Most students who like movies spend their free time at the theater. But two juniors decided to produce their own feature-length horror film–shown at AMC theater showplace 12.
Since they posted “Unsettled” on YouTube in December, it has amassed more than 800,000 views.
“Our plan was to make a little short film and post that, and we decided that it could be a cool intro to a movie,” said Brendan Cioe, who made the film with his fellow Marketing student Brendan Kerrick.
Then it just grew.
The idea of the first few scenes came to them in April of 2022, but they sat down to start the writing process that fall. The entire project took a year and a half to finish.
“I like the creative side of it,” said Kerrick. “You start from scratch, then you think of one idea and build off of it. It’s fun to write the story, but it’s also fun to put it in visual form.”
The pair had big plans, which they had to bring to life with a filmmaking budget of $5,000. With help and support from community sponsors, they were able to generate another $5,000 for advertising and a single showing in a [local?] theater.
“When we wrote the movie, it was more so ‘let’s not limit ourselves to anything’,” said Cioe. “I don’t want to limit our creativity because we do not have a budget.
“You can do a lot with a little,” he said.
The film follows two college students, Jesse (Kerrick) and Andrew (Cioe), as they move into an abandoned house with a tragic history. With themes of possession and betrayal, the story has the formula of a horror/psychological thriller.
They shot the film in about six months, using mainly locations in Dyer. To make the film, the duo recruited friends and volunteers. There were times when they had to take on the bulk of the work – which bled into the late hours of the night.
“The biggest issue was having two people [doing everything] each day,” said Kerrick. “When you don’t really have any help, you have to at each scene move the light and somebody has to go outside and be out there at 2 a.m.”
The partners took their difficulties in stride.
“There were a lot of learning curves in it, but it teaches us,” said Kerrick.
Their passion for films and filmmaking has spanned years, and they are already making plans beyond the horror genre.
“We both do at some point want to make a comedy movie. That’s probably our next feature film,” said Kerrick.
The film “Unsettled” can be found on the YouTube channel “BK Films.”
