Common Senses (2005) Online

Common Seses is a Dogme95 film shot and produced in Chicago, Illinois. Chicago is known for its improv sketch comedy troupes, many of which find their way into mainstream television on shows like Saturday Night Live. This improvisational past-time has shifted onto the screen with Chicago non-profit production co. Splitpillow's Common Senses.

"The essence of Dogme95 is to challenge the conventional film language – in order to make authentic films, in search of the truth. This implicates cutting out the usual aesthetic means of adding sound, light, make up, " mise en scene", etc. In addition, it gives more time to improvise the acting, because there are no breaks for hair, make up, light and costume change. Another point is that the hand-held camera gives the actors more freedom and space to really impersonate and act out their characters, since the camera follows the actor instead of the opposite. These unusual production circumstances, gives both restriction and freedom to the director, who is forced to be creative. You eliminate the possibility to "save" a horrible, not functioning scene with underlying music or voice-over. You have to come up with creative solutions to get, for example, music into your film. At the same time Dogme95 creates an even playfield with other people around the world by eliminating the necessity to have a make up department, a big light crew etc. It is a form of economical democratisation because cost are cut. Concerning flash backs, it's not allowed, and the main purpose of the temporal alienation rule is to prohibit period films." -www.dogme95.com In Common Senses 5 directors had 1 week to write and produce their own chapter. When I watched the film I completely forgot about the Dogme95 restrictions because I was so drawn into the story. As said before, the film was also shot in Chicago. The city itself feels almost like another character in the story. This is probably more of a filmmaker's film because of how much was done with so little (time, equipment, and budget). The acting was phenomenal considering they had a so few days to memorize entire scenes and had opportunity for rehearsal. Holly Montgomery-Webb and Luis A. Perez unltimately improvised many of their scenes together and these two unknown local actors shine on the screen.

The film is interesting watch for the average viewer I think, especially knowing what has gone into (or taken out of) the process.

Unwatchable for one reason; Terrible audio. I had to turn it off midway through for this reason. When two people are in a room speaking, and you can only hear one person clearly, but not the other, that's bad. I respect the "independent spirit" and all, but when you can't buy a couple of cheap microphones at Radioshack, you're doing your craft a disservice. That's not being an independent filmmaker with a low budget, that's just being a cheap ass filmmaker. It's a shame because the camera-work was interesting and the actors look like they put up their ends of the bargain. Being able to hear a good quality film is just as important as fancy camera work.