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Credits: Picture This
Dir. Samuel Park / 7 min / English
Harvard, 1948. Sebastian Hoffman cares about literature, the arts, and leading an unconventional life. Aaron Greenhurst worries about keeping up appearances. As Aaron contemplates his upcoming marriage to his childhood sweetheart, Annie, Sebastian tries to get him to give up the privileges of conformity, and accept his true self. Based on the novel of the same name, published by Alyson Books.
Cast
Vincent Kartheiser
Jordan Brower
Corin Amber Norton
Crew
Written and Directed by Samuel Park
Produced by Aaron Belliston
Emily Lundin
Samuel Park
Executive Producer Lorin Flemming
Consulting Producer Sarah Esberg
Cinematographer William Mackenzie-Smith
Editor David Codron
Production Design Dalila Mendez
Set Decoration Stephanie McKinnon
Costume Design Safowa Bright-Asare
Festival Screenings
Frameline 2006 San Francisco International LGBT Film Festival
2006 Philadelphia International Gay and Lesbian Film Festival
2006 Seattle Lesbian & Gay Film Festival
2006 Austin Gay and Lesbian Film Festival
2006 Closet Cinema Southwest Gay and Lesbian Film Festival
2006 Pink Apple Switzerland International LGBT Film Festival
Director’s Bio
29-year old writer-director Samuel Park was born in Sao Paulo, Brazil, and moved to the United States at age 14. He graduated with honors from Stanford University (B.A., M.A., English), and went on to earn a Ph.D. from USC, also in English literature. While at Stanford, Park wrote and directed a number of plays, some of which went on to be workshopped or performed at universities across the nation, including the University of Utah, Chapman, and Humboldt State University. His first novel, Shakespeare's Sonnets, is forthcoming from Alyson Books. Park's short films include "Not Everyday Activities," "Timeshare," and "Shakespeare's Sonnets," which was an official selection at the 2005 Frameline San Francisco International LGBT Film Festival. He has been a Nicholl fellowship quarterfinalist, Sundance Lab finalist, and Montage Screenwriting Contest winner. He is currently at work on several projects: a second novel, a documentary on gay actors in Hollywood, and the feature-length version of Shakespeare's Sonnets.
Production Notes
Park shot the short film in two days, on location in Los Angeles, shooting on 35mm stock and then doing a digital intermediary. The film features the work of an international team-- awardwinning British DP William Mackenzie-Smith, the Australian composer Allyson Newman, and Mexican production designer Dalila Mendez. The film stars young actors Jordan Brower, Vincent Kartheiser, and Corin Norton.
Jordan Brower impressed Park with his work in the cult indie favorite Speedway Junky, where he co-starred with Daryl Hannah and Jesse Bradford. A gifted actor, Brower has the ability to communicate a lot without dialogue, using his eyes to suggest an entire world beneath the
surface-- a skill that Park thought would be ideal for Aaron, a closeted young man in repressive 1940s Boston.
Vincent Kartheiser had worked with Park before, workshopping scenes from the script during the Directing Labs. Kartheiser, a favorite of indie directors for his unpredictable screen presence and ability to disappear into his characters, has long been one of the most exciting new faces in independent film, starring in Larry Clark's Another Day in Paradise and Rob Schmidt's underrated Crime and Punishment in Suburbia. Most recently, Kartheiser was a regular on the WB's long-running series Angel, playing Connor.
"Vincent has the looks of a movie star, but he's really a character actor. He's like a British actor, with tons of technique and control over voice, movement, and things like that, but being American, he always brings it back to emotion, to making it truthful," says Park.
"The interesting thing about him also, is that he's really into guerilla filmmaking. He has no airs. I'd see him carrying cable. Or one day he forgot to shave and he ran over to the market across the street and got some shaving cream and razors. No ego whatsoever. Incredibly giving.
During the other actor's close up, Vincent was off-camera, and we needed to get an emotional reaction from Jordan, and so Vincent literally started weeping. Now, it's really hard not to have a truthful emotional reaction when the person in front of you is weeping. So, in the short, when you see Jordan looking at Vincent, he's really reacting to his tears. And that's what makes the moment so real."
My intention with the short was to make it look a bit like a 'found' film, a long-lost old movie that somebody discovered in an archive. Not a homage to a specific filmmaker, like "Far From Heaven" and Douglas Sirk, but a film that, if it weren't for the times, a filmmaker would actually have been able to make it in the period it is set, the late '40s. So we favored strong Technicolor-type colors that would pop out, like red and green, and used a lot of diffusion to make the image softer. The camera is mostly static, in tune with this world that is more oldfashioned and slow. The dialogue, also, has that old-movie, mannered quality, which takes you back to another era," Park explains.
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