Bury my beautiful skeleton in Grosse Pointe.

“All the shit you need to know, simplified”

ABOUT THE FILM

You know that feeling you get when you move back home after college and everything you did back at school seems a little less special, meaningful, what-have-you? You try to make a place for yourself amidst your high school friends or community or co-workers and parents or siblings or the cashier of the BP on your block and you keep falling back, falling back into a familiar cycle? You try to keep using Tinder but things kinda aren’t the same and you retreat, you retreat back into the thing you built for yourself, only that what you built for youself was as previously mentioned never anything substantial?

And also one of your oldest friends is found dead. And you barely knew them anymore.

In this situation, you can try to cope with their suicide. Over time you will heal and move on from this town.

Except Haley Muggier doesn’t do that. She starts smoking and “chilling” with her other oldest friend, Joe Biglin, and they decide that, yeah— Kenny wouldn’t kill himself. So it’s time to get to the bottom of this.

Enter: a murder mystery.

Enter: BURY MY BEAUTIFUL SKELETON IN GROSSE POINTE.

“That’s here. That’s home. That's us. Here, everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering... every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there— on a speck of dust floating in God’s palm.” -F. Chandrasekhar Malloy, noted astrophysicist

RUMINATIONS ON THE PROCESS

AKA: “Progress Report”. Hey, thanks for checkin in, folks. It’s been a long one, and it only looks like it’s gonna be a little longer. So, the week after I graduated from the University of Michigan, I flew to New York and spent a month editing rushes for my friend Ryan McDonough’s feature film musical, Groove [see it a film festival near YOU! If you live in Long Island or Fort Lauderdale a few months ago]. That summer we edited a final cut together, and I began to form ideas for what would become this film.

Once I moved home, I was able to write a full first draft, followed by a full second draft, followed by a depression, followed by more depression, and so forth. Then, I decided to start filming. With the help of my friends Molly and Hannah, this foolhardy dream became a reality.

We decided to cut up the film into “Sequences,” just as I had filmed my pretty chill short film in individual shorts and spliced into a whole during the edit[s] while using "down time" to re-write and edit. Four sequences, each corresponding to a season.

We are in the middle of the third sequence, taking place during the winter. And we’re still going!

All told, we have about 10 shooting days to go, spread out over the course of 3 months.

WHY ARE YOU MAKING THIS FILM?

Film is an art form and medium of emotional expression. If there is one thing I learned from the Screen Arts and Cultures department at U of M, it’s that everyone approaches it from their own unique angle. The only way to make something is to find a way to make it work in your own life, and the only way to be a filmmaker is to make films.

We know we can make a feature, so we are making one. On the other hand, it has been an enormous learning process. We have relied on the help of so many kind, hard-working friends, family, and complete strangers. We owe it to all of them and ourselves to see this through. If you are reading this page, it probably means that we need your help too!

It’s skeletal at the moment, but like our Facebook page to help grow it, or send us an email if you want to get involved. We will find a place for you ON THE TEAM, BABY.

PONTIFICATIONS ON THE FORMAT

AKA “why is the film look not like sharp or whatever?” Well, to answer your question, Johnny and Susie, we are shooting on the Digital Bolex D16, a camera with a super 16 sensor that shoots onto a CCD instead of a CMOS sensor. This allows the camera to capture a more authentic 16mm film style, with lots of wonderful noise and no rolling shutter. So, in this case it is all about the moving image as opposed to getting those crispy stills. We are also utilizing vintage glass and doing pretty much everything sans-rig because— shuck’e’darn— the budget just won’t allow it! But money, or lack of, never ruined our day.

“I can see that bullshit from a mile away (see it) / You can stack my money bout a mile away (stack it) / I got three white bitches like it's powder day (white) / Mink coat with the rolls like a Shar Pei” -Young Thug

CAST & CREW

AKA “I’m about to name drop the shit out of you right quick:”

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

Joe Biglin is a filmmaker best known for “nothing really.” He made a pretty chill short film a while ago and currently teaches the youth of Grosse Pointe as a substitute teacher while moonlighting as their parents’ pizza delivery driver.

Molly Diane Reitman is a filmmaker, writer, comic, and poet best known for her seminal volume, Dogs Die. She once told me if she has to work another office job she, “couldn’t be blamed for what happened next,” but thankfully she— wait, oh no— I think she is still working in an office! Oh— phew— I’m getting word now that she also works at a pizza place in her hometown of Northville on Saturday to keep her sanity and express herself creatively.

©Joe Biglin 2016 / Minty Films LLC