A duel review – two for the price of one.  Tony Farinella & Christopher Moshier sound off on the short film " Girl with Gun ”.

Review Written by Tony Farinella

Tracy O'Connor (The Nightingale)

Short films are in an abundance today.  Trying to get an entire cast and crew for a feature length film is a chore.  Short films are a good way to get your feet wet for feature film-making.  Russ Emanuel has the skills to make a feature film. The only thing missing from 'Girl with Gun' is a screenplay to give his directorial work justice.

Tracy O'Connor stars as Gwen Hunter, who doubles as regular everyday woman and also as an assassin on the side.  The short film opens as we see her taking out a drug lord.  She then goes over to her friend Mitzi's (Michelle Martin) house for breakfast.  She inquires about her arm and why it is bandaged. Gwen shrugs it off.  She is then set to go on a date with her boyfriend Dan (Erick Holloway).  But also at the restaurant that she's meeting her date at is a mob boss and his sidekick (Michelle Lee).

Acting wise everyone is spot on in this 15 minute short.  This is Tracy's first film of any kind and she looks comfortable playing both roles. Playing the regular woman and also playing the assassin.  She goes back and forth between both with relative ease.  Erick Holloway is also sharp as he plays the nice guy, clueless boyfriend. When they interact over dinner and how he reacts is some of the films lighter moments.

Director Russ Emanuel

As stated above Russ Emanuel knows how to direct and put together a film.  He has the perfect music to accompany each scene. The film also has a soundtrack to purchase.  The action scenes are well-done and don't come off as hokey.  The film has a futuristic look to it while at the same time looking modern.  I would like to see Russ put his hat into a horror short or feature film.  I know he would be able to give it a new look and feel.

The flaw of 'Girl with Gun' is its screenplay.  As soon as things start to get interesting and are teeth are sunk into, it ends.  A lot of time is wasted on mundane conversation instead of moving along the plot.  I would have liked to know what happened to Gwen.  I can only hope a sequel is in the works.

I look forward to Russ Emanuel's next project.  He's got skills behind the camera.  It is a shame his directing talents were not given the screenplay to work with.

Tony's Grade: B

Review Written by Christopher Moshier

Tracy O'Connor

There is the good: Alias, La Femme Nikita (NO! The TV series doesn't count nor does Bridget Fonda!), Dark Angel, Underworld.

There is the bad: Eon Flux, Ultraviolet, Barb Wire (In fact anything that Pamela Anderson is in is bad...except for the one on the boat with the rock star.  You won’t find that one at Netflix kids!)

There has been a wide range of kick ass women in movies and TV the past couple decades influenced out of the pages of comic books in my humble opinion.  This includes a short independent film by Russ Emanuel and Emile Haris called “Girl with Gun”.  For those who haven’t heard of this film to sum up real quickly the story revolves around the character Gwen Hunter or her working girl title, The Nightingale.  Gwen’s job is assassin for hire - in true Hollywood heroine style - only killing the really bad people.  When not driving around in her Humvee putting bullets in mob bosses and drug runners Gwen gives the old college try of living a normal life trying to maintain a friendship with her girl Mitzi or her boy toy Dan.  She fails miserably accepting her destiny of wearing tight leather jump suits and being attacked by hot ninja chicks around every corner.

Girl with Gun is a mere 15 minutes delivering exactly what I thought it was going to deliver.  The story is basic, unoriginal, and incomplete. But it’s been done so many times before you can easily fill in the gaps yourself even if you have a fragment of imagination.  Yet this is not a slam. The film is very good. It pulls of what I believe was originally attempted to be implemented…practice.  It’s more of a resume piece than anything else or perhaps a visual pitch in hopes for a grander motion picture or dare I say FOX Prime Time.  I can hear the teaser now, “After Jack Bauer single-handily wipes out the Al-Qaeda stay tuned for the new hit show – Girl with Gun.”

Russ was also kind enough to send along the sound track of the film that clocks in at 18 minutes and 34 seconds.  OK!  The movie is 15 minutes and I am no mathematical genius, but somewhere along the line I got screwed out of 3 minutes.  The sound track was composed by Neil Argo with an original song by Jenni Alpert.  Like the movie itself (not including the Jenni Alpert song) you only get hints of mood.  And just like the movie the sound track really made me want more.  It will definitely join my car CD collection, but damn…it takes 20 minutes for me to get to work.  I’ll have to hum to myself the remaining minute and a half. (APOLOGIES – I am deeply sorry for all the math that was included in this review.)

Tracy O'Connor (Gwen Hunter) & Michelle Martin (Mitzi)

The performances in “GwG” were well done. I do believe Tracy O’Connor has ability to be a fine actress with more thespian experiences behind her.  She was a little rough around the edges, but for a premiere performance she held her own.  A heads up to Michelle Martin who I found was very natural in her role.  I would be very interested to see what she could do with a much larger part.  Erick Holloway also came across very natural in his character serving the reason for his character in the short 100%.

Bring on a sequel.  Maybe “Girl with Bazooka” or “Girl with AK-47”.

Christopher's Grade: B-

You can check out Girl with Gun trailer.

Girl with Gun Trailer

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