In a Hamilton kitchen, a movie scene is rehearsed: Actress Gina Christine speaks with her wayward son Joe on the phone while she makes peanut butter sandwiches.
"We haven't seen you in a while," she says. The conversation is terse, and significant for what's left unsaid. Christine hangs up and finishes making lunch for her two daughters.
"The towel on your shoulder is an interesting touch," director Matt Porterfield says, pleased with the rehearsal.
"I do that at home," Christine says.
As movie scripts go these days, this one is unusually understated. More of a tone poem than plot-driven, the story hangs loosely on the neighborhood quest of a 16-year-old to find the father of her child.
As script writers and directors go, 24-year-old Porterfield also is unusual. He's not crazy about dialogue, and isn't afraid to take big chances with his first independent, feature-length film.
"I'm inspired by what moves me in people: movement, gesture, sounds of voices, and in things, the colors and shapes," he says.
The film, which has the working title Hamilton, follows young mother Lena over two days, as she combs the northeast Baltimore community for Joe, who spends little time with her or their young daughter, Adeline. Soon, Lena and Adeline will leave to spend the summer with family on the Eastern Shore.
After a year of pre-production work, and a couple of weeks of rehearsals, filming starts Tuesday in the Hamilton home of Marge Ball and continues at other local locations, including the Edelweiss Bakery, Riha's hardware store and Kildaire Tavern.
Most of the cast (including Porterfield's grandmother, Marie Collins, who plays a "beautiful octogenarian"), are from Baltimore. Crew members hail from the city and as far away as France. Out-of-towners are staying at the home of Gordon Porterfield, Matt's father, who is a playwright and drama teacher at Roland Park elementary and middle public school.
Porterfield grew up in Hamilton and saw it as the ideal backdrop for his film. But the film, itself, is not about Hamilton, he says. Instead, it becomes some mythic place, where Lena and Adeline, according to the story treatment, travel in their search for Joe "through the neighbors' back yards, partially hidden amid the plush green leaves."
Porterfield attended film school at New York University for three years, dropped out and taught kindergarten for three years. Then he returned to Baltimore to make the movie. He recruited college friends Jordan Mintzer, 25, as producer and Jeremy Saulnier, 26, as director of photography. Both are volunteering their expertise.
