Lara Millard's "The Last One" (2015 Student Short Film)

Review by: Ashley J. Wilding (Professional Filmmaker & Cinematographer)

I am a professional filmmaker, writer, editor, actor and cinematographer from Shifnal, Shropshire UK. I am always reaching out to other local and distant filmmakers to help them improve and innovate new styles as well as themes for their own creative works.

I gave The Last One a viewing on the 6th February 2016 and for a first time short film it's very well envisioned, realistic looking, offers something original and the editing behind it isn't half bad either. Personally for a handheld film like this neither professional or heavy editing is acquired as it would take away the first-person and hand-held feel; therefore completely eliminating Lara’s aim.

Issues I encountered with “The Last One”

Creating a film is not something you can done overnight. It requires many skill sets, years of experience, team effort and patience but even then you are not guaranteed to produce a film that is 100% perfect without running into problems.The only issues I saw with The Last One is a quick second shot where Rhydian shows little facial reaction when he gets his arm bitten by an undead count. The second is when the camera pans down his bloodied arm and cuts to a still image of his ripped open wrist. Some of fading edits and transitions were slightly out of sync here but this doesn't affect the viewing experience all that much. According to Lara Millard this was a result of limited resources, time and budgeting issues so this is understandable and unavoidable at best. Although, the wrist effects in the photo looked decent and gruesome; the use of colour and textures made it look realistic.

Things I LIKED about “The Last One”Audio -- Firstly I would like to put my finger on the voice acting throughout the entire film. The beginning is a perfect example of normal human conversation, emotions, bodily interaction and how it suddenly changes to something much more drastic and horrifying; implying things can go from good to bad in a matter of seconds. This definitely gets things moving and had me wondering what was going on until Rhydian first spoke about the anonymous plague. The effects on the voices and its soundtrack synced well and played a huge part in getting the atmosphere and story flowing. The humans we hear previously turned out to be a flashback sequence and then somebody running away in the present day was very well put together. The passage of time and the balance between normalisation and total devastation is cleverly done. Hearing the protagonist dwelling on his past and now crumbled future brings out a realistic set of emotions and shows how he’s coping with the ordeal. His voice alone makes us as an audience feel powerless toward him and somewhat lost in the process. The power behind his slowly deteriorating voice describes the whole situation like it's no laughing matter and it's in fact a very frightening world to live alone in. The Last One delivers

powerful dialogue throughout and left me speechless by how realistic it sounded. The way it portray kind of shows how somebody would actually cope in a world like that (hopefully it’ll never come to that, if it does I have a cricket bat under the stairs).

Camera Work & Envisioning -- The entire film was shot through a handheld camera which gave a very good first person perspective and a found-footage feel. The style of it kept reminding me of the 1999 Daniel Myrick film The Blaire Witch Project (if you've watched it you'll know what I mean). Some of the scenes and filming quality had me feeling like I was actually Rhydian walking around recording everything.I was also intrigued by how well Lara Millard uses elements of both Horror and Psychological Horror in her film to help tell the story of Rhydian, the effects of the plague, the deceased family and comrades. The way it's been edited, her usage of filters and desired camera angles made it look realistic, dark, emotional and gave an overall haunting experience. Seeing a world absent of all human activity provides of a sense of loneliness, a high level of insecurity and a steep drop into insanity.The Last One maintained a constant haunting atmosphere from start to finish and this makes you feel like everything you've done, wanted and loved is gone forever in the blink of an eye. The film symbolises the End of Humanity very well, for instance the graveyard scenes show Rhydian strolling around needlessly; this implies that Rhydian is feeling lost, outnumbered and powerless toward uncontrollable forces, and escaping it is inevitable.

Having the remainder of the film set in a darkish woodland adds to the atmosphere, it builds more tension and adds a psychological effect; it creates a reoccurring thought that something is lurking behind a particular bush or tree. It was intriguing to see how Lara Millard used a dark woodland theme to keep things flowing right up until the very end. These kind of places are a common fear amongst most people due its overall quietness, eerie locations and sudden noises. Dark woodland areas are frequently seen in such horror films, video games and also read about in horror stories in order to create a sense of danger and insecurity, making them a place not to visit under any circumstance. The combination of dark places and zombies can be a very unsettling and nightmarish image. This experimental theme worked particularly well in The Last One.

Watching Rhydian stroll through a darkish woodland area is a great way to add to the scare factor as you don't know where or how many undead numbers he will encounter and especially how the trees help block out daylight (partially), hence making it more difficult to see them.

Lastly I would like to put my opinion across on the film's ending. Shortly after Rhydian loses his human consciousness and becomes another walker, the famous saying from Edgar Allen Poe's "The Raven" is read out by an actor and just after that is the moment where Rhydian's eyes change from human to zombie and the film fades out. Combining the sentence, ambient sounds and zombie eyes, this made the scene very spooky and somewhat unsettlingly. This definitely sent a shiver down my spine and I've never seen anything like that in a film before! The ending is

a perfect example of both originality and creativity. The Raven quote worked flawlessly as it implies that Rhydian is now under supernatural control and there is no way of getting out of it. The last ever human has been claimed and the earth is left to crumble for all eternity.

Overall, for a 5 minute project your film was great, there was a lot of original content present which kept me hooked and entertained from start to finish. Some transitions and edits may not have been on point but that is all down to limited resources and was unavoidable at best. Your choice of locations were great for this specific theme and built a great atmosphere, and this film shows great examples of urban decay. For a limited time in makeup and costume design; the special effects you created for the protagonist and zombies really stood out and I enjoyed it.

The film surely lives up to its name. :-)I hope many more good reviews come your way.