I managed about 5 minutes ...I can't be bothered wasting my time when the acting is so bad that it reminds me of a school play.Storyline? When the cover is so unappealing, one cannot be bothered waiting for a possible story to develop.

I really hope something comes from this for these actors writers and director involved. For a short, it has a decent story, the actors deliver committed performances and I feel as a viewer that they are the characters they are portraying. There are some solid moments that make me wonder how it would go for them had they even a bigger budget. Some sharper editing, in my opinion would make it travel with a little more fluidity, but overall, if I were casting a movie or looking for some to make a movie, I'd seek all of them. There's something there, for sure. It is worth the watch.

I love the idea of doing an Batgirl origin story. I even love the passion that comes from doing a DC character as an indie. But this movie was so far beyond unpolished. I really want to say the acting was bad. But the truth is, it wasn't. At least not entirely. All of the actors (except the brother) had moments of brilliance. There was true emotion and true tension in many parts. And then there were moments that reminded me of the last high school play I watched. Most scenes, that were otherwise well played, were ruined by blatantly poor and over the top delivery of multiple lines. And I'll be honest, that lies more with the director and editing. You can't watch a scene from behind the camera and say "well, that's OK, I guess," and then print it. If you don't have talent, sure, maybe. But the the entire cast (again, except the brother who was just awful throughout) all had great deliver at times. In an indie, you don't have the fireworks and cgi... You have to rely on performance and this aspect missed the mark. The other piece (and I've never seen a movie where this was such a problem) that was so bad as to be distracting was the lighting. It was beyond bad. You should never see lighting (yes, I'm aware that lighting plays a part in mood and feel, but unless you're on Broadway, you shouldn't see a spotlight on somebody's head). The opening scene puts this on full display right off the bat. It was almost as if there was a crack in the scene ceiling and a ray of sun was following each character.The story itself wasn't terribly well constructed. It was disjointed and made plot leaps that had huge holes (even for a superhero movie) and the written dialogue was mediocre at best (even if the cast had been filled with Oscar winners). Despite that, I found myself enjoying most of Harlene's performance and a few times I saw something really special in Barbara's character. If you are a fan of the DC Universe and have 40 minutes to kill, it's worth a watch if only because it's unexplored cinematic territory. But don't expect to be wowed.

"Batgirl Rises" is a 40-minute short film from half a year ago and it written and directed by Vincent Tran and Riyaana Hartley. For both of them, it is probably the most known work so far. I must say that I am slightly negatively biased towards the character of Batgirl as I always found Catwoman more interesting, but this film is basically about the events that made Batgirl Batgirl, so it is fine. And I believe Lindsay Heath was a good choice for the character. I liked her acting in here. There were a couple scenes that were too absurd or slightly predictable, but it's never so bad that it destroys the film somehow. A pretty solid watch. I am not sure if I would keep watching if they made a series based on this one, but as a one-time movie it is certainly worth checking out. I also really liked the Riddler scenes. Always nice to see some of the familiar characters. Thumbs up.