The 13th annual Easterseals Disability Film Challenge gives filmmakers - with and without disabilities - the opportunity to collaborate and tell stories that elevate the portrayal of disability.
Filmmaker and Park City resident Britt Sady says this is her first time entering the international competition.
“It’s a five-day competition where they [Easterseals] encourage people to come together to elevate the portrayal of disability in media and employ people with disabilities,” Sady said on KPCW’s “Local News Hour” April 1.
Sady reached out to another long-time local film director, Matias Alvarez, who says he receives many requests for help on projects, but Sady’s stood out.
“I don't know why I answered Britt's email, but I went and met with Britt at Lucky Ones, and her story struck me as something very interesting,” Alvarez said. “And the timing felt right, and so I jumped on.”
After assembling a crew, they filmed at Park City High School over two days.
“I kept reminding Britt that it always comes down to the food and the extras, because it's easy to say you're going to shoot something,” Alvarez said. “But getting 40-50 high school kids to show up and be there all day, that's a challenge, and especially volunteers. So, she did an amazing job.”
Sady says she’s grateful for the community support behind “Noah’s Big Adventure.”
“For me, the little rainbow in the clouds is these extras who drove, some of them an hour, to be magnificent,” she said. “They say, God is in the details, those extras and that food, those were, those were the tiny little details that just warmed our hearts.”
This short film serves as an opening sequence for a larger story. It follows Sady’s 15-year-old son Noah, who has Down syndrome and is determined to prove his independence by escaping high school.
Sady hopes to use the film as a proof of concept to raise funds for a feature-length film exploring Noah’s adventure in more depth.
“There's 20 million people on this planet with disabilities, and we want to see their stories,” she said. “They're adventurous, they're dignified, they're beautiful, they're unique.”
Online voting for the challenge runs April 4-12. Click here to vote for the winning film.
