Chicago Film Student's Last Stand.

Quirky, colorful, dark and lower budget films like “Party Monster” and “Boogie Nights” are not the ideal movies that inspire a filmmaker, but for Tory Bykowski-Newton, film student at DePaul University, underground films are an inspiration. Her creative visions are full of intensity and imagery; even her personal style is raw and artsy. She walks in with a purple scarf, chunky earrings and legwarmer-socks over her skinny jeans with beaten up low-top converse, she giggles as a warning she is ready to talk.

A glimpse of a Led Zeppelin wrist tattoo shows as she grabs for her coffee. As a security blanket to the conversation she takes a quick sip before talking. Timidly she explains her dream of becoming an independent film cinematographer, Newton says, “I want to work on Indie films outside of Hollywood, basically…anywhere but Hollywood because if I do end up in L.A. I would like to be outside the machine.” She ends her rant by saying, “I rather make something with meaning than something entertaining or thrilling.”

Over the summer, she studied in Rome, Italy and produced a film on beauty and adventure. This put her in a unique situation, rather than extending graduating for more experience, she is graduating early with gained experience. As she is half way through fall quarter, she is working on what is potentially her last film through DePaul. This is her time to create cinematography in turbo mode.

“Since it…it is my final film I want to utilize everything that is offered here…we don’t have to worry about getting a two-shot and work on dialogue which is boring,” says Newton.

The film she is working on is called “Joke’s On You.” The stressful series of events begins by having troubles casting actors because everyone they have seen is good, but not good enough.  Her film colleague, Joe Goudreault explains, “Finding an actor to play the clown is based more on how the person looks and their natural expressions since this is a part without dialogue.”

Joe Goudreault has a similar artistic fashion-sense as Newton with over-sized glasses, thrift-shop sweater and Herschel knapsack. They met two years ago and finished four films together. “Our biggest achievement was “Crosswinds,” which was created as an homage to Terrance Malick and went on to screen at the CineYouth Festival, put on by the Chicago International Film Festival,” said Goudreault. Terrence Malick is an American film director and writer, whose last film is “The Tree of Life” featuring Brad Pitt which was nominated for three Academy Awards in 2012.

“We took a class on him (Malick) and made a movie using his techniques,” Newton explained.

In this film is Jessie Buckley, Newton’s childhood friend. Buckley helped inspire Newton into doing films. She knew Newton had an eye for film ever since they would create silly home videos.

“Man…sometimes I wanted to get it done and she’d say, ‘No-no-no, no-no...you gotta cut it with the music,” Buckley reenacted with a smirk.

As an actor, Buckley was impressed with how she got to view Newton’s growth from amateur videos to professionalism by saying, “Those two kick major ass!” Buckley continued, “She’s great at making people feel comfortable, if it’s stressful for them they made sure it wasn’t stressful for us.”

They set high standards for their upcoming film because they believe their talent can open more doors. The main goal is to be entered in another film festival. “’Joke’s On You’ is really important to me…she (Newton) is talented at lighting and will get to show that off in the interior scenes…” states Goudreault. Staying positive Newton and Goudreault, hope this weekend at auditions, they find the actors they’ve been imagining and start filming.

A.C.O.D.: A Look Inside The Modern Family.

A.C.O.D. is a solid Sundance film that will most likely gain more viewers once it hits Netflix due to its minimal advertisement. The movie follows the life of a new generation, the life of an Adult Child Of Divorce (A.C.O.D.).  A cast with outstanding actors like Richard Jenkins, Catherine O’Hara, Jane Lynch and Jessica Alba then add the NBC comedic stars like Adam Scott and Amy Poehler from Parks and Recreation, with The Office’s Clark Duke, this could be a comedy Oscar pitch. The expectation for this comedy entails moments of grasping for air. The film had its laughing moments with parents bickering, awkward sexual scenes and the life of the upper class—stereotypical, maybe, but predictable only a little. 

