Beginning early March, senior Max hunter began directing a short film titled “The Critters” with his fellow Audio/Visual (AV) II and Practicum classmates, set to release April 28.
“The whole plot is very random, but very fun,” Hunter said. “I really wanted it to just be kind of cute and silly.”
The film is characterized by a sort of “lost boy” theme, in which a pizza delivery guy ends up at the wrong house. Upon arrival, he is greeted by a group of “critter-children” (hence the lost boy vibe) who proceed to take the man on the journey of their rivalry against a group of supposed evil critters. Hunter prioritized organization of the project above all else, keeping a notes app of every shot she intended to film over the course of the project.
“I planned out every shot that I wanted to get,” Hunter said. “I storyboarded it very, very specifically and planned out which shot I had to get each day of filming.”
This was Hunter’s first time directing, yet she followed the production steps taught through the AV program as a guide.
“Before any project we have these big brainstorming sessions where we’ll use the whiteboard and kind of just spew out ideas,” Hunter said.
According to Hunter, “The Critters” began with the character of a pizza delivery man, however, throughout the brainstorming process, that idea evolved into what it later became.
“We like to hear ideas from everyone and just see what we want to do as a group,” Hunter said. “If we want it to be a comedy, or drama that’s where we start. We start by focusing on the genre we’re going for, or maybe the vibe we’re going for.”
Once the general mood of the film has been established, the group proposes a central idea which later branches off into more specific topics.
According to Hunter, the class attempted to film the entire project within the AV class periods, using various locations around the school such as the band parking lot as the settings for their production.
“There were enough locations around school,” Hunter said. “So we just blocked off a few class periods to film and then I made a calendar with exactly what and where we would film each day.”
Senior Maile Boswell acted as the “Cowboy Critter”, while helping some of the other actors with their critter makeup and costumes. Along with Boswell, the cast included junior Josh Goldfinger as the pizza guy, Hunter as the Raccoon leader of the critters, senior Baelen Schultz as the Cub Scout critter, senior Chris Castro-Cruz as the Panhead critter, junior Zach Thompson as the leader of the evil critters, senior Aidan Leach as the Hooded evil critter, senior Sophia Kincheloe as the Fox evil critter, and junior Aynalem Rehling as the Feathered evil critter.
“I helped everyone get into costume, especially yelling at Chris, Baelen, and Josh to get their makeup on, put on their costumes, and stay on task,” Boswell said.
According to Boswell, she typically takes on the role of either directing or playing the love interest in one of AV’s productions, however, this time, she enjoyed the more lighthearted nature of the cowboy role.
“Usually when it comes to film projects I feel like I’m typically directing or performing in something romantic,” Maile said. “So it was nice this time as I just got to play a friend and just be a goofy little critter.”
While Hunter was ultimately successful in the completion of the project, several bumps impeded the groups’ progress along the way. Hunter had a difficult time getting cast members to focus, leading to the deeper problem of the time crunch of completing all necessary shots in a singular class period.
“If you don’t organize it becomes a jumbled mess of nonsense,” Hunter said. “You kind of get lost and confused, and you end up adding, subtracting, and forgetting things.”
