Production Notes

Today is an exciting day for me! We are launching the brand new, refurbished, shiny, and exciting web site for The Broken Road for world to see in all its wonderfulness.

This project has been a great experience for me to work with some of my friends to help get this movie off the ground. It has been a culmination of at least 55 hours of work. We are working create other avenues for updates on places such as the Facebook group and Myspace page.

Over the next few months, we’ll be updating this site with new features and content like additional trailers, wallpaper and posties for your blogs and websites. To stay updated via email you can register for our email newsletter which we’ll send out when we add new features or have news to report.

Michael Fulk is the web programmer for the official website. He hopes that this is just the beginning of many films to come.

Had a wonderful crew who was willing to stay up all night to shoot the final scene of the movie at Madison Grill (3003 Madison Ave.) here in Indianapolis. Tim Green, the owner of the grill was kind enough to let us shoot at his restaurant. It has been such a privilege to travel across Indiana and to meet such great people who were willing to support independent films let us shoot on their property. As a filmmaker it is particularly important to me to build relationships with people in the communities in which I am filming. I want it to not only be a positive experience for me, but more importantly for the business owners who allow us to shoot on their property. I really appreciated Lori Reinhardt and Jim Snyder who were willing to fill in for the parts of Cheryl and Shiloh on such notice. Everyone had tremendous performances including Jeremy N. Fisher and Jascha Updike. I was extremely happy with all the hard work and positive attitudes of everyone. We finally finished around 8 am. Today I had the privilege of calling a wrap on principal photography. After 20 long and exciting days the movie is finally shot. The adventure is only beginning. There is still a monumental amount of work to be done before the release on June 1, 2007. Stay tuned… before too long we’ll have a trailer cut and on the website for you to view.

Woke the crew around 4:30 am ate breakfast, packed the Suburban and headed west. Observed a beautiful sunrise around Divide. We continued past florissant and stopped just west of Wilkerson Pass (elevation: 9507 ft.) to film on a spectacular section of road that stretches out for miles through a vast valley surrounded by mountains. The temperature was 28º F when we started, but warmed up into the upper 30’s by the time we filmed the motorcycle riding on the road. Neil Karwath served as Jascha’s stunt double for the motorcycle scene due to his previous experience with bikes. We finished around 11:00 am and headed back east to Colorado Springs to film the Pawnshop scene. Eddie Leon, the owner of Zaps Pawn & Loan (932 S. Academy) was kind enough to give us permission to shoot a scene at their store. Everyone at the shop was so kind and supportive of our project. If you are in Colorado Springs please stop in for a visit. After finishing at the pawnshop we dropped off the bike, said goodbye to the Odoms and returned the U-haul trailer. We started our long journey back to Indiana and arrived early Sunday afternoon. A special thanks to all you who prayed for the trip. I saw the faithfulness of God.

I want to thank my friend, James Odom and his family, who hosted us during our scouting trip, arranged for a place to stay on this trip, and loaned us his motorcycle. I appreciate his kindness and support of my film project. Slept in this morning since we arrived so late last evening. Spent the rest of the morning tracking down a U-haul rental center, renting a trailer, and location scouting for a pawn shop. During the afternoon we loaded up the bike in the trailer and headed north west towards Woodland Park. We drove up into the mountains on Rampart Range Road and returned to a stretch of scenic road which I noted during the scouting trip in July. It was a challenge working in between clouds that drifted in front of the sun, however we managed to get the whole scene shot before the sun went down. After I called a wrap I got to take the motorcycle for a spin for a couple miles. It was a blast!

Woke up to a beautiful and clear day. Spent the day driving around the park shooting various shots of Jascha on his journey to the “rock” where he will complete his mission. We traveled as far up the Trail Ridge Road as possible in search of the “rock”. While we were up there we ended up unknowingly loosing the cinesaddle (a beanbag camera support) because the of the fierce wind gusts. We came down from the road and found the perfect “rock”. It was at the moment that we realized that we had lost the cinesaddle. At the very moment we were discussing its disappearance a car drove up behind us and a lady asked if the beanbag thing was ours. We couldn’t believe it! God answered our prayer even before we had a chance to pray - it was a miracle! Finding the “rock” was an answer to prayer in itself. I had no clue where we would film this important scene, yet God knew and directed us to the perfect spot. We finished up the day shooting other shots of Jascha walking across wide open spaces. After the sun set behind the mountains we left Rocky Mt. NP and headed for Colorado Springs. Arrived in Colorado Springs around 11:00 pm and crashed at the Reformed Presbyterian Church in Colorado Springs who was kind enough to let us stay in their building.

Left last evening and drove through the night and arrived at Rocky Mountain National Park this evening. Filmed a few shots before the sun set behind the mountains. There have been many challenges leading up to the departure for Colorado. God has been faithful and has provided. I am not only directing this portion of the film, but also filming it. I am grateful for Neil Karwath (Executive Producer) and his son Graham (Production Assistant) for volunteering of their time and resources to make this trip possible. Jascha completes the group of four who are along for the adventure. Camped at the Moraine Campground. Jascha built us a very nice campfire which helped ward off the bitter cold gusts of mountain air.

We had a successful afternoon/evening shooting at Mike’s Service center on the south-side of Indianapolis. Mike and his crew were kind enough to take their entire Saturday to support our film. When one of our actors didn’t show due to a mix up in communication, Mike (the owner of the service center) stepped in and played the role of Virgil, Mile’s boss. It was a long day of shooting. Thanks to all of you who showed up and helped with the shoot. We are especially grateful to the Reinhardt Foundation for the Arts which provide snacks and pizza for our tired and hungry crew.

We really had a great group of people show up in Layette Indiana for the filming of the funeral scene. Not only were there the actors, but we had extras! The filming took longer than expected, however everyone was patient and we finally called it a wrap after working a 16 hr. day. As the director, I must say that I really feel good about this scene. I was pleased with the performances and feel the right spirit will be conveyed to the audience. Today marked the end of principal photography. There are still three scenes to shoot to complete the filming of the movie, however those will be completed in September and October. School starts up again next week and we will take a week off before gearing up for the next three shoots. Locations still need to be locked down and several actors need to be finalized. I’ll update when something new happens. Thanks to all of you for your support these past three weeks. The journey is just beginning…

Today was sad day for me as the director. Dan had to head home today. He came out from Pennsylvania just to help me with this movie and I can truth fully say that this movie would not be what it is without his help. I have appreciated all his sacrifice and dedication to the project. I’ll also take this opportunity to say that if anyone ever needs a photographer, higher Dan for the job, his photographs have been excellent. As the director I spent about half the day on the phone setting up things for tomorrows big funeral scene. I got caught up on some much needed rest and enjoyed this “day off”. Photo: Dan is the guy on the left and Daniel is the guy on the right.

Slept for a few hours in the morning before getting up again and preparing for tonight’s shoot in Franklin, IN. Photos were shot during the afternoon of Jud who is playing the part of Aaron for this evening and for the funeral scene on Saturday. Arrived at Province Park in Franklin around 6:30 PM and started setting up for the evening shoot. Jack from the Amity fire department was kind enough to bring his tanker truck down to provide rain for our bridge scene. Thanks for you patience Jack! After working through some generator problems, setting up lights, testing strobes, positioning props, and testing rain we were ready to shoot. Here is trivia for ya… wait, a fact: we dumped 1,800 gallons of water for this scene. We wrapped around 2:00 AM after a successful night of shooting.