DuPage Film group helps people who love movies

Cynthia Cherry-Schif thought everyone wanted to make movies.

It's every person's dream, right?

After seeing her son off to college, the 50-something St. Charles woman assessed her successful career in advertising and freelancing and decided it was time to make that filmmaking dream happen.

That's when she discovered DuPage Film, a group of people who love and support filmmaking and formed a group a year ago to support each others' projects.

"This is an opportunity for me to really make that dream come true," Cherry-Schif said.

"That's not everyone's dream. That's my dream, and I'm responsible for making my own dreams come true, and that's what we're about to do."

Cherry-Schif's first short film, "The Nick of Time," is being shot this month as part of the group's first project: a collaboration of short films that all address the same subject - time - to make a feature-length film.

Filmmakers often work together on projects in Chicago, but traveling to the city for evening meetings from the suburbs can be time consuming and costly, said Gary Sellergren, founder of DuPage Film.

"Typically, in our area, people have great ideas and start projects, but they find out that they don't have enough people and resources to rely on," said Sellergren, of Wheaton. "What I want to do is find as many like-minded people with a passion for filmmaking. It's really helped a lot of members' projects get off the ground, helped actors get roles and so on and so forth."

Thirty members strong, the group just held its first acting auditions to fill positions in the upcoming time production, as well as building a general library of actors for future projects.

"People are starting to put stuff together faster," Sellergren said. "They're going to get more and more requests to be in these movies."

Once done, they'll consider the quality of the films and send them along to festivals where they could earn recognition.

As in Cherry-Schif's case, the main benefit of collaboration is sharing knowledge and expertise with others. For Cherry-Schiff, who hasn't been able to keep up with the ever-changing filmmaking technology since her initial college courses years ago, it would be impossible without her fellow DuPage Film members.

"In a lot of independent films, the director is the writer, is the producer and has done some of the acting," Sellergren said. "We're trying to create more of a professional production where you have 10 or 12 different key people in different roles."

So that means one person handles the electrical aspect, one is the director, one is second in command as the director of photography, one handles the talent and so on.

"We're trying to give them real world experience in doing this," he said.

DuPage County residents may soon begin to see movies being shot throughout the county, although there isn't a master schedule of upcoming public shoots as of yet.

"A lot of people are interested in filmmaking and Hollywood and seeing that there's a film being made in their hometown," said Rebecca Tulloch, of Bartlett, who will direct her own short, "The Eye of Time," as well as serving as director of photography in Cherry-Schif's film. "I think it would be a lot of fun for some residents, particularly if they're able to come out to some of our exterior shoots. It's always nice to see your hometown in a movie."

For filmmakers at heart, DuPage Film could be that outlet to make dreams happen.

"I really feel like I'm stepping into some shoes that have been waiting for me for about 40 years," Cherry-Schif said. "Yeah, it feels comfortable. It feels doable. It feels right."

DuPage Film meets the last Wednesday of each month at the Wheaton Grand Theater, 119 N. Hale St, Wheaton. To become a member of the production team, the cost until the end of the year is $15 per person or $10 per student.

For more information about DuPage Film, visit www.dupagefilm.com.