The start of the movie is a dramatic event viewed through a video camera lens of two parents fighting at a birthday party. Surprise, the temperamental couple is Hugh (Jenkins) an old, rich, materialistic jerk and Melissa (O’Hara) loony, over-dramatic business manager. The world of Carter, Adam Scott, forever changes from that day.  Now both parents are on spouse number three, always trying to out-do each other. Relationships are hard to understand. 

Guessing from the movie poster, the film revolves around the life of Carter, who has grown-up into a successful adult or so he thinks. Beer-goggles fog up his view of trying to live a normal adult life despite a quirky, ugly, funny and traumatic divorce. He supports his brother Trey, Clark Duke by letting him live in his garage. Trey is getting married to his girlfriend of four-months, while Carter has a girlfriend of four-years and hasn’t given her a key to his home. This eloping means bringing the parents together to tolerate each other in the same room.

Through chaos Carter reaches out to his therapist, Dr. Judith (Lynch), only to find out she is a scientist researching psychotherapy of children of divorce. Lynch is great, her scientific, hippy-aura plays off smoothly with the frantic “case studies.” It is believable that she is there to inspire and study rather then play therapy lesson with her subjects.

There comes a point when Carter sets his parents up to have dinner, thinking he resolved their tolerance for each other, but he may have resolved feelings more than tolerance. Carter’s internal struggle and desire for his parents to never get along conflict who he is, this socially and professionally successful man has flaws. The dialogue of divorce gives this film a serious undertone loosing its comedic flare. There are times when you laugh, but by the end there’s a wallowing feeling to emote for Carter because he has shame or struggles accepting how he handles conflict when he shelters his brother so much that he never saw pain from the divorce or when he verbally states he doesn’t want to be a part of the family as any easy way out.  

People who are not from a divorced home can still enjoy the movie and relate to the main character with how family affects your future judgment. A.C.O.D. is a journey through a modern family life rarely viewed naturally without negative reflection.  As the credits role, clips of employees on the set talk about how they are all children of divorce, minus a few born into “happy” marriages. It also feels like you’re leaving an A.C.O.D. group meeting giving a melancholic thought of marriage having a high chance to never work out. The closing confessions, even admitted by the director, Stu Zicherman, give the movie its full honest truth. Divorce is real and common—a natural habit and family is forever. 

"A.C.O.D." – 3 stars

MPAA rating: R (for language and brief sexual content drug)

Running time: 1:28

Opens: October 11, 2013

"Catchy Horn Lines, Soulful Vocals."

A night full of bands with smoker voice-boxes, angry dancing and drinking to forget they came from a nine to five office job would typically fit-in around the Bucktown to Logan Square bubble. However, last Thursday, “Punk Night” made its way to the Gold Coast at The OriginalMother's…thanks to Bravo Artist. These bands made sure their landlord knows, they f---ing hate him. 

Not all bands had a traditional anarchist sound. Near the end of the night, Run and Punch, a funky, jazzy, reggae-esque ska band came on. Their energy was out of control, the crowd's dancing wiggled naturally to the rhythm.  The six-man band, including a trumpet and trombone, had their newest a female-frontman, Laura Camacho.

Camacho is a bartender on nights she isn’t performing and in the day she is a student studying vocal performance in classical and jazz at Northeastern Illinois University. We met at her bar in Bucktown, chatting on the smokers patio in the back. She comments on their sound, “We’re very versatile because everyone can play so many different instruments, when someone comes up with a song idea, we can do it, song ideas come from everyone…it definitely makes the music diverse because it’s coming from different people, different minds, tones…“ After a regular interrupts her to say hello, she continues, “we try to keep it sassy…just keep it sassy.“

Camacho believes in the importance of reading the crowd’s vibe to give a top performance. “At the end of the show I was getting hoarse…I felt my voice snap three songs from the end,” she exaggerated sounding out of breath. Her goal was to emphasize their punk sound, “I was screaming more…the music is still going to be the same, the performance is gunna be dif, it’s gunna have that punk edge.”

