“Second Chance” was an entry for the 48 Hour Film Project in which I worked on as editor and assisted in writing. The 48 Hour Film Project is a short film contest in which you have 48 hours to write, film, edit and deliver your movie. At the start of the contest you get a character, a prop, a line of dialogue and a genre, all to include in your movie. For this entry the character was John or Joan Charles, Energy Consultant, the prop was a bowl, the line of dialogue was “Please, I beg you” and our genre was sci-fi. Other members of my team “The Lower 48″ included David Haznaw, Matthew Cowden, Michael Palzkill, Aaron Harris, Heather Stoskopf and Molly Cowden.
“Vile Affection” was in pretty much every way an experiment. It was created for an advanced Producing and Directing class at Ball State University entitled “Hands Across McKinley” in the summer of 2005. This class incorporated students from disciplines such as Acting, Writing, Video and Audio Production and brought them together to make numerous short films throughout the semester. This project was the only one of the semester shot entirely in HD as the reward for a previous project, “Goodwill,” receiving the highest grade in the class.
“Vile Affection” is based off of a brutally violent script entitled “Playing God” in which the protagonist has a “god-complex” leading him to stalk and in the end kill his victim by crucifying him to a wooden floor. I chose to work with this script because it was drastically different from any of the other selections and posed an entirely new set of challenges for the actors and myself.
The first challenge in the production of “Vile Affection” was to modify the script to make it more appealing to a college aged audience and allow for a greater connection with the main characters. The protagonist remained a confused, disturbed, schizophrenic whose actions eventually lead him to become violent and the “god-complex” was replaced with confusion over his sexual orientation. Whether or not this was all medically sound was irrelevant to the story because it gave the protagonist the needed internal struggle that leads him to become violent not only towards his initial victim but the victim’s girlfriend as well. This helped the story reach its intended audience but also became the next big challenge.
Although the script was modified, the violence was kept along with the addition of another violent scene ending with a sexual assault. We were warned early in the process by professors that film violence should not be taken lightly especially when it involves novice actors and directors. Thus, the proper steps were taken to choreograph the action with the help of a Ball State University professor, Darrel Rushton, who specialized in theater violence. Not only was the physical safety of the actors a high priority but also their mental well-being; especially surrounding the sexual assault. Both Sarah Haworth and Zack Florent were terrific in the planning, choreography and execution of this scene and even more importantly, understanding after the initial footage was taped over and the scene had to be re-shot. Which was completely my own fault.
The third major challenge was taking advantage of the technology that I was able to use for this project. Shooting the entire project in HD on a camera that no one was familiar with was a big challenge and would not have been possible without all of the help from my Director of Photography, Krystal Rizzo. She spent a lot of extra time acquainting herself with the camera so that we had one less thing to worry about while on set. Additionally, we were granted access to a Steadicam for two scenes of the film but no one was able to overcome the steep learning curve to proficiency. So our professor, Tim Pollard, stepped in to help us get exactly what I wanted.
The finished project was premiered to a large group of students along with other selections from the class at the newly constructed Sursa Hall on campus.
“Goodwill” was my first project that I believe still holds value today. It was created for an advanced Producing and Directing class at Ball State University entitled “Hands Across McKinley” in the spring of 2005. This class incorporated students from different disciplines such as Acting, Writing, Video and Audio Production and brought them together to make numerous short films throughout the semester. I was fortunate enough to participate in the first semester that this class was offered.
The majority of the project was shot early on a weekday at a Goodwill store in Muncie, Indiana while it was open to the public. It is amazing what you can get away with when you are producing a student film. Additional scenes were shot at the home of the lead actress (Lana Cook) and throughout the city of Muncie. The original script was meant to be a linear story and this remained the intention until after everything was shot and I began editing. I have always been fascinated with non-linear films and this was the perfect opportunity for such an experiment. In the end, it paid off because it received the highest grade in the class for that round of projects and, as a reward, allowed me to utilize additional resources for my next project; “Vile Affection”.
Take the time to watch Winterclash 2013 - Snowtime. Showtime! // Two incredibly talented videobladers put in work vimeo.com/benjaminbuettn… // 1 week ago
