Reviews

The Present- short film review

A short film about the harsh realities of acceptance and self-love, with a wholesome ending sure to warm hearts

****

Ruby Hemsley

Above- The award-winning CGI short film released in 2014, The Present

A boy sitting on the sofa, playing violent video games, gets annoyed when his mother places a box down on the table in front of him. So far this is typical children's/teenage Hollywood blockbuster stuff. Yet when he rejects the dog, the story takes a turn that eventually twists to a satisfying resolution.

This 2014 animate short presents a realization of something that we all need to know: to not judge a book by its cover, as we can be more alike with each other than we think. The balance between subject and sentimentality is perfect, executed further in its genius presentation and colour palettes, the scene lightening as it progresses.

The simple concept and lack of dialogue say more than a 2 and a half hour deep dive ever could, a snippet sure to tie a ribbon around and steal your heart.`

Review research

Review topic- Don Broco gig @ Motorpoint Arena (2nd December)- supported by State Champs, Yonaka, Magnolia Park

Written review + Tiktok video documenting concert (??)

OR

Album review- Nothing But Thieves, 5SOS, PVRIS, Palaye Royale etc.??

Reviews- pitching our ideas

Today we learnt a bit more about how to structure our reviews, and practiced pitching them too. The review that I am doing is on a gig that I'm going to for a band called Don Broco. In my pitch, I talked a bit about the history of them and how this Nottingham gig is a special one (as they attended the University of Nottingham), and the pre-existing bias I have with them overall.

We also then looked at an example of a review to help us with our ideas and gain a little inspiration on how to write our own.

Review diary- W/C 08.12.25

Over the last week, we have constructed our draft review. I couldn't start mine straight away due to the gig being the day after we started. I decided the best thing to do was to research and collect live reviews of the band I was seeing, Don Broco. I also collected album reviews so I could get a deeper atmosphere about the songs I would hear live.

I read through about 15 of them to get an overall impression and some inspiration for my writing style. It helped to inform me of how to compact a show into an article whilst still capturing the atmosphere with ease to make people feel like they were there.

Next day I attended the gig and took photos, videos and start forming mental notes of how I was going to structure my article around what I had captured. I already knew I was going to do a written article but also wanted to make a short 1-2min video as well to add multimedia to this project, which I am still working on. In it I will include photos from the concert, but will rely more on the videos for footage.

On Friday I wrote my article and got some feedback and how to improve and edit it as it was over the word limit. I am also still in the process of editing this to get it down to the word count.