Filmmakers' experiment thinks inside the box

"Thinking outside the box" just got turned on its head. \nIn the case of filmmakers Adam Carroll and David Mickler, creativity comes from inside the box. They are shooting one scene from their film, "Conversations with the Almighty," by placing a camera inside of a box to capture the action from a different angle.\nIt is 10 o'clock on a cold night in early February at screenwriter Mickler's apartment. Both he and director Carroll prepare for the first dialogue scene of the movie. As they review the storyboards for the upcoming shoot, only one thing is missing: the lead actress.\nThey tend to shoot the film at random intervals -- whenever both the directing team and the actors are available, Carroll said. Tonight, with sleet falling outside, they start only 30 minutes behind schedule.\nThat's when senior Jenna Weinberg, who plays the character Mary in the film, arrives and joins Ross Matsuda, who plays Patrick, to shoot a dramatic argument between the characters. For this scene, Carroll said he wants to run through all of the scene's actions four times, shooting from four different angles to later edit into a sequence of varied shots.\nMany of the actors in "Conversations" have theater experience, but acting in a film is a change on several levels, said junior Lauren Clemmons.\nClemmons, who plays Mary's friend Lillith, said some of the differences can be liberating for a stage actor, but others elongate the process.\n"I think film is a lot more difficult because (it is) a lot more technical and more about the director's vision of how he wants everything to look," Clemmons said. "You also get as many chances as you want to make things look exactly how you want them (in the film)." \nAfter reading through the entire heated argument a half dozen times, nearly two hours have passed. When the camera rolls, however, the cast and crew are all business.\nMickler systematically cluttered his apartment for the scene, in which Mary is packing and leaving Patrick, whose life and home are a mess. \nDespite the obstacles, Carroll navigates his camera to shoot amid the multitudes of movies, music and what Mickler describes as "terrible screenwriting books" on the bookshelves and floor. \nOne of the final shots of the night comes from the perspective of the box, where Weinberg is placing her books. Supposedly only a few seconds of the shot will make the scene's final cut, but the entire dialogue is read again for the angle, which is standard practice for this film.\nCarroll, dressed in an athletic T-shirt, suit pants and tennis shoes, conceals his hair under a worn Louisville Cardinals hat. His eyes survey the scene before he shoots it, looking for any necessary last-minute changes.\nCarroll also follows the night's action with his own small digital camera, recording a small "making-of" tape as a keepsake of the experience.\n-- Contact Staff Writer Josh \nKastrinsky at jkastrin@indiana.edu.