Friday Nite Rite

Guerrilla filmmaking - generally shot quickly with no budget, a skeleton crew and frequently without permission - can be a heady affair. Frequently it is edgy and has a high level of energy as filmmakers race against time to get things done.

Sadly, Friday Nite Rite, has none of this vigour. Curiously, despite being shot on the New York subway, everything feels staged - quite the opposite of what you would expect. A man is using a payphone on the platform to call his 'pals'. He pretends to be at home but is really just desperate for company.

As he becomes increasingly irritated by the lack of return calls the other folk on the station begin to root for him. The problem is, the audience don't. The script fails to convince and it is impossible to care about this 'Billy no-mates'. Friday Nite Rite is over-stretched at an eight minute runtime - it might well have been much better at about half that length. Mention should be made of the music by Sam Albrigno, however, since it is really very good.

Out to own as part of the Final Cut: Take Three DVD short film collection.