48 Hour Film Project: A Cinematic Rush

No more watching from the sidelines for Dan Young. Nope. This year he is in the thick of things, having just completed his first marathon filmmaking weekend.

In 48 hours Young and his ragtag film crew managed to write, produce, edit and burn to DVD a complete character-driven movie. The result is "reUnion," which they will proudly premiere, along with about 28 of their fellow flash-mob filmmakers, when New Hampshire 48 Hour Film Project screens the fruits of everyone's high-speed labor June 13 at Cinemagic in Hooksett.

Young spent most of his adult life working life as a photographer with the late "Wild Bill" Melton of Wild Bill Studio in Manchester, until Melton's tragic death in a car crash in 2006.

Young had to reinvent himself, doing commercial photography and dabbling in film, something he and Melton had begun to experiment with.

Fast forward six years to find Young, 40, feeling ready for whatever comes next. When he's not working his day job for UPS he's likely doing some field work for the city's public cable station, , or refining his own big ideas for a feature film.

All that is to say that this past weekend, for Young, was the stuff of dreams.

"I've only ever been a spectator, watching from the sidelines –  or actually, on YouTube. Last year I was at the Somewhere North of Boston film fest and ended up sitting next to a producer of a movie. We got to talking, and she was the one who suggested I talk to the local cable people about picking up some work, so I did that," Young said. 

"She also said something I'd always known, but hadn't really taken to heart. She said if this is what you want to do, you gotta jump off the diving board and jump right in. That was my moment," Young said.

For the uninitiated, the 48 Hour Film Project is described as "a wild and sleepless weekend in which you and a team make a movie — write, shoot, edit and score it — in just 48 hours."

There are rules.

Most challenging, perhaps, is that each movie must only run between four and seven minutes in length after a feverish 48-hour scramble to get it done. So much more is left on the cutting room floor in the name of brevity.

New Hampshire's aspiring filmmakers assembled this past Friday night at Double Midnight Comics & Collectibles in Manchester, where they were briefed on this year's required elements –  a particular character, prop, line of dialogue and genre, that has to be incorporated into the movie.  By Sunday night at 7:30 p.m. the movie has to be conceived, executed, burned to disc and delivered back to Double Midnight.

The real reward comes three days later, when every film is screened during a secondary marathon at a a local theater which, for New Hampshire, will again be Cinemagic in Hooksett.

Organizer Bill Cote of Manchester said even the four teams who missed the 7:30 p.m. drop-deadline will have their movies screened during Wednesday's mega-screening event.

"We are so proud of all the competitors. We had teams from as far away as Berlin who came all the way down to participate.  Most importantly, all the teams had huge smiles on their faces when they came in to the drop-off.  And that's what it's all about.  Having a great time making movies," Cote said.

Following the screening, a panel of judges will determine winners in several categories, including one “Best Of” film to be sent to the international 48 Hour Film Project competition. Award winners will be announced at the “Best Of” NH 48 Hour Film Project screening, which happens Aug. 2  at Concord’s Red River Theatres.

Although New Hampshire's Fourth Annual 48HFP drew 29 teams, the competition is actually an international amateur filmmaking phenomenon – in 2011, nearly 60,000 filmmakers made 4,000 films in 96 cities on 6 continents. 

Young said he and his team decided to approach the challenge head-on. Rather than shoe-horning the required elements into a preconceived plot, they decided to build their movie around the hand that was dealt them.

The genre they were dealt was comedy, which was fine with Young, who is a Kevin Smith devotee. 

The other required elements for all teams this year included the following:

Line of dialogue: "It's been a long, long time."

Prop: A scarf

Required character: Doug or Donna Dupin, Water tester

After brainstorming well into Saturday morning, Young and his crew were on to something, a pretty great idea they abruptly scrapped after deciding it wasn't going in the right direction. The finished project, titled “reUnion," turned out to be a mockumentary of the life and times of fictional rock star, Jack Union.

This is the descriptive synopsis:

"Everyone knows Jack Union and the Jolly Rodgers.  They were the biggest thing to hit the music scene since the Beatles.  His rise to fame was swift and he led the high life.  His only companion was himself – and Linus –  but when Linus went missing, Jack spiraled down faster than ever.  Now, former band manager and part time drummer Nigel 'Vanilla Gorilla' Kringle is looking to get the band back together and he thinks he has found a way, by filming a documentary featuring Jack Union's past."

Yes, it was frantic. Sure, there were times when Young wasn't sure if it was all going to come together in time ("We may have been burning a DVD on the way back to Manchester Sunday night. Just maybe.")

But in the end, it was totally worth losing sleep over.

Young said the personal growth process that got him to the point of mounting a 48-hour filmmaking challenge includes learning that no man is an island.

"When I worked with Bill it was really just a one-man band making things happen. It wasn't until I sat watching the film credits at the SNOB festival that it hit me, that making these movies is not an 'alone thing.' I started thinking about who I knew and as I brought people on board as crew members, the team just kind of organically grew," Young said. 

Speaking of the team, he'd like to give props where props are due to his posse, who go by the collective name of Bank Holdup Films. They are no longer just a rag-tag bunch.

"Through this process we've truly become friends," Young said.

Roll credits:

Dan Young - Director/cinematography - Nashua

Brian Watson - Asst. Director - Manchester

Ryan Hayes - Asst. Director/Editor - Manchester

Kevin Potter - Actor - Milford

Dan Greenleaf - Actor - Manchester

Ian Hawkins - Actor -  Manchester

Kate Paulsen - Actress - Boston

Mary C. Wright - Actress - Plymouth

Lisa McHenry - Actress - Nashua

Scott Silva - Editor, Asst. Camera, B-Unit - Nashua

James Fogg - Production Sound Mixer - White River Junction

Raymond Peeples - Stills photographer - Litchfield

Laura Potter - Logistics - Milford

Sandra Silva - Graphic Designer - Nashua

Leilani Delmore - Asst. to Everyone - Manchester

List of 2012 48-Hour Film Project Tour

New Hampshire 48HFP Premiere Screenings