Quest Films

FADE TO BLACK - A DIAMOND IN THE ROUGH Tonight I saw a rough cut of a film that has the potentiality to be the most interesting film to come out of Boston since BLACK AND WHITE AND RED ALL OVER, a Sundance competition film made over 10 years ago. (And,yes, I include my heavily liked NEXT STOP WONDERLAND among those that this film can potentially exceed).A film about racial violence, and more importantly the psychology of violence, it was made by two Boston filmmakers, Trevor Bailey and Bill Singleton, whose knowledge of film is astonishing. I saw an earlier 3-hour rough cut over 8 months ago, and I knew the film was unwieldy, too much sociology on its mind that distracted from the compelling core story. They have cut the film to under 2-l/2 hours and they need another 30 minutes cut out. I brought my friend, editor Loren Miller, whose editing of thesis films by BU graduate students in the 70's and 80's helped put BU's film program on the map. I hope they will retain him for the final cut.Like local filmmaker Andrew Bujowski's deservedly acclaimed FUNNY HA HA, FADE TO BLACK has the feel of lived in reality. The hand held camera and overlapping editing only add to the intensity of the dramatic and action scenes that are at the film's core. The filmmakers have worked on this project for amost three years. I look forward to helping them bring the film to a successful conclusion.-David Klieler, Local Sightings