Upside Down

Rock bottom is a beautiful place to start.

The Film:   Upside down is a short film that follows Emma, a single mother of a 9-year old boy with Down syndrome. Struggling to keep her life from spinning out of control, Emma relies on her younger sister Naomi to help with childcare and pay the bills. When Stetson is bullied at school, things take an unexpected turn. A film about family, forgiveness and the bravery to acknowledge our breaking points.

Why this film?   As the film market grapples with questions of sexism and race, we strongly feel that disability is the next frontier that begs to be explored. Upside Down tackles themes of marginalisation amongst the most vulnerable head on. Globally, as women struggle to raise their children and survive financially, many find themselves in crisis, the demands of survival stretching them to their breaking point. So many of the day to day little things - the invisible struggles -happen in the home. In this film we will show, with unflinching realism, the humanity of fragility and imperfection.

How you can help:   We've had generous support for this film since it's inception. From people offering their time and skills for free, to great shoot locations donated. But we still need to secure vital crew and equipment to make our production look the best it possibly can. To get this film off the ground we need a minimum of $3000, but to get optimum post-production and a great finished product we'd LOVE to raise $5000. Here's a breakdown of what that will get us:

$3000 - Goal: 

Camera and lighting equipment rental (camera, prime lenses, stands, monitor, shoulder rig)

Purchasing art department / wardrobe supplies.

Payment for our amazing crew (director, DOP, Boom operator, actors, art department etc).

Petrol vouchers for locations travel.

FOOD - Feeding our actors and crew for four days.

Locations - Koha/offering Print/Online publicity 

 

$5000 -  Goal:  

If we can smash our initial target we can use the additional funds for...

Professional film editing

Professional sound mixing

Professional colour grading/design

Festival entry fees (Festivals help get the film seen as widely as possible and represent NZ filmmaking New Zealandly).

 

The Crew:  What sets us apart from most film crews in town is that we are 100% female. That's right, a band of wonder women who are passionate about telling stories.

Georgia Agnew - Director of Photography

Kacie Stetson - Director, Co-writer

Jessi Williams - Creator, Co-writer, Producer

Juanita Ballantyne - Sound Recordist/Boom Operator

Amanda Billing - Art department / Wardrobe

Maza White - Hair / Make-up artist

Loren Kett - Editor

PS: To donate you need to register with Boosted, but this is so they can issue a receipt for your donation. All donations via Boosted are 33% tax deductable. That's right, you can write it off on your taxes.