I definetly agree with Wilkin Chau - I've used a boom pole when I want some nice overall lighting adding some definition around my model's heads when I am doing a photo shoot as well. I must say, that with the stuff you were working with - it seems a little precarious. Was the pole bent like that when you got it? If not, was it the light that caused it? It looks like a 1k to me - what was it exactly?
I was in a similar situation my last video - here I was using Arri 650 (and yes that is aluminum foil. The shoot was so last minute, we couldn't even get any snoots!) with the same type of rigging you had, but I guess the 650 was not as heavy as what you were suspending...
and this was what we filmed as the finished product:
