Burnt

in my mind this film is a sequel to the 48hour film from years back where the cops partner was a talking toaster and now that toaster has retired from the force to work in an office.

anyhoo. great film with some great toaster based comedy. nicely shot and edited with some solid comedic performances.

is it bad that I wanted him to throw the toaster in the sink and electrocute himself?

You might think you can outnerve a household appliance. You would be wrong. Karma will come for you.

This is an odd movie and I'm here for it.

I love the ominous bass that starts this film. Some great one-liners. The toaster coming alive was a great jump scare if my friend's reaction was anything to go by.

Congratulations on sticking a knife in a toaster without dying.

I'm increasingly wondering though: why are there so many rubber ducks in this competition?

Seeing 'Man VS Machine' as a genre during the heats made me worried the heats would be packed with 'Man VS Every Day Appliance' films, but this one did it so well I don't even care. I've definitely owned that toaster and any machine that won't make you toast when you're drunk at a party deserve to be drop kicked into the ocean as far as I'm concerned. Thanks for the laughs

Another nice film from everything sticks, BUT what I really want to see is the team go balls to the wall! Stop playing it safe! I got some good chuckles, but with 17 years of experience, I want to have my mind BLOWN!! I don't want to see a toaster in a small white break room, I want to see a middle aged man wielding a submachine gun in the Halswell quarry!! I know you have it in you STICKS!! YOU CAN DO IT

Funny subtext to use and good use of close up shots to rachet up the emotions of your central character.

Fantastic shot at @2:18. Love the slow zoom in into the toaster stop-animation.
To consider and its never easy operating a camera looking down if not on a rig @3:30. Might of been good to do a second take to follow the movement easier.

Well done. Look forward to next year!
Camera 3/5
Editing 3/5
Story 3/5

There's something so charming about a film centred around a man's unbridled quest for something as insubstantial as toast.

I loved the office snark (we've all been there) with the stand out line for me being "another performance issue, greg?" as it is, upon closer inspection, tri-sided wordplay (the prince of all wordplay!). I also loved the ending, so pathetic and inconsequential it really wrapped up Greg's miserable life into a bow.

Some great sound in there such as the foreboding tones at the beginning. I would have loved to hear some really rich and threatening sound design from the toaster itself. An idea might have been to embolden, deepen the tone and reverb on each of those handle pushes, really filling the sonic space and using audio to get inside Greg's head and feel his cyclopic vision.

On another note, not thrilled to see the use of what I assume is generative AI in the poster. While being a little lazy, it also sets up expectations for the look and feel of the film in a way that can never truly be delivered on. If this was designed by a human, then please forgive me, as the poster does look amazing!

Side note - could four-slice toaster technically win best use of all four "elements"?

Stu has been super nice in seeking out a review from me, so here we are!

Let's clear some air; I meant chief only as a synonym for "pal, buddy" or "dude."

This movie isn't for me! I think the cinematography is really hampered by the setting; there's nothing tougher than standing out while shooting in a normal house cause most people are doing that!
I feel like last year's film from Everything Sticks was a little stronger in the visual department!

Good plot! I enjoyed the twist, though it was heavily hinted at throughout.

I found all the characters pretty tiring. Everyone is just nagging each other, and it feels pretty hollow and miserable.

The moment where the toast fell in the sink was a funny laugh!

Ultimately, I'd like to see this team shoot somewhere interesting; having access to a cool location can change the game in 48 hours!
Whether that's building a set oneself, or filming a groovy house, park, hill, road, or whatever! Something that make people go "woah, weird!"

All that said, I look forward to watching more work from this team going forward! Make it 18 years!!!

HUGE REVIEW FROM STU!

Ok I see the format you’re going for, and i'm back for round 2! (plus im sick and stuck at home with nothing better to do 🤒)

What got my attention:

Some nice closeups. Some good classic 48hours humor right from the get go! The conflict of a man hating a toaster reminds me a lot of great films like Office Space, The Castle, and even Falling Down, so I was primed to have good time. The toaster turning on by itself was a cool effect! When he sticks the knife in the toaster, we used the same body hit sound effect which im very fond of! And you KNOW I laughed when that toast goes in the sink! Great setup and pay off with the overly dramatic music. Really makes you think if maybe it WAS just a performance issue from Greg. There's also no denying that this is a man vs machine film in every aspect, which is great to see in a year when some people are dancing around the genre (Those fuckers at Herms Heroes and Hindsight Productions come to mind)

Take it or leave it:
Hope this doesn't leave you feeling too BURNT! (you’re not woke so I know you can handle it)

-What the hell was that AI intro?? Thank god that wasn't in the heats! I know you’re having a lot of fun with chatGPT, but the overwhelming majority of artists do NOT like seeing it! Its soooooo deeply uncanny. I would recommend scaling back your use of it, or just keep it as a storyboarding tool. I know you've got it in you to make that intro for real, or to sketch it out. It would be very charming to see you hand draw it!

