Twenty-four films made in two days of madness

48 HOUR START LINE: Energised and ready to roll, members of the 26 Gisborne teams who signed up for the 2017 HP48Hours filmmaking competition stand by to hit the ground running at 7pm last Friday. Picture supplied

THEY wanted more female directors for the 48Hours filmmaking competition and in Gisborne they got them.

Seven female directors joined the two-day madness when the competition hit the ground running at 7pm on Friday.

Out of the 526 teams to enter around the country, 26 were from Gisborne and 14 of those were school teams.

In previous years, teams have been given a line of dialogue and a prop to be incorporated into the storyline. This year, teams were given a female character they had to include in the story.

Rules are strict. The deadline for film submissions was 7pm Sunday night.

One Gisborne team who arrived two seconds too late were disqualified.

In the end, 24 films were submitted.

“I’ve been watching them,” said the event’s local manager Tom Paton. “There are some really good films in there.”

Judges include two-time Oscar winner for sound mixing Michael Hedges (King Kong and The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King.)

Academy award nominee Jason Canovas, Gisborne man Darren Maynard, who now works in a Warner Brothers sound department in Los Angeles and previous Gisborne competition judge Pene Walsh will also judge submissions.

The public can view the top 12 films at the Dome Cinema on September 29. Tickets can be bought online through Eventfinda.

Among those who hope to make the finals is the Cowps Productions team. The team were given the buddy movie genre to build a story around.

“We brainstormed movies like Dumb and Dumber that had done that before to make sure we were on the right track,” said videographer Ben Cowper.

“We also wanted to include music.”

With Gisborne heavy metal band Uni-Fi’s lead singer Cory Garrett on the team, the cast and crew developed a plot around a duo trying to record a song ... then one of them gets a girlfriend.