Film schools generally
discourage people Steve Coulter's age from attempting to make
feature-length movies, but few film students have his years of
experience as a writer, actor, editor, cinematographer and
producer.
Fortunately, Coulter isn't
in film school.
The 22-year-old Rolling
Meadows native makes his writing/debut Saturday night with the
world premiere of his drama "Fate Twisted Simply" in
Palatine's Cutting Hall.
The film explores
questions of fate in war and in love when Army Ranger Sgt. Kevin
Hill (Charlie Franklin of Palatine) goes missing in action while
serving overseas. Uncertainty about his survival is presumably a
concern for Sgt. Hill, but the film deals primarily with the
effect of his disappearance on friends and family at home.
"Fate Twisted
Simply" was shot on digital video last May through August in
the northwest suburbs. The war scenes were shot on a set in
Cutting Hall and in the First United Methodist Church of Palatine,
made to look like a war-torn building in Eastern Europe.
"There's no mention
of a particular conflict or country," said Coulter, a
business major at the University of Iowa. "I wanted to keep
the story away from politics. It's not about whether or not we
should be in Iraq. It's about families having to deal with young
people going to war."
Coulter first conceived of
the story as a short film four years ago when a cousin in the
military was assigned to duty overseas after the invasion of
Afghanistan. But he felt he couldn't do justice to the issues the
subject raised with a short treatment.
"Some short films can
tell you a lot in five minutes," Coulter said. "But I
like longer, more fully developed stories."
He's had lots of
experience doing both.
Coulter and his friends
Michael P. Noens, Nicholas Mikula and Marc Muszynski began making
short films together in their early teens at Plum Grove Junior
High School in Rolling Meadows and graduated to features at Fremd
High School in Palatine. Two years ago, after they had all gone to
separate universities, they formed CNGM Pictures as a
not-for-profit company to maintain their creative partnership.
All four friends took
turns serving as actors, writers, editors, cinematographers and
producers on their collaborative efforts, drawing on a cadre of
friends to serve as actors and crew members.
Coulter considers CNGM's
efforts to be part of the emerging microcinema movement.
"Microcinema is very
low-budget and truly independent," he said. "The
attitude is: I only have one or two thousand dollars, but there's
some technology out there that makes it affordable and I know some
people with skills so let's make a movie."
The CNGM partnership's
feature films to date include a horror movie, "The Legends of
Cuba Road," and a romantic comedy, "Please Wait to be
Seated" -- each made for less than $1,000.
"Fate Twisted
Simply" has roughly 50 times as much production value, taking
into account donated services and locations.
"Our earlier films
were more genre-based," Coulter said. "Now, instead of
imitating what Hollywood does on an extremely low budget, which
doesn't really work, we're trying to tell stories we don't see in
movie theaters.
"But our focus has
always been on story, script and performance rather than blowing
up cars."
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