-Same thing goes for the AI thumbnail. I know it looks ‘good enough’, but you have to resist the devil's temptation to use it! The use of AI is the REAL man vs machine conflict of our time! Everybody gets one, so I will forgive you…..this time…….but I don't want to see it next year!

-Turn off your auto focus! It's breathing all over the place. I feel like i'm slipping in and out of consciousness! (all good for the party/drunk sequence though) I could forgive it if you were filming a fast moving object in a huge space, but a toaster in a break room doesn't need it.

-Toaster should have had some clunky sound effects. (I would have made it sound like a loud gun reloading, but that’s just me and not really part of the review) Instead we are left with echoey background audio. Remember, the toaster is the second most important character. Give it some personality!

-The drunk/party flashback is a nice switchup, but the lighting is SO dull. That’s not what a green /pink light looks like in a small room. Ramp up that saturation! Make it pop! It would have been 10 times better if you used a real colour changing light, which I know you didn't because the colour filter layer ends right before the end of the shot? Sloppy work on the edit there, in a film that doesn't seem overly complex to edit?

-The back and forth between the girls could be faster. Seems like there is some dead air.

-Is the burnt toast he grabs with scissors the miniature? Because its all out of focus, it just looks like a charred crumb (manual focus would have saved this one. Perhaps the battle with the camera is the REAL man vs Machine all along😉)

-We don't need to see Greg on the computer. It's such a messy shot. It's barely in focus. We already know he wants to kill the toaster. There's SO MUCH TEXT on the screen that it becomes a visual mess. I have learned this the hard way, ONLY show the text you want people to read. It doesn't even have the word toaster in focus for fucks sake. Why didn't you just film it AGAIN! You can do a second take Stu. You can do infinite takes! It's digital! You should have re-shot that part after seeing it in the edit, or cut it!

-Why does the line ‘Greg, its a fucking toaster’ sound SOOO different? Did the mic turn off? Was it brought down in the edit by mistake? The credits say you shot, recorded and edited this one, so this is on you. It's the EXACT same setup as the other shots??? I just don't understand how this happened??

-The ‘This ends now’ shot is another victim of the autofocus.

-The sink shot is the best use of visual storytelling. The top down is a new angle we haven't seen yet, and the way it's framed as to not show the water is actually great! Also good use of slow motion! Maybe it would be better if we got to see our man ecstatic at the opportunity to eat some yummy toast. Just a little more character moments would be nice.

-The final shot of Greg is fine…but didn't need to be slow motion. May as well be regular motion. Also a missed opportunity to see the girl's reaction to his small win and subsequent pathetic failure. Think of the hilarious sassy banter they could say about his wet bread!

-The little quip at the end has the same sound issue as before??! That's your big final joke!! Not sure how that could happen as it’s in the same space as everything else, and hopefully shot on the same day? The joke itself is very Marvel core, but you don't strike me as a guy who likes the current state of superhero movies (in fact I would love to hear your thoughts on them, unfiltered and uncensored because I reckon that would hilarious)

