Children of the Holocaust - ID# 61

Glenbrook South

Division: A

Documentary

Entry Description

Steen Metz and Sharon Pitluk Silver, children Holocaust survivors, share their story. Produced by Alison Krolopp and Aaron Gallegos.

Recent Teacher Comments

• 4/23 7:54 pm - Technically sound but visual aesthetics are weak. Great Radio story, but your class and course instruction are intended for maximum, visual storytelling for display on television or Internet - which means lots of b-roll.
• 3/8 2:44 pm - Polished, intriguing opening. We know this film will have professional flourishes at the get go, from lighting, music, levels, titles. Wow! Good cold open into title. The changing background with stills is very powerful, effective- yet oddly subtle in a great way. Cutting between alternate angles-- is little disruptive, breaks up rhythm of the edit. Intercutting 2 separate stories doesn't work narratively. Unfortunately, this leads the film into a place where it becomes scattered and chaotic. In spite of fantastic production values, the narrative structure does not work with the intercutting of disparate stories that share one common idea and that’s it- child survivors of the Holocaust. I recommend "uncoupling" these two and creating two separate films...
• 3/5 3:25 pm - I really like the idea of setting up your interviews against the background of archival photographs. It's a very meaningful representation of history always "rolling" in the background of our lives. I think lighting is very effective and the sound recorded very well. Your story is not framed (set up) so the ending is underwhelming. I am trying to figure out why you chose to cut the various camera angles together...

Judge 1

Positives: Nice use of the infinity black background. Love the way that you edited the interviews together - very well done. You truly respected the topic and subjects by the way you put this together. So glad you used 2 cameras and did not cover the subjects.

Improvements: consider dialing the music level down a bit at the start. A few audio edits are a bit rough.

Judge 2

Positives: Excellent technical abilities- camera, sound, lighting and music all are exceptional.

Improvements: Name titles could have been placed lower, like lower 3rd, looked strange in the middle of the screen.

Judge 3

Positives: The integration of photos behind the interview subjects is done well and helps keep visual interest. The sound recoding is well done and a lot of care was given to location and quality of the field recordings, which elevates the film’s professionalism.

Improvements: The decision to shoot the interviewees in profile and and from a variety of camera angles is distracting. The subjects themselves are compelling and the use of editing distracts by not allowing us fully engross ourselves in the story. The editing calls attention to the fact that this is a construct.

Judge 4

Positives:

Improvements: