Screen Gems

Friday, March 29, 2013

Two films by University of Central Arkansas Digital Filmmaking graduate students will screen 7 p.m. Saturday in Reynolds Performance Hall at UCA in Conway. Lyle Arnett’s contemplative period piece December 1982 and Chris Paradis’ artsy A Wheel & the Moon will be screening for free. I caught up with Pardis online.

Q. Could you tell me how you came up with the idea for your current project and funded your venture?

A. I had some ideas for original stories for my thesis film, but my imagination tends to be expensive to try and capture well in a film. I worked at different Barnes & Noble stores, both part time and full time, on and off for about 15 years, and I was always keeping an eye out for material that might make an interesting film. Author Neil Gaiman and artist/director Dave McKean endorsed ashort story single-edition book by Jonathan Carroll titled The Heidelberg Cylinder. The pair have been influential on me, and I eventually read a rare collection of Carroll’s short stories that contained “A Wheel in the Desert, the Moon on Some Swings” - which I shortened to A Wheel & the Moon. I started adapting the story two years ago in Bruce Hutchinson’s screenwriting class. I’ve always been fascinated by film adaptations that add or remove characters and plot lines but still manage to find the heart of a short story and make it work.

As far as funding goes, Iset up a seven-month-long Indiegogo campaign that ended before the fall production semester. My largest donors skipped the fundraising site to avoid large fees, especially currency exchange fees, as my executive producer is a friend who is a counselor in Brescia, Italy. Valerio Manzo and I met through our mutual interest in tarot.

Q. Was there any moment during the shooting of your film or a particular scene that you were really excited the way it turned out?

A. One shot in particular from the summer session seemed like an impossible image to capture, but Jarrod Beck picked the right lens, and [assistant camera] Marcie Finney put up with me worrying about the 5-8 minute time span we had to get the shot before we lost our natural light. Other than that, watching Bryan Stafford combine shots and being in such a creative flow was exciting in its own right. He and Brent Bailey really like to go all out in getting perfect shots. I’m really excited the way it all turned out.

Q. What do you hope people get from seeing your films?

For AWTM in particular, I hope that the film taps into certain emotions of fear and loss, where the beauty of the imagery and tone of the film make it not so depressing, hopeful and life affirming - not an easy task!

Levi Agee is a filmmaker and programmer for the Little Rock Film Festival. E-mail him at: [email protected]

MovieStyle, Pages 36 on 03/29/2013