It's only fitting that the Philadelphia-based production company Truly Brave Films is working with award-winning Philly screenwriter and director David Greenberg on Stomping Ground, a coming-of-age movie that recently launched a Kickstarter campaign for $12,000 in funding.
The production is assembling a team in less than two months to produce a feature-length fillm in two days.
“It's not enough to make a good movie. You have to make a marketable movie,” says the writer-for-hire and senior lecturer in screenwriting at The University of the Arts.
Greenberg really means that. A fan of and advocate for low-budget indie film production, Greenberg shot his 2009 feature film “Aftermath” in one day. He has written, edited and “doctored” more than 30 feature films, documentaries and shorts since 2006. Greenberg, a Temple University grad, won an award from The American Film Institute for his short film “The True Meaning of Cool.”
Stomping Ground is being referred to as “Stand By Me” meets “Mean Streets” — an attractive mix to most any film fan.
More on the story, from the Kickstarter:
Mike, Chris, Bobby, and Joe are life-long friends out for a rowdy good time that goes horribly wrong. They commit a random act of violence, savagely beating a young man.
The film begins with the boys cruising to their favorite spot in the park to lay-low and blow off steam. The beating is a non-issue until cell phones start ringing and they learn that their young victim has died from his injuries.
What was a random act of violence gone wrong soon pulls many factions they dread into the arena. Their friendship is pushed to the brink, the group buckles and strains under the darkest aspects of their personalities, and an earthshaking revelation muddies the waters further.
How does one even begin to try and make that work in two days? Stomping Ground is designed to be shot economically. It's described as a one-act play with six characters and one location.
When Joe Stinson, who has written five Clint Eastwood movies, including the iconic command “Go ahead, make my day,” read Greenberg's script, he acknowledged that Greenberg has broken almost every rule of screenwriting but still came up with a “script that works, that could be really innovative and revolutionary.”
The project has reached 10 percent of its funding goal with about three weeks left. Truly Brave's last Kickstarter campaign, for the short “Window,” was 115 percent funded. Truly Brave's Dan Zubrzycki has raised more than $20,000 to fund three separate short films.