‘Night Falls Fast’ in Philadelphia
By Casey Bell
PGN Staff Writer
© 2007 Philadelphia Gay News


Mark Jackson (Center) Directs Tom Mason (Duke) And Craig Di Francia (Joey) In "Night Falls Fast."

With the Philadelphia International Gay and Lesbian Film Festival in full swing, the city is awash with unique, evocative cinema.

And director Mark Jackson is hoping to make a big splash with his debut dramatic short, “Night Falls Fast,” screened at 2:30 p.m. July 22 at Arts Bank, 601 S. Broad St.

The short is also the first release from Jackson’s production company, Timely Entertainment, which he runs with producer Matthew Hallman.

Partially shot in Philadelphia, the 25-minute film tells the sordid tale of Vale, a struggling crystal-meth addict who travels to his childhood home with his partner, Joey, to visit his father, Duke, shortly after his mother’s death.

Viewers are thrown headfirst into a disorienting world of crippling addiction, strained family relationships and suicide.

Jackson, a former Philadelphia architect who moved to New York City nine years ago, said the idea for the film came from personal experience.

“Living in New York City, I’ve known a lot of gay men struggling with meth addiction,” he said. “Some have gotten through it and found their courage and others haven’t — I’ve found that courage to be very inspiring.”

Vale’s tense relationship with Duke was also derived from Jackson’s personal life.

“All gay men struggle with relationships with their fathers,” he said. “It’s a universal theme for gay men and I thought it would be dramatically interesting to pair a father and son whose inability to communicate drives them into self-destructive behaviors. I used the idea of pain as an obstacle in the way of understanding.”

Although the film has a dark, somber tone — which Jackson said was inspired by renowned directors Stanley Kubrick and Ingmar Bergman— the director ultimately aimed to give viewers a sense of hope.

“Through any kind of dark period, there’s always a ray of hope, however dim it may be,” he said. “That’s what I’ve found with most addicts — at the most hopeless point in their lives, there’s a moment of clarity that’s so fine that some never find it and end up dying or living as addicts. Those dark moments reveal the most — that’s what I was trying to do with this film.”

The short’s dark themes are echoed with eerie cinematography and visual effects.

“My cinematographer and I wanted to come up with a way to create tension and disorientation for the scenes when Vale was high,” Jackson said. “We ended up using a combination of high-def cameras and lower-grade cameras so the images weren’t coherent.”

Jackson added that while “Night Falls Fast” zeros in on the struggle of a gay man and his father, he did not want the film to fall into a cliché, gay-film stereotype.

“I want to market this film as a family drama with a gay character — and I think we’re at the threshold in queer film where we’ve matured out of the niches and have laid enough of the brick work. It’s time for us to move up to the next phase.”

The director said that the film’s honest depictions were a turn-off to several gay constituents, but were vital to him and producer, Matthew Hallman.

“It’s very controversial,” he said. “Any time you depict something negative involving a minority or fringe community, people feel that you’re making that community a target for others to judge and it will be detrimental. This film shows the brutal truth of meth addiction among gay men, and it’s uncomfortable to watch sometimes — but we feel it’s something that needs to be shown honestly. If one person finds a way out after seeing this film, then it was a success.”

“Night Falls Fast” won Best Short Film in the 2007 Philadelphia International Film Festival and received Official Selections in the 2007 Nashville Film Festival, Frameline 31 Film Festival and 2007 Miami International GLBT Film Festival.

For more information, see www.timelyentertainment.com or www.phillyfests.com.