ON THE LOT
Episode 6

So Trever’s sent home. If you’ve been reading my On The Lot reactions, you’ll know that decision doesn’t sit well with me. It really isn’t anything personal against Hilary, but her films just haven’t made any sort of positive impression on me. I hope she sees this as dodging yet another bullet and somehow, pulls a good one out of the bag in the next challenge.
Adrianna also neglected to mention which of last week’s shorts was Box Office Champ, which left me a tad miffed.

As for tonight’s batch of five shorts, as I don’t really have an Un-Favorite this time out, we’ll just go from my Favorite to my Least Favorite, and top it off with a Special Mention.

MY FAVORITE: Marty Martin’s “Dance With The Devil”
Yeah, the style does threaten to overwhelm (and I’m not 100% sold on the text appearing onscreen; a little too Tony Scott’s Man On Fire, where Scott just ODs his audience with gobbets of over-indulgent and headache-inducing style), and the characters are rather one-dimensional, and the confidence-always-threatening-to-spill-over-into-arrogance doesn’t really help either, but this one definitely looked the best, and was absorbing.
But dude, try not to be too defensive with the judges.
(And while on the subject of Tony Scott, wasn’t his BMW short titled “Beat The Devil”? Just wondering out loud…)

Andrew Hunt’s “Polished”
The office pariah, the janitor, takes vengeance on his co-workers with some floor wax and hamburgers.
Funny, yeah, but the pay-off doesn’t quite make up for the lengthy build-up.
(In Andrew’s defense, he did direct this short while in the midst of wedding preparations, so he was multi-tasking…)

David May’s “Love At First Shot”
A cellphone-carrying Cupid helps out with some geek love.
Again, funny, but like “Polished,” the pacing leaves something to be desired. (To its credit though, it was funnier than David’s previous effort, “File Size.”)

MY LEAST FAVORITE: Shira-Lee Shalit’s “Beeline”
A single mother does her darnedest to keep her sex life a secret from her extortionist son.
Two out of three judges liked this one, but it just didn’t rev my engine. And please note, it’s not an Un-Favorite, so I didn’t hate it; it’s just the one that left the least impression on me.

SPECIAL MENTION: Kenny Luby’s “Edge On The End”
It would’ve been so easy to just say this was my Un-Favorite, but it would’ve been for the wrong reasons.
In this one, a young man turns to alcohol to ease the sting of grief at the passing of his father.
A dramatic enough premise, but Kenny chooses to execute it in an experimental short film/music video style that makes actually accessing honest emotion a little difficult. So much so that when the epiphany comes and the grief-stricken young man turns his back on the bottle, I didn’t feel the catharsis.
But it by no means is a bad short film; it just doesn’t seem to quite fit in with the rest of the shorts.
There’s a place for a Kenny Luby in the film world, but that place may not necessarily be On The Lot…

Having said that, it sounds like I think Kenny should be sent home from this batch, and that’s definitely not the case. The competition’s that much more interesting with Kenny—I think of him as the anti-Marty—in it.
Given that “Beeline” was my Least Favorite, I’d then have to say I think Shari-Lee should go home, though if the judges’ words have any weight with the voting public, she’s probably safe. And to be fair, “Beeline” isn’t bad; it’s just not my speed.
Which should make next week’s eliminations pretty interesting…

Tonight’s guest judge, director of The Devil Wears Prada and the Entourage pilot, as well as Season 1 episode, “The Scene,” David Frankel. (Frankel's also done some Sex and the City and a couple of Band of Brothers. Heh. That sounds funny, doesn't it?)

(Contestant image courtesy of thelot.com; David Frankel image on the set of The Devil Wears Prada, courtesy of movies.yahoo.com.)

ON THE LOT
Box Office Results 1

It alarms me that all 3 of my Un-Favorites from last night survived the cut. (Is this where my personal tastes diverge from those of the American viewing/voting public?)
It doubly alarms me that Phil Hawkins was sent home. “Please Hold” may not have been on my Favorites short list, but it looked great and was still pretty funny, funnier than the shorts of some of the other directors who squeezed through to the next round. Does this actually mean “Wacky Alley Cab” or “Bus #1” was funnier in the eyes of the voting public? Errr…

I also thought Claudia La Bianca’s “Blind Date” was visually interesting, so it’s odd that she went home, when other shorts (like, ahem, “Bus #1”) weren’t particularly inspired as far as their visuals were concerned.

And though I did love Marty Martin’s “The Big Bad Heist,” placing him alongside Carolina de San Martin just made the fact that he submitted a trailer instead of a short film with an actual story seem like a glaring, unfair oversight. De San Martin’s “Deliver Me” may not have been the funniest short, but at least it displayed a single situation, as opposed to a bunch of cool money shots (which is really what a trailer is all about).
But hey, Marty, “The Big Bad Heist” was great. Really. “24 angry little ninjas.” Classic.
Boiling it down to you and Carolina in front of the television audience was in all probability the producer’s choice, so we’re all good.

On the other side of the coin, only one of my favorites (Zach Lipovsky’s “Danger Zone”) was in the top 3. The other two were Will Bigham’s “Lucky Penny” and Jason Epperson’s “Getta Rhoom.”
I enjoyed the former, so that’s cool, but Epperson’s “nerd” really did seem off the mark. I just hope that Epperson can come up with better stuff in the next challenge.

Which is what I also hope the 3 directors on my Un-Favorites short list last night—Jessica Brillhart, Hilary Graham, and Kenny Luby—do as well. Based on the comedy shorts, I honestly think Phil Hawkins is a better director than either Graham or Luby; Brillhart is arguable, as I have a feeling I haven’t seen what she’s really capable of yet.

So on that note, here’s the final 15:

Adam Stein, 29, freelance film editor, born in Miami, FL, currently living in Los Angeles
Andrew Hunt, 31, promo producer from Minneapolis, MN, raised in Pittsburgh, PA
David May, 23, admissions counselor living in Santa Ana, CA, but grew up in Aurora, CO
Hilary Graham, 37, stay-at-home wife and mom who lives in Francestown, NH, and raised in Chelmsford, MA
Jason Epperson, 30, owner of film production company, born and raised in Winchester, KY
Jessica Brillhart, 22, computer specialist, grew up in York, PA, currently living in Brooklyn, NY
Kenny Luby, 28, freelance director and painter, born and raised in Owego, NY
Marty Martin, 26, creative director of a multimedia company, born and raised in Seattle, WA
Mateen Kemet, 41, teacher, currently living in Los Angeles, CA, raised in the Bronx, NY
Sam Friedlander, 28, web producer, living in Santa Monica, CA, raised in Westchester, NY
Shalini Kantayya, 30, freelance director, raised in Hartford, CT, currently living in Brooklyn, NY
Shira-Lee Shalit, 38, acting teacher, born in Johannesburg, South Africa, now living in New York
Trever James, 24, film editor, currently living in Los Angeles, CA, and raised in Great Falls, MT
Will Bigham, 31, film editor, originally from Canyon, TX, currently living in Glendale, CA
Zach Lipovsky, 23, special effects editor from Vancouver, BC, Canada

And before I go, I have to ask, would it kill Adrianna to announce, “Next week, on On The Lot…”?
I mean, part of the fun of American Idol is the anticipation of, “Can Contestant X handle Disco Night?” or “How will Contestant Y do an Elvis?” As it is, I’m in the dark as to what’s coming next, and I can’t even seem to find that information on the website. (Or am I looking in all the wrong places?)

(Contestant images courtesy of thelot.com.)