The New York Times, The New Yorker and TV Guide are just a few of publications that lavished praise on Baltimore filmmaker Matt Porterfield’s “Hamilton.”
Unlike other independent films, the 16 mm film, set and shot in Northeast Baltimore, relies on strong images to have an effect rather than dialogue. Porterfield will be on hand at Maryland Institute College of Art Tuesday when the school screens “Hamilton.”
“[Hamilton] is one of the most original, moving and accomplished American independent films in recent years,” wrote the New Yorker’s film critic Richard Brody. “The story alone is touchingly simple — a teenage mother, about to leave town for a month, wants her baby’s young father to pay her a visit — but Porterfield’s genius is revealed above all in the way he brings it to life.”
Starring teens who had never acted on professional sets before, Porterfield’s first feature took five years to progress from concept to print. He first sent out the film for festivals to consider in 2006. That year, it screened to sold-out audiences at the Maryland Film Festival.
“I wanted to keep “Hamilton” largely image-based, to reduce the expository use of dialogue and plot contrivance, and really focus on the characters’ movements,” said Porterfield, who teaches scriptwriting and film production at Johns Hopkins University.
That sentiment has lead Porterfield to his latest project, “Metal Gods.”
He describes the film set again in Baltimore as a morality tale involving an ensemble cast of teens who love heavy metal and shape their own code of ethics, which other cultures’ adolescents usually find through a traditional rite of passage.
“When you’re working for a year or two on a script, you have this precise image of each of the characters — who they are, what they look like,” Porterfield said. “But everything starts to open up in casting. You find people who embody these roles and bring so much more than what you thought. You’re forced to reimagine the project.”
The first open audition for “Metal Gods” will be Dec. 6 at the American Visionary Art Museum, 800 Key Highway in Baltimore. For details, visit www.hamiltonfilmgroup.org.
If you go
Screening of ‘Hamilton’ hosted by Writer/Director/Editor Matt Porterfield
» When: 7:30 p.m. Tuesday
» Where: Maryland Institute College of Art Falvey Hall, Brown Center, 1301 Mount Royal Ave., Baltimore
» Admission: $5 admission, free for MICA students, faculty and staff
» Info: mica.edu, hamiltonfilm group.org
