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High schoolers are ‘reel’ writers

Ryan GraffPost Independent Staff
Post Independent Photo/Kara K. PearsonMargaret Fay Seldeen, left, listens as Ian Fletcher discusses how they made their two-minute movie, "Something So Surreal," which they entered in the Rocky Mountain Filmfest.
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Ian Fletcher’s mental health will be either the savior or the undoing of his young film career. He’s got what he called a “pretty untreated” case of attention deficit disorder. So he’s started many films with his group of film-buff friends, but not completed many.

“We’re all pretty unreliable,” said Fletcher, a tall, shaggy-haired Bridges High School junior. Fletcher did manage to make it through his first film a few weeks ago, though. He delivered “Something So Surreal,” which his girlfriend, Margaret Fay Seldeen, wrote, to the sixth annual Rocky Mountain Student Filmfest two days late. The Filmfest takes place at 7:30 p.m. Friday and Saturday in the Glenwood Springs High School auditorium.Fletcher mentioned a second, and seemingly competing disorder – obsessive compulsive disorder – that he said took him through the editing process.

He said the OCD “went into overdrive” after the two had compiled 45 minutes of footage, and they went to the technology room at Glenwood Springs High School, where they spent nine hours editing, Fletcher said.Fletcher and Seldeen, a Yampah High School student, met again in the GSHS technology room Thursday afternoon for what they said was the first real showing of the film.”She wakes up in an empty room in an empty house in an empty world,” the narration begins.



By the film’s end, the audience has a sense of what it means to grow up in a small town. But more importantly, it has a sense of the talent of two young filmmakers, with a strong narration and clean editing. “Something So Surreal” is one of dozens of films that Roaring Fork Valley residents will have the chance to see this weekend. The Fest has moved from its origins in Basalt to Glenwood Springs for the first time in six years, and has expanded to accept statewide entries. High school students entered from both the Colorado and Roaring Fork River valleys, and as far away as Grand Junction and Steamboat Springs, said Elizabeth Winn, a BHS senior who helped organize the festival. The Fest also cut entries for the first time, which means that the quality of films is the highest it’s ever been, she said.


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