Final Thoughts:
This is Everything Sticks doing their thing so fair play. It was a real crowd pleaser at the heats, but unfortunately will not be shown at entX due to the judges not taking cash bribes. I have such a soft spot for Everything Sticks, and look forward to their entry every year, and this is VERY ‘Everything Sticks’ style. I'm guessing this took a few hours to write (please don't tell me you put this into chatgpt), and maybe 3 hours at most to film? There's so much room in the day for more! Not to mention the lack of lights! If it's not about lighting or setups or making a big mess, then what's it for? You could take a hint from the MILK film and maybe the guy sharts? There was a FANTASTIC film from Dunedin called TOAST that had a similar concept in a super small space and it’s BEAUTIFUL! Really pushed the boundaries, and I say it's required watching for you (I'm assigning you media studies homework that’s due before next year) I do feel like you had fun making this, which is the most important thing. In my previous review I suggested Everything Sticks does a Herms Heroes, but maybe that’s not what this team needs, but dammit it's what I want to see!! You would look very cool as an uzi wielding super spy with sassy quips. Maybe that's a Mad Scientist thing, but there's always room for more! I don’t imagine that Stu is ready to pull an all nighter from Saturday to 7pm Sunday for this competition anymore. I do however want to see Everything Sticks in the finals again, but that can only come from a bigger team, and a (slightly) grander vision. Polish up your editing and sound skills for next year. YOU CAN DOOO IIITTTT.

Never stop entering Stu, but also never stop trying new things! Expand the team! I hope to also make 17 + 48hour films!

I will see you at the heats next year for LARVAE GIRL 3: THE FINAL FIGHT! (I know I know… you’re already disappointed, but the crowd is going to LOVE IT!)

P.S If you tell me who lebombjames is, I will give you $20

OOHHHH Stu you beautiful battler! I just listened to your Plains Media show, and in the first minute you explained that your camera man got gastro and had to bail!! Im so sorry for ripping into you like that! I assumed you always planned to film + edit, so hearing that it was a last minute decision clears everything up. It sounds like a miracle that the film even got made! Ignore my advice about getting a bigger team. If I had the ability to delete my review, I would do it!! All is forgiven ✨

Always happy to see Stu return year after year with both the film he wanted to make and the reviews he wanted to give! You’ve become a pillar of 48Hours ChCh traditions, and so beyond the film itself we want to start by saying thank you - for the support you give to the teams with your reviews, and the support you’ve given us taking on the manager mantle this year. You’ve been very kind, and we’re grateful for that!

The film is good! And given the context we learned from your radio report about what it took to get this done, it helps clear up some questions and elevates the overall delivery.

It was close to shortlist! There were definitely things about it that would have made it a worthy earner of a spot - in particular, the cinematography! Which is cool given you lost your camera guy. We’d have to go back and double-check, but this might be the best-looking film made so far by this team. How good! Also, in a year where most of the man vs. machine stories in Christchurch were pretty sub-par, this one really *Sticks* out as being an actual man vs. machine. Excellent!

Here’s our take-it-or-leave-it...

Interesting to hear you like close-ups! It was certainly… a choice! Maybe a tad overused for us to really grasp the relationships between characters and get a sense of physical space. Did your lead get electrocuted by the toaster at one point? We thought we heard something fall down, but the focus was on the toaster close-up, so not sure...

For a film called BURNT there wasn’t really a lot of burning of toast hahahahaha. We kinda felt a bit ripped off! A story of a guy constantly burning his toast no matter what he tries - and then when he finally gets it right, he drops it in the sink? That would’ve killed! Instead, it felt a bit convoluted with a toaster that was clearly not plugged in refusing to work, and then these women being super rude to the poor man! (Oh wait, was that the “burning”? Ohh hold up… hmmmm…) Idk, we don’t want to be too nit-picky here, but perhaps this film just needs a different title or something? Idk what though, Burnt is such a great title!

Already been mentioned so won't bang on about it but 48hours fanatics probably aren't the audience for that generative AI stuff. Live and learn aye - I (Joel) was hot on the AI train for like six months before realising it was making me feel dead inside.

THE BEST THING: Great use of genre, and even though it was all close-ups, they were very beautiful close-ups!

THE NEXT THING: It does seem like a common theme the last few years that your characters are just really mean to each other ahahaha. Maybe next year it’s time to switch that up! Not sure to what, but something!

See you for year 18! That's genuinely remarkable.

This was an excellent man vs machine story. The idea was there. The production quality was there. It could have worked well - but it didn't.

For me, to be honest, the main issue was that the women just came across as so obnoxious it was painful to watch them. The man's struggle with the toaster was a great story, but then it kept switching over to these women acting like real - well - you know what I mean! It was jarring rather than comedic (I presume you'd intended them to be comedic?). It did not build the story, it detracted from it.

This just needed another hour or two put into storywriting at the beginning, to flesh out the man's struggle with the toaster into a compelling story that could stand so well on its own two feet that you didn't feel the need to jump to something else all the time to add interest. And that would then have been a finalist film.