Today I finally went to see Charlie St. Cloud, which features Zac Efron (High School Musical) in the lead role alongside Charlie Tahan (who is also in Meskada, an upcoming movie produced by my friend Jen Gatien) and Amanda Crew (The Haunting In Connecticut). Zac Efron plays Charlie St. Cloud, and Charlie Tahan plays his brother, Sam St. Cloud. Charlie is a sailor who lives with his mother and brother. Sam is getting baseball lessons from Charlie because their mother can’t afford to pay for summer camp and the brothers make a pact to meet up at a certain time every day to practice throwing and catching a baseball. One night Charlie is ambushed by his brother as he is pulling out of the driveway. Sam convinces Charlie to give him a ride to a friend’s house to watch the baseball game on TV. As they drive down the road they joke around, and Charlie begins to have some trouble keeping an eye on the road. They stop in the middle of the street, an error that leads to tragedy. Two cars hit their car in succession, and once they are pulled out of the totaled car, they are put in an ambulance, and this is when Sam dies. At this point in the film, I couldn’t help but cry. Not many films get that kind of reaction from me. During Sam’s funeral, Charlie runs off into the woods to the secret spot where he had promised to meet Sam every day… and when he gets there, Sam’s ghost is waiting for him. The brothers talk, bond, and practice with the baseball, and at this point Sam realizes if he shows up at the correct time each day, he can spend time with his deceased brother, as if his brother were alive. Charlie takes a job at the cemetery so that he can work close to his brother’s grave and gives up sailing. Sam isn’t the only ghost Charlie sees, he also ends up seeing a friend of his who died in military service, and when he talks to this friend, he is seen by his coworker from the grave yard, and his coworker thinks Sam is crazy, since he appeared to be talking to himself. Then Charlie one day meets Tess (Amanda Crew). Tess is complaining about the flowers being dead at her relative’s gravestone, and Charlie agrees to plant some new ones for her. Charlie continues to play baseball with his brother’s ghost, but as Charlie gets to know Tess, the more time he is spending with her. Ray Liotta (Heatbreakers) meets Charlie for lunch one day and tries to convince Charlie to begin living his life again. One day, spending time with Tess results in Charlie losing track of time and going late to the spot where he usually meets Sam. Sam is hurt by this, and points out to Charlie that Tess followed him to the spot. Charlie turns around, sees Tess, and Tess tries to comfort Charlie. Tess is planning on sailing around the world, a feat she says should take her up to 6 months, so she tries to explain to Charlie that she doesn’t know if their getting so close before she leaves is a good idea. Then one day she takes her boat out and there is a terrible storm. She decides to test her boat by sailing directly into the storm. She goes missing, and everyone assumes she is dead because the search parties could not find her. After a lot of grieving Charlie suddenly realizes she probably isn’t dead, because he figures out the coordinates of where she probably is on the basis of what he would do if he sailed through such a storm. As he is out searching for Tess, Charlie realizes that rescuing Tess will require him to miss his daily meeting with his brother, and that this means he may not ever get to see his brother’s ghost again. He decides to keep looking for Tess and he does find her, after spotting her capsized boats near a jagged rock embankment. The movie ends with Charlie going back to the spot where he usually meets his brother, only to find that now he can HEAR Sam, but not SEE Sam. Sam says goodbye at this point, and then Charlie goes to find Tess and the two live happily ever after. This movie is a high quality drama, one that stirs up lots of emotions, especially sadness, though there are also a lot of happy moments which keeps the movie balanced.
This past Sunday night I went to a private screening of the new short film "Crumble" which featured lead roles by Okasana Lada (The Sopranos), Alexandra Grossi (The Sheol Express), and Raymond Hamlin (Nightmare). I had been invited to the red carpet premiere but my RSVP wasn't found until the day after the event. So my friend Renata Lorenc invited me to a private screening party on Sunday, an event open only to Renata's friends, which was held at the home of a friend of hers here in NY. Renata wrote, directed, and produced for the film. The film is set to premiere in Los Angeles but there is also discussion about doing a tour of film festivals. The film was shot in just 4 days, but the script was thirtysomething pages long. The movie begins with Oksana trying to convince her new husband Michael (Hamlin) to stop using drugs, and her husband responds only to offer her cocaine, and then to hire a female prostitute Bianca (Grossi) to seduce Oksana. Bianca and Oksana meet out in the hallway and get a chance to talk. Oksana is already upset at her husband for being a junkie and derelict, so she is somewhat open to Bianca, who makes it clear she is attracted to Oksana and she reassured Oksana that Oksana is not a prostitution client to her, but rather someone who Biance genuinely likes. Oksana still says no to Bianca, though. Then she thinks more about the dysfunctionality of her relationship with Michael, and decides to go to the address listed on the business card Bianca gave her. It turns out to be the address of a nightclub where a drag queen is monitoring the front door. Oksana talks her way inside and finds Bianca. The two begin to dance together but someone interrupts and pulls Bianca away for a prostitution client. Oksana goes looking for Bianca and finds her drugged by the prostitution client, and gets upset, so she lifts Bianca up and tells Bianca she is going to take her out of the club to someplace safe. Suddenly the pimp who also doubles as Michael’s drug dealer shows up and tells Oksana he owns her now that Michael “sold” Oksana to the prostitution club and the pimp claims he now has the right to keep Oksana there forever and that she no longer has individual rights as a human being. At this point, Bianca is recovering from the drugs she was on, and she pulls out a gun and tells everyone to stay away or else the pimp will be killed. This results in a clean getaway for Oksana and Bianca who decide they will drive and keep driving until they find a suitable town or city to live in where the pimp won’t find them. This movie is to be commended for taking a strong stance against the enslavement of human beings by pimps. It makes an important statement against the trafficking of prostitution slaves. I have had the pleasure of working on two movie premieres for the Redlight Children foundation, an organization that uses films to raise money to fight child prostitution slavery. Also, Ashton Kutcher and Demi Moore have a similar organization that they set up to battle against the enslavement of children as prostitutes.
For information on these foundations visit:
http://www.redlightchildren.org
http://demiandashton.org
For information about Crumble:
http://www.crumblethemovie.com
For information about Charlie St. Cloud:
http://www.charliestcloud.com
Me with Director/Writer/Producer Renata Lorenc at the private screening of Crumble:
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