It's with an equal mix of guilt and excitement that I dust off my blog and begin typing this. On the one hand, as usual, I've allowed this little part of the internet to sit quietly inactive as life moves forward, faster than anyone is truly comfortable with. But on the other, I'm here bringing some exciting news. After a couple of false starts and plenty of dreaming, we're making a short film. It's exciting, it's daunting, but the project feels right and the timing more important than ever.

"RESIDUE" is my newest project, a short film which centres on two recent exes being reunited when Elliott, our primary lead character, decides to return every leftover item and belonging from his now-ended relationship with Melissa, our second lead character. Over the course of a single evening, we explore the struggle that both of these people go through in defining independence in this new and difficult stage in their lives. It's messy, confusing, and filled with contradictions and painful revelations.

This is without a doubt the most personal piece of work I've ever written, but it was even more important to me that the script function as an objective perspective and exploration on how we navigate the grieving process over relationships and the vulnerability we experience in adult attachments. Having only two characters in the film, we never take sides; neither character is villainised for their actions and both make mistakes in the process of figuring out whether a relationship of any kind is possible while moving forward.

I've always connected deeply to character-driven films like Barry Jenkins' Moonlight, Richard Linklater's The Before Trilogy, and Spike Jonze's Her. The film's design is intentionally (and deceptively) simple, taking place primarily in one location with zero flashbacks. It's a snapshot of their lives, a brief window in time, where we set the stage for characterisation and emotional wins and losses. By stripping back the "plot" to small emotional skirmishes between the characters, we allow the film to be all about the subtext; what is the meaning behind every line? What are the characters not saying to each other and how does that make them feel? Like the above-referenced films, this film is all about character and performance, creating a bridge of empathy to the audience.

Making this film independently is fulfilling yet difficult, so we've set up a GoFundMe for our production. If the above write-up interests you in any way, you can contribute to our journey in as small or large a donation as you feel comfortable making. Every single donation will push us further towards making the film we've all dreamed it to be and allow us to push it as far as we can, both during production and beyond. You can see where the funds will be put towards before making any decision to help.

You can support our production at www.gofundme.com/residue

Thanks for sticking with me.