It’s 2:30 a.m. Seven students stand around a cold basement with a camera, lights and a boom mic, all directed toward a large hole in the wall. All eyes are focused on a pale, bloody arm as it emerges from the ominous hole and grabs the lead actor by the shoulder. The actor screams “cut!” The students gather around the camera to see if they got the shot they needed.
Welcome to the Bijou Art Cinemas 72-Hour Horror Film Festival, where local filmmakers produce a 2-3 minute film in just two and a half days. Sound simple? UO senior and Cinema Studies major Jenna Townsend and seven other UO students gave up their weekend to write, shoot and edit their own short horror film.
The members of the group found each other through University Film Organization, UO’s filmmaking club. Seven students expressed interest and they all met on Oct. 22, two days before the official start of the festival. Most of the members had never spoken before, but all shared the desire to work hard and have fun.
“I’m doing this to experience the adrenaline. I’m moving to Austin where there are a ton of film festivals, and I want to gain experience,” Townsend said at the meeting.
Besides Townsend, the initial group consisted of Meghan Hodge, Marley Orahood, Mario Calabrese and Emily Adamiak, who are all Cinema Studies majors. It also included Cathryn Phetsomphou, an art major, Eli Perkins, a General Social Sciences major and Brady Cox, a biology major.
They discussed possible directions to go with the short film and outlined a plan for the 72 hours. One of the biggest parts of the initial meeting was the decision to not delegate specific roles to people, but instead to work collaboratively.
Thursday, October 25, marked the first day of the festival. Contestants gathered to receive their mandated line of dialogue and prop. The line of dialogue was, “I’d should know, Sir, I’ve always been here,” and the prop was a tennis ball, both allusions to Stanley Kubricks, The Shining.
Calabrese, Hodge and Townsend brainstormed for two hours.
“I think the scariest stuff is supernatural,” said Calabrese, a strong lover of horror films.
Besides supernatural scares, the group discussed shadows, werewolves, mad scientists, twist endings, decrepit old men and haunted movie theaters. Like true film students, they strayed off topic only to discuss Quentin Tarantino.
One of the hardest parts about coming up with a story was finding a way to come up with something completely original. Because horror is such an expansive genre with several subgenres, it’s difficult to come up with someone who has never been done before.
Every time they group hit their stride in discussing a new idea, they also reminded each other of the tennis ball prop they were required to use. Should it roll? Bounce? Be bloody? After a lot of arguing, Townsend, Hodges and Calabrese came up with a rough story.
A guy and a girl on a blind date leave a theater. The guy starts talking about how much he hates the director of the film they had just seen, whom the girl is actually a psychotic fan of. They get back to the girl’s house and she kills the guy. Blackout.
The next day, the group had an entirely new story concept. Inspired by a large hole in Hodge’s eerie basement, this idea was simpler than the original because the entire film could be filmed in Hodge’s house.
A guy has just moved into a house with random roommates. He’s home alone when he hears a guitar playing. He plays tennis ball with a cat, which chases the ball into the basement. The guy sees a sign that says ‘don’t let the cat into basement,’ so he goes down to get the cat. There, he sees a huge black hole, where a hand comes out and grabs him. Blackout.
The group shot until 2 a.m. Friday night, getting most of the filming done. Or so they thought. Upon looking at the footage on Saturday, they realized the lighting was bad and that most of the scenes needed to be reshot.
Although stressful, most of the members of the group agreed that the experience would be helpful for any later filmmaking. Around 10:30 p.m., after a Dough Co., break and a consequent morale boost, the group was ready to shoot again. After spending an hour getting Walter the kitty to cooperate, tension started to kick in.
Because nobody had specific positions, people had clashing opinions on all different aspects, from the script to the camera angles. Hodge shared in this frustration. “I almost wish it was an application process or something, so that every single thing didn’t have to be hashed out,” she said.
Townsend also felt the tension. Around 3:30 a.m., she likened the experience to being stuck in an elevator with a large group of people. “I’m losing my mind,” she said.
The group faced further conflict when their actor, Steve Coatsworth, didn’t show up until 1:30 a.m. Productivity decreased during these hours, as people took frequent fresh air and coffee breaks.
At 3:50 a.m., the glorious words, “that’s a wrap” were finally spoken. With tired grins and baggy eyes, everyone hugged it out. The plan was to have only three people edit the following day in order to speed the process along. With that decided, everyone went home to get a few precious hours of sleep.
At 4:30 p.m. on Sunday, the group suffered another major setback. All of the edits to the film were accidentally deleted. With three and a half hours until the film’s deadline, the group started to panic. They buckled down, finished the editing at 6:55 p.m. All the group had left was to put the film onto a disc and drive it to the Bijou. Unfortunately, they suffered one final setback when they experienced technical difficulties putting the film onto a disc and did not make the 8 p.m. deadline.
Despite not being able to enter the festival, their film was still completely finished in 72 hours. Eight students, mainly strangers, wrote, shot and edited an entire 3-minute film in 72 hours; this in itself could be a horror film. Although disappointed, the group was proud of their work and grateful for the learning experience.
Friday night, Cox had said, “Even if it’s a failure, I’ll be happy to say ‘I got that under my belt.’ My goal is to learn something new every time I do this, to constantly advance the knowledge I have.’”
They weren’t the only group who didn’t turn their film in. Out of the 29 original groups, there were 20 films completed by deadline. However, proud of what they were able to accomplish, the group still went out for a celebration dinner that night.
“It sucks that we weren’t able to finish the film, but we do have a finished product and raw footage that we can re-edit and make even better for the future,” Townsend said, “and it was such a fun weekend bonding and making new friends.”
The group plans on possibly making the film longer and entering it in UFO’s annual film festival in the Spring.
Check out “Lived In,” here: