Arts | 4/3/08

Media Credit: Patrick Smith [Click to enlarge]

The script was something different for Jason Stefaniak.

And that's what he wanted.

After predominantly writing about relationships, the senior electronic media and film major sought to stray away from his norm, crafting a script focusing on a mother-daughter dynamic.

But it wasn't working.

And it was the Friday before the Saturday morning class when he was supposed to have a second draft prepared.

So Stefaniak, the University Residence Government president, did what any film student would do: He watched a movie.

"I popped in 'Solaris,' the remake with George Clooney, because I really liked, not necessarily the story as much, but some of the directorial choices [Steven] Soderbergh made," Stefaniak said. "And based on watching that and some of the things he did, I had the movie playing and the script open on my computer and I wrote and it evolved back into a relationship thing."

Stefaniak speaks a mile a minute. In responding to questions, he's a leer jet, taking off into an answer, speeding through an idea. Statements are clarified and qualified with their responses. Punctuation is nonexistent.

"I didn't want to go back there," he said of the relationship story. "But I ended up going back there."

The end result, a short film "Look at Me," will screen at The Heritage Film Festival in Prince George's County on Friday, April 4.

The film was conceived as part of a directing class project, where Stefaniak was assigned the theme of disillusionment with a specific plot caveat: Somebody receives an e-mail, which causes them to do something and that causes them to make a decision that permanently changes their life. The 11-minute final product focuses on a young college couple living together when the woman discovers that she is pregnant.

"The film takes up from there and shows a good disillusionment of their relationship based on a choice that she makes," Stefaniak said.

Casting the film proved difficult for Stefaniak, as a scripted sex scene proved uncomfortable for many of the potential actors, but continuing with the theme of last minute solutions, Stefaniak cast his leaders in the proverbial eleventh hour.

Continued...

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