Cinereach Blog

RFF Fellow Courtney Hope Faces Fear of Nature on “Wild Birds” Location Scout

A post by Courtney Hope

To be perfectly honest, I’m not a big fan of nature. I grew up in Pennsylvania, in a county with the most parks per capita ratio in the country. I went to a private school with trees and lawns and a rose garden. My parents forced me to go to camp and sleep in a cabin – for which I may never forgive them. But when the time came for me to choose my own setting, I chose the bleakest landscape of all – New York City. And I’ve managed to avoid the great outdoors ever since.

So why then would I chose to set my RFF Film, Wild Birds, entirely in the woods – in the middle of November – in the hometown where all those trees once suffocated the city girl in me? I was asking myself some of these same questions as I dragged my key crew into the heart of the forest that sometimes haunts my nightmares.

My DP, Carole has the exact opposite opinion of woods than I do. She can’t get enough trees and berries and acorns – and other strange things she picks up as we walk.

“You sure that’s edible?” I ask as she sinks her teeth into something she found on the ground.

She explains that the acorns she’s chomping on can be made into flour if you can gather enough of them. I can’t help but to roll my eyes. Why would anyone ever do that?

My Production Designer Emmeline, also has an affinity for the woods. But she’s from Vermont, where that sort of attitude is mandatory. She collects leaves and twigs and seed to flatten into the notebook she’s brought with her. I really don’t fit in with these woods enthusiasts.

So here I am, wandering off trails in the woods searching for the strangest looking trees we can find. And there really are some crazy-looking spots in these woods.

“This place is like an evil Disney forest,” Carole notices.

An illustration from the Wild Birds team

“Yeah, I know. Woods are terrifying,” which leads us into a discussion of what kind of woods the characters try to hide in. Are they nice woods that are easy to live in, mean woods that hurt the girls, uncaring woods that watch the girls struggle without offering any guidance? We decide that the woods are like their mother (who is omnipresent, though we never meet her on screen), somewhat cruel, but unintentionally so. They’re just wild unsympathetic woods, but they wouldn’t go out of their way to harm the girls. So it’s settled, abusive-mother-woods. That’s what we’re after. This changes how we analyze each attractive patch of nature we come across.

Emmeline smashes some berries into her notebook. “Look at all these bruise colors. These are great.”

Carole points out some poison ivy. “Let’s not shoot in poison ivy. That’s the last thing we need is itchy actors.”

“Wait, this yellow leaf? Did I touch it? Did anyone notice if I touched this poison ivy?” No one’s noticed. Great. Now I’m going to have poison ivy. How did I grow up in Pennsylvania and never learn what poison ivy was. I was a girl scout… for a year…

Wild Birds location scout photo

Then we come upon my favorite place in these woods, a strange start of a building that was never finished. It’s just a corner of bricks that stick up under a tree. We decide this is our first choice for the dead bird scene. It has the right sort of half-warmth of home and half-empty and uncaring feel to it.

Then we find other strange pipes and old wells sticking out of the ground throughout the place. These woods are picture ready!

At the suggestion of a local film enthusiast, my crew and I drive to an abandoned amusement park in Easton, PA. We were told it flooded in the 90s and was never repaired. On the way there, Emmeline spots an empty birds nest near the side of the road. She demands we pull over so she can pick it up. I take this nest as a good omen.

When we arrive at the amusement park, the gates are locked. But it looks like the sort of place teenagers would have a way into, and after a quick search, we find a place where we can sneak through the fence. This place is definitely a popular trespassing zone, with trash everywhere.

We walk through this abandoned amusement park and all we can talk about is the horror film we should shoot there one day. What kind of creepy things go on here at night? I don’t want to think about it. I’m already afraid of everything.

I loudly try to focus the conversation off serial killing clowns and back on the film we’re actually shooting.

We decide that most of the amusement park is unusable because it’s too obvious – placing abused children in a dilapidated place that represents childhood would feel clichéd. But in the back of the park are a few shed-like structures that seem to be falling apart. “Does this look like it could be in the woods?”

“We could use it for the beginning,” Carole chimes in.

“Or a rain location.” I make a face. Please, don’t let it rain!

“Oh right, rain locations…”

And with that in mind, we walked quickly out of the haunted park back to the safety of our cars.

We found some great locations, took a ton of photos, and survived a few hours in the woods without anyone succumbing to poison ivy. It was a good day and a good scout, even if it did take place outside.

RFF 2010 Fellow Courtney Hope (mentored by Jeremy Kipp Walker) recently graduated from New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts with a degree in Film & Television. While a student at NYU, she wrote and directed several short films. Hope’s thesis film Sex & German Grammar, was awarded the prize for Best Cinematography at NYU’s Fusion Film Festival and screened at the Southside Film Festival and the Palm Springs Shortfest. Hope has also shown films at the London Super Short Film Festival and the Reed Media Festival, and took home a prize at the 2007 Southside Image Over Words competition. Hope recently completed her first independent short, Another First. Courtney’s RFF Film, Wild Birds, is about two young sisters who enter the woods determined to be “wild.” As the story unfolds, we begin to understand what they are running from, and see the power dynamic between them shift as the younger sister develops second thoughts about their plans.