Thursday, December 23, 2010

Holiday House - A Short Doc About That House


It's hard to believe it's been nearly 5 years since my friend Steve Stuart and I made this short documentary in one weekend for the 2006 International Documentary Challenge.

It seemed seasonally appropriate to put it online now. If you live on the North Shore of Boston it's likely you know the house in question.

I shot this with my venerable old Panasonic DVX100A (not so old then). The timelapses were done with a consumer Nikon camera with crappy compression--and show a lot of artifacting. I'd never shoot them that way these days!

As usual, scratching the surface of ordinary people reveals unexpected depths. Here's the blurb:

Holiday House tells the small town story of "That House" on Rt. 62 in Danvers, MA. You know the one you drive by as you head into or out of Beverly, that is usually overflowing with decorations for every conceivable holiday?

Who does that?!? Well, now you know! For Karen McCarthy and friends, it's a labor of love and a celebration of freedom, family and community.

This film was created by Brad Kelly and Steven Stuart in Danvers and Beverly, MA between Thursday, March 23, 2006 and Monday, March 27, 2006 for the International Documentary Challenge.