D.T.A. - a short film for the ages
Donation protected
D.T.A. is the most bold and powerful film to be made as the United States faces an unprecedented employment and economic crisis, and WE NEED YOUR SUPPORT to make this important film come alive! PLEASE DONATE NOW!
Inspired by the Japanese "karoshi" epidemic, the focus of this short film is putting a gripping, creative and compelling microscope to an overworked and underpaid American labor force/society. "Karoshi" means "death caused by overwork or job-related exhaustion". The current coinciding pandemic is the best time to fundraise our $20,000 to creatively make best use of this strange slowdown to develop and prepare all of the crucial pre-production tasks.
PLEASE DONATE TODAY to help ensure we are ready to rock when it's safer to shoot this exquisite and important film.
I, Tommy Franklin, wrote this film in 2018. For people facing soul-sucking jobs that barely pay the bills and render countless citizens depressed, broke, and facing dangerous life circumstances, 2020/21 is the right time to make a film that challenges and broadens our collective perspectives to arrive at more urgent conversations about what we as communities can do in action to achieve economic and institutional justice.
PLEASE DONATE WHAT YOU CAN TODAY! 5% of what we raise will be donated to local Minneapolis worker justice organization, C.T.U.L.
This film is personal for me, and after you see it, you will be hit in the gut by it's universal theme, one of at-all-costs endurance to survive our most challenging chapters in our lives. I worked in a toxic (literally and figuratively) manufacturing plant from 2008-2012. I decided to quit before I no longer had a semblance of a soul. No one deserves to risk falling into darkness and despair from working a job that taps into 0% of their passions. This film explores the main character's brave and dangerous quest to "make it out" of a dead-end job in order to survive and have a chance to thrive.
The film will be shot in only 3 locations, not only to create a visceral world for the main character, but also to be able to ethically pull off this production efficiently, ensuring the cast & crew gets the compensation they deserve, and that the needs of a high quality production are met from start to finish. Everyone working on the film is currently distressed by lack of work due to the pandemic, and this project would give an amazing and talented group of freelance creators an opportunity to get back to what they love most, being on a film set together as a motivated team to create a beautiful piece of work for the screen.
My first three (3) short films were shot with budgets of $2500, $200, and $5000, respectively. For all of them, I had to dip into my personal finances to help get them to the finish line. I can no longer afford to take that risk, and we're asking for you to join this fun ride of making movie magic!
SHARE THIS LINK, DONATE WHAT YOU CAN, AND WE THANK YOU!
About the filmmaker.
Tommy Franklin is a formerly incarcerated filmmaker, writer, producer, performer, co-creator of the art-meets-activism interview show Weapon of Choice Podcast, Founder and President of Special Menu Productions , an independent production company with an eye toward art that changes narratives and disrupts. Tommy collaborates in philanthropic and grassroots organizing communities to produce content he believes in, indiscriminate of form or medium. As a survivor of incarceration (born in prison and having served time as an adult), Tommy works to radically reimagine power structures across issue work while focusing his advocacy efforts in criminal justice reform and visions for liberation. Tommy is a 2019 SPNN New Angle Docu Fellow, a 2020 Kartemquin Diverse Voices in Docs Fellow, and 2020 Sundance Short Documentary Film Fund Grantee. His 3rd short film, WHITE TEARS (funded on GoFundMe in 2019) is currently in post production, and his documentary, YOU DONT KNOW MY NAME , is currently in production.
ANY AMOUNT DONATED IS GREATLY APPRECIATED! AND PLEASE SPREAD THE WORD!
Inspired by the Japanese "karoshi" epidemic, the focus of this short film is putting a gripping, creative and compelling microscope to an overworked and underpaid American labor force/society. "Karoshi" means "death caused by overwork or job-related exhaustion". The current coinciding pandemic is the best time to fundraise our $20,000 to creatively make best use of this strange slowdown to develop and prepare all of the crucial pre-production tasks.
PLEASE DONATE TODAY to help ensure we are ready to rock when it's safer to shoot this exquisite and important film.
I, Tommy Franklin, wrote this film in 2018. For people facing soul-sucking jobs that barely pay the bills and render countless citizens depressed, broke, and facing dangerous life circumstances, 2020/21 is the right time to make a film that challenges and broadens our collective perspectives to arrive at more urgent conversations about what we as communities can do in action to achieve economic and institutional justice.
PLEASE DONATE WHAT YOU CAN TODAY! 5% of what we raise will be donated to local Minneapolis worker justice organization, C.T.U.L.
This film is personal for me, and after you see it, you will be hit in the gut by it's universal theme, one of at-all-costs endurance to survive our most challenging chapters in our lives. I worked in a toxic (literally and figuratively) manufacturing plant from 2008-2012. I decided to quit before I no longer had a semblance of a soul. No one deserves to risk falling into darkness and despair from working a job that taps into 0% of their passions. This film explores the main character's brave and dangerous quest to "make it out" of a dead-end job in order to survive and have a chance to thrive.
The film will be shot in only 3 locations, not only to create a visceral world for the main character, but also to be able to ethically pull off this production efficiently, ensuring the cast & crew gets the compensation they deserve, and that the needs of a high quality production are met from start to finish. Everyone working on the film is currently distressed by lack of work due to the pandemic, and this project would give an amazing and talented group of freelance creators an opportunity to get back to what they love most, being on a film set together as a motivated team to create a beautiful piece of work for the screen.
My first three (3) short films were shot with budgets of $2500, $200, and $5000, respectively. For all of them, I had to dip into my personal finances to help get them to the finish line. I can no longer afford to take that risk, and we're asking for you to join this fun ride of making movie magic!
SHARE THIS LINK, DONATE WHAT YOU CAN, AND WE THANK YOU!
About the filmmaker.
Tommy Franklin is a formerly incarcerated filmmaker, writer, producer, performer, co-creator of the art-meets-activism interview show Weapon of Choice Podcast, Founder and President of Special Menu Productions , an independent production company with an eye toward art that changes narratives and disrupts. Tommy collaborates in philanthropic and grassroots organizing communities to produce content he believes in, indiscriminate of form or medium. As a survivor of incarceration (born in prison and having served time as an adult), Tommy works to radically reimagine power structures across issue work while focusing his advocacy efforts in criminal justice reform and visions for liberation. Tommy is a 2019 SPNN New Angle Docu Fellow, a 2020 Kartemquin Diverse Voices in Docs Fellow, and 2020 Sundance Short Documentary Film Fund Grantee. His 3rd short film, WHITE TEARS (funded on GoFundMe in 2019) is currently in post production, and his documentary, YOU DONT KNOW MY NAME , is currently in production.
ANY AMOUNT DONATED IS GREATLY APPRECIATED! AND PLEASE SPREAD THE WORD!
Organizer
Tommy Franklin
Organizer
Minneapolis, MN