5DMM: Without a Clever Title

5DMM
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by Denny Betterman
Daniel Martin

Denny Betterman and Daniel Martin have teamed up to create this offbeat, entertaining bit of work, and the wackiness runs rampant. Though lack of a plot and some sound problems stand out, 5dmm is an energetic piece demonstrating fun animation and a certain ambition.

Story
There’s no story to speak of, as the movie is made in the “Who’s the director, anyways?” format introduced by Mike and Justin. The last frame of the last scene is sent to the next director, who takes over the movie. When a bit of plot does come into focus in the later part of the film, it becomes clear that a plot all along would have helped things a bit. If Dan and Denny are ever to do another chain movie, it would be nice to see how they could work with a plot. They could collaborate on the script (bare bones: dialogue and scene changes) then each do one page (not scene, page, to mix it up) of the script, sending in the final frame, therefore not knowing how the previous director had handled the previous page. The result would be more coherent, and more enjoyable as a whole. However, given the style of film, it’s easy to forget that nothing of substance is going on.

Presentation
The presentation is slick. It’s full of handheld cameras, stylish cinematography and breakneck action. This is the high point of the film, and it’s interesting to see Betterman and Martin bounce off each other, with two distinct but complimentary styles. Dan works with insanely fast, effects filled scenes and fights, while Denny is a bit more off the wall, with events happening more randomly and with increasingly bizarre results. Certainly the presentation is the best part of the film.

Visuals
The visuals are decent, though the fast speed of most scenes renders detailed scenery unimportant, stationary shots are well composed, so that it’s always clear where the action’s taking place. Dan and Denny have gone on record saying that the focus was purely on the action, which explains much of this. The film doesn’t use v3dmm, so the scenery can generally have a more dated look, but it goes by so quickly that it’s almost impossible to notice.

Sound
Sound has a few issues, most of them being lack of consistency in the voices. At times it’s unclear who exactly is talking (short of checking the clothing, that is), and some scenes are completely silent altogether. There will be times in which Dan and Denny will do their own voices for a particular scene, and times when they just imitated each other. Denny’s British accent comes off as a southern redneck accent, which is pretty fun to laugh at. Some of Denny’s scenes seem to err on the quieter side, with less ambient sounds, such as footprints and whatnot. Dan’s scenes generally have more sound, though this leads to many repeated sound effects. This only detracts very slightly from the wild fun these two seemed to have together.

The Final Word
Normally, I wouldn’t care for this type of movie. I like mine with plots, development, and feelings. But with all the impressive style in the film, plus an understanding and appreciation for the improvisational nature of Who’s the Director, Anyways, it easy to ignore that shortcoming. Part of the reason this movie works is the fact that the whole time, Dan and Denny seem to be having lots of fun constructing scenario after ridiculous scenario over and over again.

******** (8/10) Great