Screen gems

University of Central Arkansas film students Brandon Bristol and Allison Hogue made quite a splash at the 2011 Little Rock Film Festival’s 48 Hour Film Project competition with their short Home Tweet Home. Now they’re looking to cast their next project, a different kind of superhero story. Here’s what Bristol has to say about the project.

Q. What is the project you’re currently working on?

A. Death of a Superhero is a dramatic student short film being produced as part of the University of Central Arkansas’ undergraduate Digital Filmmaking Program.

Q. What is the film about and what are you hoping it accomplishes?

A. The story is of John Jonahson, the alter ego of Metro City’s greatest superhero, Captain Amazing. One night after a devastating battle with his arch-nemesis, Doctor Disaster, John loses his powers. John has to learn to cope with the loss of his identity, and examine the part that has been left behind. He tests himself to see if he is still capable of being what he wants so dearly to be: a hero.

The goal of the film is to take the world of superheroes that we all know and love and find a place for it within our everyday world. Comic book superheroes are the perfect American mythos. They developed their stories and mythos alongside America’s story itself, often becoming fantastic allegories for American zeitgeist over the past century. We want to use that rich heritage and create

a story that appeals on a personal level to the modern American.

Q. What stage of production of the film are you in right now? Have you already cast the film?

A. We are currently in the thick of preproduction. Our crew is hard at work scouting and securing locations. We have been researching locations in Little Rock and hope to shoot the majority of the film there. We have also been holding auditions in Conway, in conjunction with the university, and in Little Rock. We have an open audition in Little Rock scheduled for [today] at the public library downtown. We will be in the East Room from 12-5:45 p.m. We’re very excited to say we have officially cast Ali Mattox, from Little Rock Film Festival favorite Foot Soldier, in the role of Krissy, Captain Amazing’s number one fan.

Bristol, who wrote and will direct the film, says he expects it to run between 10 and 12 minutes. The entire crew will be UCA undergraduate film students, including producer Benjamin Smith, director of photography Kurt

Underwood, and production

designer Virginia Buff.

Bristol hopes to have the film financed by Feb. 1. To that end, a fundraising campaign has begun at the “crowd-funding” website Indiegogo. It can be found at indiegogo.com/death-of-aSuperhero.

Principal photography is scheduled from Feb. 15-22. Levi Agee is a programmer for the Little Rock Film Festival and the founder and host of Cameras on

the Radio. E-mail him at:

levifilm@gmail.com