Smith.  In this part of our interview with Hughes the Force director J.C. Reifenberg, J.C. discusses the... we'll call them... "determined" tactics he used to get Smith to do his movie.

The film also features cameos from Star Wars: The Clone Wars voice actors James Arnold Taylor and Catherine Taber, appearing as their characters of Obi-Wan and Padme for the first time in live action.




Part III - How long should a short film be?
Part IV - "The best thing I could have done for my career from a networking perspective."

Webshow is back! Interview with "Hughes the Force" Director J.C. Reifenberg - Part 1

Yes!  After months of waiting, The Bitter Script Reader webshow is back with a new video, this one the first of a four-part interview with J.C. Reifenberg, the director of a Star Wars fan-film called Hughes the Force.

As someone who's made several short films and assisted on many others, I can attest that it's never easy.  A short filmmaker is almost always going to be struggling against not having enough time, money and resources to complete their vision.  But even before that, the filmmaker needs to have a solid concept worth producing - and sometimes it's harder thinking of a short idea than it is a feature.

Then once the film is done, the already exhausted filmmaker has to figure out some way to get his short in front of people.  With sites like YouTube, the process of distribution is simplified, but at the tradeoff of needing to stand out from the pack.

I first heard about Reifenberg's film last year around the time of San Diego Comic-Con.  It had what I considered an irresistible hook: a mash-up of Star Wars and John Hughes's Weird Science.  Better still, Reifenberg came up with some savvy ways to add production value such as costumes and some sly cameos from the Star Wars Universe.

Long time readers of this blog will recall my spotlighting other Star Wars fan films Troops and George Lucas in Love, two productions that stand as A+ examples of short films/fan films in my estimation.  Seeing the potential in Hughes the Force, I contacted the filmmakers through their publicist, and after arranging a viewing of the film, director and co-writer J.C. Reifenberg was good enough to sit down with me.

So watch the interview below to find out more about the premise, how J.C. got such great costumes and props, and why getting an actress to perform mostly naked and in green body paint was actually one of the easiest tasks the filmmaker accomplished.



Hughes the Force will be released this Friday, May 25, on both the Hughes the Force website and Kevin Smith's YouTube Channel, S.I.T. - SModCo Internet Television.


Part II - Stalking Kevin Smith: Getting celebrities to make a cameo appearance in your short film
Part III - How long should a short film be?
Part IV - "The best thing I could have done for my career from a networking perspective."