Harry Boast (Barnstaple)

First of all let me say that this is obviously a film you have put a great deal of work in to and one you should be very proud of. So well done!

The acting is consistently good throughout. There are a couple of line repeats where the actors have forgotten their lines initially but recovered well. For example, the scientist at the start repeats “the boy clearly exhibits”.

The start of the hand held camera is nice with a Bigfoot point of view running through the grass and turning in to a suburban area. I found that pulled me in to the story.

However, for the next 25 minutes of the film I found it boring. Nothing was happening and we were learning little more about the characters we know are going to be killed. We need to care and empathise with these people because of the outcome we know is coming. If we don’t care, the film is flawed!

After they leave Jamie asleep on the floor we cut to the next day where the camera is fixed pointing at the 3 of them. He is complaining that they left him there. Wouldn’t he have been doing the complaining when he woke up? This to me felt a little too fixed. Perhaps just to have him sulking and the others asking him to cheer up would work better. A small point but this moment did take me out of the story so worth looking at.

The Cannabis field is a good idea because it does develop the plot. However, for the drug dealers not to follow them means that it was almost pointless. We know and the kids know to an extent (Carlos certainly seems to!) that Sawtooth ridge is a bad place to go. On the other hand if they did follow it may turn in to the film ‘Without a Paddle’, so I can understand your choice from that point of view.

Lynn’s death leaves a lot to be desired. We know Lynn is a fighter, the only one who is. I agree with what the two guys said that they would have heard it. I can believe that they may not have heard had the tent not been torn to pieces. I can see what you were trying to achieve here but done in this way I don’t think it works. The tent and blood did look fantastic though!

When Lynn is gone and they don’t find her, that is when the alarm bells would ring. However, both Carlos and Jamie don’t appear to be very worried at all. This, to me, this feels unrealistic.

When Jamie is injured he needs to be in a lot more pain to make it believable. The prosthetic bone is fantastic, but Jamie needs to be writhing with an injury like that.

66 mins. The best shot of the film by far. With the camera on the ground while Carlos attends to Jamie, the shot of Bigfoot walking by in the background was brilliant. Very well timed too!

Couple of extra notes:

48 mins good sequence with the gunshot and running through the dark.
12 mins Motor sounds. Do another take without them!
54 mins Motor sounds. Do another take without them!

I enjoyed parts of this film but as a whole I think it needs work. The basic flaw is that we know the end from the beginning.