FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: John Romeo John Romeo Productions Phone: (804) 314-7413 Email: [email protected]
A SHORT FILM 52 YEARS IN THE MAKING Local director revives his grandfather’s movie and presents it online
RICHMOND, Va. (May 4, 2006) – Last winter, John Romeo was digging through his grandfather’s bevy of 16mm films. He finally found what he was looking for: a group of unique sound films that no one had seen in over 30 years.
His grandfather, Paul Kimaid, was an amateur filmmaker in Buffalo, NY. Kimaid belonged to a cinema club in the 1950s, where he and other film hobbyists would present their movies and discuss various filmmaking techniques. At a time when all home movies were silent, Kimaid engineered a technique in which he recorded dialogue and sound effects onto a reel-to-reel tape to sync up with his movies. Using this method, he made close to a dozen sound films.
Until recently, the films and audio reels were buried in a box in Romeo’s uncle’s basement. “When my grandfather passed away in 1989, my family transferred a bunch of his home movies to VHS tape. They transferred mostly birthday parties and holidays, but the story-based sound films were left behind.”
Romeo began transferring the films and audio tapes to digital formats that he could sync together on his computer. “It wasn’t nearly as easy as I thought it would be,” Romeo said. “It didn’t sync up perfectly because of the fast speed used at the film transfer facility. I had to digitally slow down the films, at various speeds throughout each movie, to match the audio recordings.”
One of the films he transferred stood out in particular to Romeo. Shot in 1954, Short Pants is the story of a simple sewing alteration gone wrong. “My grandfather owned a men’s clothing store,” Romeo explains. “It’s no wonder that one of his best films was about tailoring!” The film won an award at his grandfather’s cinema club that year.
“It’s a very fun movie, but it would be considered a little long by today’s standards.” After restoring the film to its original form, Romeo decided to make an alternate version using some modern editing techniques.
“The story and the dialogue were kept in tact,” Romeo is careful to explain. “Without giving away too much of the story, I merely shortened some of the non-dialogue scenes, and added some visual transitions.” Romeo has a free show online called “The Romeo Theater,” available at http://www.romeo-theater.com (note the hyphen). Each week he presents a short movie and tells a little bit about the story behind it. This week’s show features Short Pants, and includes an introduction by Romeo. It’s also available for download along with past shows as a free video podcast.
What would his grandfather think of all this? Romeo hazards a guess: “I think he would be absolutely thrilled that over 50 years later, his film lives on through the Internet. He would love that.”
EDITORS NOTE: You can view Short Pants for free online at http://www.romeo-theater.com. For photographs to use with this story, go to www.romeo-theater.com/press.html. For interviews with John Romeo and to receive broadcast-quality video excerpts from the show, please contact John Romeo directly at (804) 314-7413.
About the Romeo Theater: The Romeo Theater is a free, weekly video show available online at www.romeo-theater.com. It showcases independent short movies and the stories behind them. The show is also available as a downloadable podcast via Apple iTunes and other podcast directories. The Romeo Theater was created John Romeo, a videographer and art director in Richmond, Va. He’s president of John Romeo Productions (www.romeo-dvd.com).