...Around: An Independent Feature Film

Film Director who Self-Financed His First Feature

May 28, 2009

David Spaltro's first full-length feature film "...Around" was filmed in 21 days, at 190 locations, and self-financed for $175,000 with 40 credit cards.

...Around is about Doyle Simms (Robert Evans), the main character who moves to New York City to pursue his dream of filmmaking at a film school while struggling to survive and thrive on the streets. Suite101 interviewed filmmaker David Spaltro about his first feature film.

Spaltro: I had made a decision, upon returning in December 2005 from a couple of months backpacking through Europe after graduation, that I was going to try and make a film. It had started out as a sort of kamikaze and personal mission, to see if 1) I could make a film and 2) if this was what I loved and really wanted to do with the rest of my life. I just wasn’t sure what story to tell, I didn’t feel I had one and a lot of my friends sort of thought I was crazy.

Spaltro: Ulli Gruber, a talented filmmaker and personal friend sat me down over a cup of coffee and implored me to try and tell some personal stories about my experiences in NYC which I’d sort of been summarizing on train and in bars to strangers in Europe anyway. I wasn’t nervous about using personal stuff, I just didn’t think it was interesting. I took a few months and taught English in Korea in the summer of 2006, and, with the aid of a vicious monsoon season, was able to bring back a first draft of “…Around” that September and began a year of rewriting, casting and putting it all together. It just sort of flowed from there.

Suite101: How have audiences responded to it and at what festivals has it screened at?

Spaltro: The film has been surprising me and several of those involved in it, the way it seems to play across the board. We've had a lot of local screenings and have been at a lot of local festivals such as Big Apple Film Fest, NewFilmmakers and we'll be screening in competition at the Hoboken International Film Festival on Wed June 3rd at 4pm. Audiences are really responding to it and are coming from all walks of life. I always thought the film would play best to a New York audience or people in the film industry or at film school, maybe mid to late twenty-something who could still relate to the experiences of the characters.

Spaltro: I think, with the way the world became right around the time we wrapped in September of 2007 the film has taken on a bit of poignancy I never saw or intended. Not just the struggles and poverty aspects, but taking chances and trying to find your place in a world that is increasingly trying to place ceilings over you and what it feels your potential is.

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