Middleschool shorts

Callum, removing his cool knit hat to play the vicar, is a good sport as he dies five time to get the shots we need. He hasn't planned to be in our film, but he comes along to help Rebecca in her baby--she's written, is starring, and is one-quarter directing a murder mystery at Youth Club--and Callum, the first to arrive, is conscripted to play the vicar. He puts on our foam-and-printer-paper vicar collar we made which shows up well on film even if it seems ridiculous and he promptly dies five times.

It's a Clue game, really, with the vicar getting murdered, pandemonium ensuing, and set at ease by the arrival of Rebecca as English bobby PC Mc'D. She interviews everybody, finds someone has been stealing from the collection plate, someone is jealous of the vicar's flowers, another mad that the vicar asked her to stop eating chocolate because she is on a diet. Not much of a reason to kill someone, but it is the evidence at the crime scene. That is, until Rebecca--that is, PC Mc'D--accuses one, then another, before finally one of the accused asks, "Wait, where were you at the scene of the crime?" PC Mc'D nervously puts her hands to the side before it comes out: "He had it coming! I mean, I'm PC Mc'D, the world-renowned serial killer of vicars, it's my job! The Mc'D stands for: 'McDeath!' Mwahahaha!" Then the lights go off and she's escaped and a "To Be Continued..." slugline crawls across the bottom of the screen.

Odd sort of story, sure, but Rebecca wrote it herself, organized all of the actors and their costumes, and then she starred in the thing. We're shocked by how well the middle school actors snap from shrieking to in-character the moment we call action, and they're not a bit shy under the lens that freezes us forever in a moment of time. We split the directing credit four ways, for Ryan, me, James our IT-loving 9th year, and Rebecca. It's a true ensemble, with James or Ryan setting the shots, me directing the kiddos, and always checking with Rebecca making sure it all fits her vision. We'll get it edited and ready to shoot a different project next week, tired and somewhat daunted, but this is where we are at the moment, simple as that.