Filmmakers Zoom In On North Jersey Heroes [Video]

FRANKLIN LAKES, NJ — A man who farms 100 feet from a major highway. The owner of a gym for special needs children. These are the people, the heroes of North Jersey who might never be known if not for Beard & Bowler Productions

Beard & Bowler Productions is a two-person company. Jason Ellinger and Matt Carpenter are two guys who only want to show the good side of North Jersey and the surrounding area. The company is a labor of love.

Ellinger was working as a FIOS1 cameraman doing the same thing, asking the same questions, shooting the same kind of stories day after day. Many of them dealt with negative subjects.

“I just felt that what I was doing wasn’t making a difference,” said Ellinger, a Saddle Brook resident.

Ellinger and Carpenter’s wives grew up together. The guys became friends in college a decade ago. Last year, they started talking about making a difference in the world.

“We started asking ourselves, ‘What if we could tell positive stories about people who are doing it right?” Ellinger said. “How do we highlight the things that don’t get attention? How would it look if we could be the hero guys?”

They talked about what they wanted their legacy to be. That's when it hit them: They would only tell positive stories.

“That’s where the different is,” said Carpenter, a Franklin Lakes native.

They had a vision. Now they needed the money. Enter the DSM Group in Mahwah, a marketing, advertising and public relations agency.

The guys worked exhaustively on a business plan for four months, only to have to rewrite it in a few days and find a matching investor. They did. That was about nine months ago. Now, they are looking for sponsors.

The guys travel around the area with their GoPro cameras and find stories no one else will tell, that no one else wants to tell. They meet people in their homes and at their businesses. They're heroes writing about heroes.

The guys have high standards too. They will not work with brands or companies that add to the degeneration of society or that belittle or sexualize women.

“Why would we want to do anything that would contribute to that?” Carpenter asked.

The guys have produced several short commercial pieces and a few longer-form ones so far, but they want to do bigger, longer films.

Many of the films on the company’s YouTube channel are of the guys going out and working. They take viewers along for the ride, something other production companies shy away from. For Ellinger and Carpenter it’s about the journey and the destination.

“We want to take people on this journey with us,” the guys said.

For more information about Beard & Bowler visit beardandbowler.com or see their Facebook page at facebook.com/beardnbowler.

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Photo, from left: Jason Ellinger and Matt Carpenter/By Daniel Hubbard