Alexandra Barreto's short film "Career Day"

What a busy 48 hours I had this weekend! After attending and writing about the NY premiere of Thomas Dekker and Natasha Lyonne's new film "All About Evil", I got an email at the last minute informing me there would be a screening of "Career Day", a short film I'd been wanting to see because Alexandra Barreto (Pepper Dennis, Blood Makes Noise) plays the lead role in the film. It screened Saturday afternoon at the New York International Latino Film Festival, presented by HBO. The movie begins with Alex cooking in the kitchen as her son asks her if he can go to work with her so he can write about her job for his school's parent "career day" assignment. Alex denies his request, telling him that since she works in a hospital, she doesn't want him going there and catching a disease from any of the sick patients. The kid doesn't want to take no for an answer so he follows the bus his mother takes to work, only to find that she exits the bus in front of a strange building, clearly not a hospital. Somehow he talks his way into the establishment which turns out to be a stripper bar. He even manages to get served alcoholic beverages at the bar, and then trouble ensues when he confronts Alex about her true profession as a stripper. Alex is to be applauded for taking this role in a film clearly meant to humanize strippers, and by extension, prostitutes, clearly with the message that strippers and prostitutes are not objects or degenerates, but rather real human beings faced with tough and tragic lives with issues beyond their control that drag them, involuntarily, into an underworld they would prefer not to be in at all. Some feature length films have carried the same message. "Joyride" (Tobey Maguire, Amy Hathaway), "Twist" (Nick Stahl, Tygh Runyan), "Whore" (Thomas Dekker, Megan Fox), and "Where The Day Takes You" (Lara Flynn Boyle, Will Smith)" all had plots or scenes meant to compel empathy for those who have the misfortune of being forced by circumstance into the world of stripping and/or prostitution.

Alex is currently involved with two other short film projects where she is collaborating with her boyfriend Rider Strong (Boy Meets World, The Penthouse) and his brother Shiloh Strong (The Mommies, Dinotopia). She is playing the lead in their upcoming short film "Dungeon Master", which Rider and Shiloh wrote, directed and produced. Additionally, she recently finished writing a short comedic film of her own, "Method", about an actress who takes her job way too seriously. "Method" is also a collaboration with Rider and Shiloh producing & directing, and Alex acting. So far they haven't posted either film on IMDB, but both films and the process of making them are discussed on Rider and Shiloh's blog. The brothers made their debut as filmmakers in 1998 with their short "Irish Twins", which I attended the premiere of at the Tribeca Film Festival. An excellent film which won awards at some of the other festivals it played at, I was impressed at how it had the quality of a major studio production, and it definitely overshadowed the other films it was competing with.

For more information on "Career Day" and future screening notifications, you can visit Foe Killer Films' Facebook page
http://www.facebook.com/FoeKillerFilms

To read about Rider, Alex and Shiloh's work on "Dungeon Master" and "Method", check out Rider and Shiloh's blog at
http://www.strongbrothersmagicshow.blogspot.com

Trailer for Career Day:

Career Day teaser trailer from Foe Killer Films on Vimeo.

Trailer for Irish Twins:

Irish Twins Trailer from Meyer Management on Vimeo.

Me at the screening of "Career Day":