Film Notes: Equestrian Sexual Response
Tom King's Notes:
Awkwardly titled, but accurate in its description, Equestrian Sexual Response is a nice short film. A young ranch girl confides with her favourite horse Red and his mate Molly. Alice's world is turned around when they mate a stud with Molly and Alice's romantic notion of the world is shattered. She also finds her schoolmates are developing a sexual awareness that she is unsure of. Her family life begins to change as she starts the awkward transition from young girl to teenager.
You've seen this type of film before, but this film has a nice awareness of it's characters. A good script, solid direction and an unassuming wonderfully natural performance from lead Christina Robinson. Even though this reviewer felt uncomfortable of her sexual awareness, (as I am sure parents have felt with daughters), I think the film could work even better as full length feature film as my only complaint is that it's too abrupt and there seems to be stuff missing. The short film (around 19 minutes) could be very well extended from the current script.
Filmmakers Zeke Hawkins, writer Courtney Stephens and the whole crew should be commended for packing in some good stuff (if not enough) in the film. 3 stars out of 4.
Jon Ashby's Notes:
What a beautiful film! I loved almost everything about it. The cinematography is gorgeous, the highest standard I've seen to date, it's a real credit to the AFI program. The story is a classic coming-of-age and I think gives us a very real perspective on the transition from childhood into maturity. So often we find this theme treated with a comic-bookish attitude, tongue-in-cheek dialogue and kids acting younger than they really do. The dialogue from some of the kids on the bus would make a parent cringe - newsflash folks, that's really how they talk. Zeke Hawkins, I'm officially a fan.
Robinson does a wonderful job as our young, confused tween, and even the horses seem to have an on-screen presence! There is actually nothing I can find to even nitpick on for a sense of objectivity here - this is just an excellent short film. Aspiring filmmakers, do you yourself a favor - seek this one out. Why not give their site a hit at http://www.thehawkinsbrothers.com.
Five out of five.
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Jon Ashby
