Dollar Baby: THE THINGS THEY LEFT BEHIND



I saw this first at Lilja's Library

This is from the press release, as posted on Dread Central:
In 2008 great American author Stephen King released Just After Sunset, a novel featuring a collection of short stories. One story, "The Things They Left Behind", is King's approach to the tragedy that struck NYC on 9/11. Almost a year after 9/11, strange things start happening to the main character, Scott Staley, who, at the time of the attacks, is employed at 'Light and Bell Insurance' on the 110th floor of the World Trade Center. Not only is Scott unable to get rid of his survivor's guilt, but things belonging to his late colleagues start to appear in his apartment.

After a run of bi-monthly short films on their YouTube channel, independent filmmaker Pablo Macho Maysonet IV and his Shattered Dreams Productions (SDP) sought out to obtain permission to produce a non-profit short film based on a story written by Stephen King through King's "Dollar Baby" program (in which King will allow a filmmaker to adapt his story for $1). This program was originally started when Frank Darabont, director of King's feature adaptations of The Shawshank Redemption, The Mist and The Green Mile, produced the short film adaptation to The Women in the Room in 1983. This would pave the way for other qualifying up-and-coming filmmakers to produce short film adaptations of King's work.


In late 2010, after signing a non-profit agreement with Stephen King, Maysonet was allowed to produce the emotionally charged adaptation of "The Things They Left Behind".


Production began in December of 2010 on a budget of $10,000 and included shooting in Times Square as well as various locations mentioned in the book. After completion, the film was immediately sent out to over 30 film festivals around the world including Sundance 2012. The Things They Left Behind is quickly stirring up attention around the world with festival screenings in Spain, Argentina and the Netherlands.


3 comments:

  1. This was a great little attempt on the part of a low budget adaption, the only problem is, it's got really bad acting and some horrible soap opera moments when the actors are playing for the camera, for low budget it is what it is, nothing great just some really bad acting that the viewer really can't over look. Stick with the short story.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I've never seen a Dollar Baby that I thought was very good (though I admittedly haven't seen too many). Even Darabont's "The Woman in the Room" is a little hard to watch. But, after all, they ARE amateur films.

    ReplyDelete
  3. I thought this movie hasn't been shown yet? How did you see it?

    ReplyDelete