Blind Spots

I've had to do a lot of growing up in the past few years, and something that heavily influenced my life was coming out to my friends and family. I struggled with identity my whole life and was never living authentically, but three years ago I decided it was time. Even though I had a ton of support, there will always be people that treat you differently and start to show their true colors. For me, that happened to be with my best friends. I really struggled with the idea that these people I had been around for years were not who I thought they were; this image I had of my friends for so long was completely fading. This is where the idea for this film started.
I took the idea of how one instance can you make you see someone differently forever - that feeling when your role model stops being your role model. I formed a story around it and made it about two brothers, because, for me, these friends felt like brothers to me. I wanted to make the film look and feel familiar, so anyone viewing it can feel like they experienced something similar when growing up, so it has a nostalgic tone to it and takes place in the earlier 2000's.
I also wanted to add some subtle nods to sexual orientation without being upfront about it. This is a young boy who has a lot to figure out, but one thing is for sure: he's been trying to fit in by using this role model as a form of security - sacrificing his own feelings and desires to become an inauthentic version of himself. Sexual orientation is a slow realization for many and can take many years to discover, as it did for me, so I wanted to introduce the idea that Henry could have these feelings, but he is so young and naive that he couldn't possibly realize yet.

All of these ideas culminated in this short film and I couldn't be prouder of the cast and crew! This was my thesis film for my Narrative Filmmaking course before graduating and I was blessed to be surrounded by a plethora of brilliant filmmakers to help bring it to life.