The cabin on the hill Short movie (green screen)

A short story about a guy who runs out of gas in the middle of nowhere....

I have used green screen and Poser for the alien model...

Cheers Ogrindo

I liked it. Great use of sound effects, the green screen works well for this. For me, the style is more appealing than the substance. The story is kind of the weakest aspect so at first I'm hooked by the style, but then ultimately let down. The stylized imagery piques my interest, the aliens walking very effective, bullet hit convincing, but some things just don't make sense, or kind of go nowhere, & the ending is just lazy, both script & film-wise.

Perhaps a clever twist with a bit of humor might make the ending more of a payoff for the viewer.

Technically, when we look down the side of the gun, as if the lead's POV, it looks very plastic in that shot, not in the others. Lead's skin tone on hand picking up the gun, interesting, when we see the face while running, it's a bit blanched & thus appears too flat, since it's night perhaps a very slight blue cast might work.

The body falling is lazy technically because it doesn't move. Look at the beginning title sequence to Mad Men, you have the same idea with a cut-out silhouette falling, but the limbs move slightly, adding value to the shot, this can be done with the same cut-out, just articulate the limbs.

But the lead dying at the end is a disappointment anyway, so I'd rather see something more interesting.

You say he's run out of gas, but I like him better as the guy who lives in the cabin, hears the sound of the ufo, comes out to investigate & off we go. You'll need a reason for the gas can so show a lawn mower or chainsaw, better yet, a tractor! Tractors are funnier. Then how about after he shoots one alien, the others in that little "V" formation wave their hands as if surrendering, they mean no harm. Then they point at the can he's carrying as our lead begins to understand, they just need the gas. But he's reluctant to just hand it over, so the aliens all face each other shrugging their shoulders wondering what they can give in exchange. Then one reaches into his pocket (that's funny in itself), & pulls out a shining orb (that sparkles with Mikey's free light rays found here at 7min 40seconds of his video).

Then we see the view of the cabin on the hill but instead of our man falling, we see the alien ship ascending with accompanying ufo sound, but it sputters for a second on his stale gas, puff of smoke, then it's gone. Final shot we see our man sitting in his cabin, warm glow as he's examining the sparkling orb in his hand (about the size of a billiard ball), suddenly its light rays intensify & zap his third eye, his face lights up wide eyed & amazed, he's been transformed in some wonderfully mysterious way.... fade to black.

Now you're set up for a sequel.

Thank you for your comment great advices as usual
Cheers Ogrindo

Glad to hear you're open to different ideas. Often Hollywood completely changes the ending of a film. There are plenty of directions you could go, maybe my suggestions with the alien actions are too labor intensive, but I really like the idea of aliens shrugging their shoulders unsure of something, & rummaging thru a pants pocket in their skinny suits. That really cracks me up.

Maybe even when the alien finds the orb the others kind of gesture like "really?" Shoulders dropping with head to the side as if, "Give me a break, those are worthless on our planet."

These are just the first things that come to mind, you can probably come up with something much stronger. I just can't forget one of my elementary school teachers giving me a chastisement on an otherwise good creative writing assignment, because I'd ended it in the same lazy way.

All these years later, I finally understand why...


PS - skinny suits - I'm now tweeting the more interesting reviews here - with this one I typed "Beware of #Aliens on #Slimfast!"