After three years of Filmmaker’s Club trying to complete a project, the members finally produced a movie and hope to continue making a movie every semester. The Filmmaker’s Club will be showing its original short film “Mac and Sunny,” a comedy about two buddy cops who are promoted to detectives after the rest of the precinct quits, 7 p.m. Friday at the Aquadome.
Graduate student Jamie Garland, Filmmaker’s Club vice president, said she and club president senior Katey Stoetzel accepted leadership positions three years ago when all the other club members graduated. Garland says lack of interest in certain aspects of filmmaking — such as the technical side of producing and acting — were factors that kept the club from making a film, even though club members had experience as leaders and talent in screenwriting. Garland says being a leader in Filmmaker’s Club has given her great filmmaking experience.
“I’m currently trying to get internships and jobs out in Hollywood, so being able to put down that I was vice president of film club and some of my scripts have been filmed that I can show them is nice,” Garland says. “It’s good practice to learn how a film set works and practice things.”
Garland says being a part of Filmmaker’s Club and minoring in film studies helped solidify her passion for film. Garland says she wants to pass her love for film on to the younger members of the club. She says she hopes Filmmaker’s club finds new members that can stay on the path she and Stoetzel have sent the club down.
Junior Will Fries, who directed “Mac and Sunny,” joined Filmmaker’s Club this year. Fries says he likes the technical side of film, and the club dynamic this year has changed from watching and appreciating films to actually making them because of more members in the club like him who are passionate about camera angles, sound, equipment and acting.
This story originally appeared in the April 28 edition of the Index. To read more, pick up a copy on newsstands now.