LOCAL FILMS HONORED AT FILM FESTIVAL
Publication: GRAFFITI
Published: 10/10/2007
Page: 21
Headline: LOCAL FILMS HONORED AT FILM FESTIVAL
Byline: TONY RUTHERFORD
Do you view life as a daily “audition” by selling yourself, taking on new roles and attempting to win approval?
Sam Holdren, an M.F.A. candidate in Temple University’s Department of Film & Media Arts, has along with Joseph W. Nig [sic: Ng], now an M.A. candidate in Media Studies at West Virginia State University, collaborated on the screenplay for “Audition,” whose main character William Ashe equates a drifting ‘everyman’ looking for success and a whole lot of hope.
The short screens at 7:25 p.m., Oct. 12 in the Landmark Studio of the Arts, Sutton, W.Va., as part of the West Virginia Filmmakers Festival. It has previously been honored as Best Student Short Film and Best Regional Student Film at the Bluegrass Independent Film Festival, La Grange, Ky.
The Winfield, W.Va. native [sic: South Charleston], began principal photography in November 2004 but the film took two years to complete with scenes shot in Philadelphia and Charleston, W.Va.
“When you’re a student film on a limited budget, it tends to slow down the process,” Holden said. However, aside from financing, graduate school and teaching delayed completion as well as “music, visual effects and sound editing É (they) always take three times longer than you expect.”
However, their character Ashe has hit a meaningful chord with viewers. Essentially, he’s a 30-something loser living at home with his mother who believes in “signs” and has an insatiable spirit.
“People like William Ashe have not found their way in life just yet, but a person with the spirit of William Ashe will go on forever despite naive mistakes or failures,” Holdren explained. “Some people see it for the dark comedy, but it’s gratifying when regular people, colleagues or anybody else sees your work and gets it on a human level.”
How did Nig [sic: Ng] and Holdren formulate the character?
“As folks in the Charleston-area who have seen the film are certainly aware, many qualities of William Ashe are unquestionably inspired by a good friend of ours. This includes the energetic personality and external traits; however several of William’s experiences belong to Joe and I. The actual audition is my own experience auditioning for a movie. But as we were writing the screenplay, we decided that a character like our friend would be more interesting and watchable through all of the absurd things that happen. It’s an abstraction, not a biography.”
So, on the way to the theatre in the big city for a major moment, William suddenly finds himself sidetracked and caught up in murder mayhem and mistaken identity. Not unlike curves, detours and uncomfortable so-called growth opportunities in everyone’s journey? “You ask actors to come and try to create some sense of natural behavior in an unnatural environment and then judge them for it while also trying to maintain natural behavior,” the writer/producer said. Sounds like how many of us often try to adapt and conform to environments and relationships that we willingly or unwittingly stumble into?
Thus, despite the hyperbole of circumstances, he represents anyone struggling along life’s path.
“In practically every sequence, William is auditioning. Everywhere he goes, and for everyone he speaks to, he is constantly selling himself,” Holdren said. “He’s trying to make his mother proud by successfully doing something, anything.”
Aside from the Sutton screening, “Audition” has been shown at Huntington’s Appalachian Film Festival, Muskogee, Oklahoma’s Bare Bones International Film Festival, and Springfield, Illinois’ Route 66 Film Festival, and next month in Hatboro, Pa. at the Delaware Valley Film Festival. Check other upcoming showings at auditionmoviesite.com.
Although Holdren has his thesis mostly on his mind, another short film of his, “Play” will be shown at the inaugural Rockport Film Festival in Texas. Visit: www.playmoviesite.com. While studying at West Virginia State University, he won the West Virginia International Student Film Competition for “Unexpected Aphrodisiacs” (2001) and “Blah” (2002). On his 2008 slate, “The Paradigm Shift,” a short drama, and he recently worked as the line producer Huntington native and NYU graduate student Kim Spurlock’s “Roy G. Biv.”
About the festival
Two films with Huntington, W.Va. roots will screen during the 2007 West Virginia Filmmakers Film Festival, Friday, Oct. 12 in Sutton, W.Va. at the Landmark Studio of the Arts.
Back in June 2006 just after Warner Bros. left town, Mandy Sherwood, a Huntington native, began shooting her no budget “Sixteen to Life” at locations around the city, including venues like the Keith Albee, Frost Top Drive Inn, the former C & O Piano Bar and Daniello’s Pizza.
Featuring rock music, skateboarding, teenage angst, after-school jobs and dingy music clubs, “Sixteen to Life” follows two girls dealing with family and peer issues. Shelly, the daughter of a local rock musician, has been pressured into guitar playing; Amy, a straight-laced Pakistani girl has a love for music and must fight her fiercely conservative step-father for independence.
As part of the rite of passage, the film’s two leads Sarah (Heather Newhouse) and Amy (Sarah Plata) participate in the competition in which the title song, “Sixteen to Life” is featured. Three bands took the stage at the Piano Bar: Darism Drive, Broken Heart Transistor and Dog Spit.
Writer/director Sherwood, whose parents often provided a ‘catered’ dinner for cast and crew, patterned the production after John Hughes’ “Sixteen Candles.” Sherwood wants her film to appeal to both teens and 30-somethings, as it updates the concepts and perspectives of “Sixteen Candles.”
In addition, David Smith’s “Maneater,” which has screened at both Marshall University and the Appalachian Film Festival, will be shown.
