Volume 124 Issue 144
kansan.com
Friday, April 27, 2012
ENTERTAINMENT
Making Movies On No Budget YOUNG FILMMAKERS USE LIMITED RESOURCES TO CREATIVELY OVERCOME CONSTANT OBSTACLES // ALEX TRETBAR
Christopher Good, 31, is an independent filmmaker based out Kansas City. He was able to raise $20,000 through Kickstarter.com to fund his current film project "Mudjackin'." CONTRIBUTED PHOTO
limmy Darrah, one of the lead actors in Good's film, poses with mudjacking equipment. CONTRIBUTED PHOTO
Christopher Good asks his girlfriend and co-producer to call one of their lead actresses with a costume question.
"Ask her if she still has the same outfit from when we filmed at the Ozarks," Good says. "Remember, the pink thing?"
This is just one facet of what Good, 31, and other independent filmmakers call "no-budget" production. Good and his girlfriend, Megan Mantia, are getting ready for a shoot at Mantia's parents' house in Lenexa. They're working on Good's first feature film, "Mudjackin", and the pair has to jump through a number of hoops to make the project possible—but it takes time and patience.
"One thing that slows the process down is having to work around people's work schedules," Good says. "It just takes longer. We can't have concentrated bursts of filming because of it and, of course, there are the money-related issues. We make a lot of trips to Home Depot and Hobby Lobby."
But Good and Mantia were able to raise their goal of $20,000 last July through Kickstarter.com, a website that enables anyone to pitch ideas to friends and strangers alike, who then decide whether the project is worth donating cash toward. Most notably, 63 people donated between $25 and $50, and three donated between $2,500 and $5,000.
"Mudjackin" is an absurdist summer comedy set in the Ozarks. Mudjackers are
workers hired to repair sinking concrete by drilling a hole and filling the area underneath the concrete with a mixture of mud and concrete, raising the sidewalk or driveway back up. The story revolves around two mudjackers trying to have the summer of their lives. The pair have a rap-metal project, rival mudjackers show up and the story eventually becomes a kooky murder mystery.
Before "Mudjackin", Good, who graduated from KU with a psychology degree in 2003, wrote, directed and produced two short films, "Return of the Gumshoe Kids" and "Holy Moly," released in 2010 and 2011. Good's style is frantic and fast-paced with dark comedy sprinkled throughout. He says "Mudjackin' has roughly 200 scenes, and the script isn't even complete yet.
Good first met Mantia, 28, when she helped organize a screening for him at Tivoli Cinemas in Kansas City's Westport district. He eventually asked Mantia, who graduated from the Kansas City Art Institute in 2006, to help him get "Holy Moly" started, and the two began dating shortly thereafter.
"He's ultimately at the helm," Mantia says. "I've filled the roles of co-producer, production coordinator, manager and documentation photographer. And those often extend to craft services—I'm the general gopher. Sometimes I help with casting, props; even hand-stitching letters
to a jacket for a costume."
"Mudjackin" is coming along, but as lead actor Jimmy Darrah explains, Good's filmmaking process is careful and patient.
"It's a lot of hard work," Darrah, 28, says. "He's definitely a perfectionist who really really knows what he's doing, and he knows what he wants. He does a lot of takes until he gets exactly what he wants from me. It just really rewarding—I love working for him."
Good, Mantia and Darrah face problems and issues throughout the production process, but imagine the difference $20,000 makes. Graham Young, a Lawrence filmmaker, doesn't have that kind of money, but he makes do.
Young, 29, graduated from KU with a theater and film degree in 2008. He began production on his film "Kurtwood" at the end of last summer, finishing filming within the first few months of the fall semester. Having worked on the film for the better part of a year with virtually no budget ($763.41 to this date, which Young insists is not much in the film world). Young is finally close to finishing. It's been a rough road, though.
"The hardest part is finding people that want to work for free," Young says. "When you're working at an independent level it's hard to find people that can sacrifice a number of things, including pay. The good thing about independent filmmaking is that it allows you to solve problems
creatively instead of having to use your checkbook."
But, as in the case of Good and Mantia, Young needed a second-hand man. Young met Jordan McClain, 22, about four years ago when McClaim first moved to Lawrence from Wichita. Last summer Young asked McClaim to sort through multiple film ideas, and they eventually settled on "Kurtwood," a story about a prisoner who learns of a fortune hidden on the outside. McClaim, who is set to graduate from KU with a film degree next month, offers advice to the budding filmmaker.
"Be prepared for constant failures and constant difficulties, 'cause they'll happen a lot," McClaim says. "The most important thing for a young filmmaker is just to produce stuff. The value of having physical material to show people is irreplaceable."
Young says "Kurtwood" will be done by June.
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FILM
Documentary prompts race discussion in schools
Patrick Monroe, a senior from New Berlin, Wis., looks through a lens to focus a shot for his documentary. The documentary features the "Can We Talk" program at Free State High School, which focuses on racial issues in public schools.
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XIN LI editor@kansan.com
Sylvia Yimer, a graduate student in the School of Social Welfare, went to visit the program "Can We Talk" at Free State High School. "Can We Talk" is a localized part of a national program. Yimer said her visit was driven by her interest in race equality in public schools.
A group of University students is producing a documentary called, "Courougeous Conversations about Race," a program encouraging high school students to face racial issues.
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Yimer said the program was meant to facilitate understanding of different races and reduce the academic performance gap between white students and students of minority groups. She said she was surprised by how unrecognized the program
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"Film can be used to make change and be the outlet for voices that are marginalized to be heard," Yimer said. "These kids wouldn't get an opportunity to get their stories heard without someone giving that to them necessarily."
Last September, Yimer brought the documentary idea to a University student club, the Documentary Film Society. The student club was just established by then. The president of the club, Patrick Monroe, a senior studying film, was excited to hear about the idea.
Monroe said it was great to know that Sylvia was as dedicated as he was to filming and directing.
was. Yimer decided to make a documentary to raise awareness of the program.
"Since we started, we were focusing on funding and didn't have
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Yimer said Singleton was personable. The author set aside more than four hours of his day to meet exclusively with Monroe and Yimer.
The program is inspired by the book "Courageous Conversations about Race — a Field Guide for Achieving Equity in Schools," by Glenn Singleton and Curtis Linton. In February, Yimer and Monroe flew to San Francisco to interview and film Singleton.
"It was easy to tell how passionate he was about his work and how eager he was to help us," Yimer said. "The interview with Glenn is by far the most important interview for the film."
anything solid to work on" Monroe said. "Then Sylvia called me with this golden idea."
Monroe said a lot of work needs to be done to make the documentary successful and he hoped they could eventually send the documentary to film festivals. He hasn't yet announced a release date.
During spring break the team conducted an interview with a Free
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"As a filmmaker, I hope this will be a calling card not just for me, for the club, but for KU," Monroe said. "We want to show people what KU students are capable of."
Monroe said the project would expand through the school year and develop into a 70-minute feature.
State High School student who said to have benefitted from the program. Yimer said their next goal was to set up an interview with Tim Wise, one of the leading authors on race and racism in America.
Edited by Anna Allen
Today is the Brown Bag Drag Show sponsored by SUA, Queers & Allies and Kicker. This is the last Tunes @ Noon of the year.
Today's Weather
Showers and thunderstorms are likely, otherwise mostly cloudy.
HI: 67
LO: 54
Don't get struck by lightning.