Photo courtesy of Phil Worfel

What could a pig farm have in common with Victorian England or a cutting edge barber shop? All three subjects are part of the stories in thesis films currently being produced by Compass Film Academy’s class of 2010. The projects this year are some of the most ambitious and complicated productions in the school’s history. Through it all, the students are hitting their marks with industry professionalism.

The first film shot this semester was a dark comedy entitled A Close Shave. This film follows a husband and wife as they respond (poorly) to a horrible accident in their small town barbershop.

“I think that all of our planning in pre-production came together really well during filming,” said Eric Sandefur, the director of the film. Blood effects had been tested weeks before so the visual effects operator knew exactly what needed to happen in the moment. The production lasted all night for four nights during the barber shop’s closed hours.

When shooting wrapped on A Close Shave, the students had less
than 24 hours to rest up and drive to Asylum Farm near Lansing, Michigan for The Opera Farmer, which is a film that tells that story of a middle-aged farmer who is faced with a choice between fulfilling his dream of being an opera singer or continuing the life he has built for himself on his farm. A unique story, to say the least, and one that immediately broke the old Hollywood dictum to “never work with children or animals.”

What the production lacked in children it made up for in spades by wrangling way more animals than any Compass production has ever seen: 4 Pigs; 5 Chickens; 1 Rooster; 1 Dog; 1 Pony; 4 Goats; and over 20 Sheep.

“At first, we were worried about working with so many animals,” says Elizabeth Nelsen, the producer of the film. “But the story was so compelling we had to figure it out.”

The group hired wonderfully talented Christine Mahaney, a professional animal wrangler, whose work includes the Johnny Depp film, Public Enemies. Elizabeth adds, “We found the experience on Asylum Farms to be very rewarding.”

Crashing Man, the third scheduled thesis film, is yet another first in Compass history. Steven Wygmans the writer and director of the film, along with producer Daniel Overton, put together a film in the genre of Steampunk. The majority of people that hear the term have no idea what it means. In deference to the uninitiated, here’s an explanation from Scifipedia.com. Steampunk is a subgenre of science fiction set in an era or world where steam power is still widely used (usually the 19th century) and often set in Victorian era England, but with prominent elements of either science fiction or
fantasy, such as fictional technological inventions like those found in the works of HG Wells and Jules Verne.

Sound like a tall order for a student short film? Tall order doesn’t even cover how challenging this production was.

“Since I was setting my ‘steampunk’ story in Victorian England, there were countless details that had to be figured out.” says Wygmans. “There were 20-30 major props and costumes not to mention the hundreds of tiny pieces of gears and dials and other minute components that the audience will most likely not even see.” It’s that level of detail that makes Crashing Man, perhaps, the most fully realized fantasy world that a Compass student has ever created. The thesis films will premiere August 11 at the Wealthy Theatre in Grand Rapids.