The band’s photographer, Vanessa Bly has known the band for ten years.  When they got Camacho, she knew the band found its missing piece. “I pulled Anthony to the side and told him, ‘this is the best band you have ever played with that singer just blew my mind with her scat’.“ After Bly slyly admits she mainly listens to country and female vocals like, Ellie Golding, and referred to the ska genre as “whatever,” however, she surprises herself with how Run and Punch grabs her attention. 

As an outsider watching the band…the band’s passion has its own energy. They work for personal and group goals, even “ska scene” goals. Challenges and variety are elements they’re smart and savvy about. Bly lost for a word to conclude says, “These guys are serious at their music and they sure as hell know how to market themselves.”

Run and Punch is in the running for the RAWawards, an independent music award, which fans can vote on their Facebook page. Their music is easily available on their website, iTunes and SoundCloud. 

As for the next Bravo Artist event, they trade-in Doc Martins for cowboy boots, it’s Country Night.  

Will You Survive The Carnivale?

October has finally approached us. The air is filled with pumpkin spice latte tweets, getting homemade costume ideas from Pinterest and local showings of nostalgic Halloween movies like, Hocus Pocus for the ‘90’s kids or The Exorcist for the vintage folk. Besides looking for an infinity scarf that matches your new Steve Madden boots, the chilly air is perfect for Halloween activities with a group of your closest friends---the classic haunted house.

Behind Metra tracks hiding in a block of storage units is FearCity. FearCity is one of the top haunted houses in the Chicago area. Last year they combined with Fables Studios Interaction Attractions to bring a bonus room to their event.  Entering this rundown warehouse, all you hear is heavy guitar shredding music, blood sliding down faces, the papery smell of a fog machine and a Boxer puppy named Buddah, who properly greets you with slimy kisses.

Fables Studios provides a communication element to the classic haunted house. This twist gives the audience a theatrical experience, like a comedy show, that makes the audience feel a part of the production---instead of laughs they’ll be getting screams.

Peter Tomeczko, owner of Fables, runs his business with his wife Deondra Tomeczko with help from his mother and friends. Deondra said they design, construct, choreograph and cast the attraction all on their own. They love the work they do. When Halloween is not in season, they sell props and costume featured on their website, which are made authentically by Pete.

In dimmed lighting, in the heat of a technical rehearsal, Peter’s mother told a story about her getting a phonecall. She knew it was Halloween season when her son asked to use some furniture and antiques from the basement, she thought it would be a few items, but when he came over, he was yelling at the truck driver it’s clear to back-up into the garage.

This year’s theme is Carnivale. “The idea of the characters….well they are generations of underground ‘carnies’…who went into hiding…now exposed  years later from FearCity’s CTA tunnels,” says Tomeczko. “They’re really messed up,” interrupted Deondra.

Games are the newest elements to the attraction. Guests will have to play games to move onto the next part of the maze. “I am a huge gamer,” says Tomeczko. The concept of moving onto the next level inspired him to incorporate that into his maze to create more suspension.

For being an interactive experience auditions are a large component because improv creates the success of the haunt. Auditions consisted of simple improv games. Grace Lusk, a Chicagoland stand-up comedian, says she really enjoyed the audition process, “Auditioning for Fables was fun. I got to play a junkie school girl and I’m pretty sure I nailed it.” 

Once placed in the haunted house Lusk realized the importance of her acting experience because of the element of spectacle connected with the scare.

“The interactive portion made the job more difficult because they relied heavily on timing for the proper reaction from the patrons,” she said.

Fables pride themselves with the hard work they put in to make a unique experience of actor and audience enjoyment. The third wall goes away and guests feel placed in a Carnivale underworld. According to Shannon Larkin, drummer of metal band Godsmack, it’s the place to go to get spooked out.

Fables Studios Interactive Attractions will open at 7 P.M. every weekend of October.   Tickets are $15 and can be purchased at the gate or online. For exact dates and details visit their website here.