The work of seniors and film students Anthony Reynoso, Aidan Klauk and Charlie Wachtel has come into full fruition. Their entry for the ninth annual Student Silent Film Festival was championed under the “Outstanding Achievement for Cinema” award.
Under the guise of their Viking Television production teacher, Matt McLindon, the boys were able to crown themselves after completing symbolism in silence.
Selected from 12 entries of neighboring schools in the Chicagoland area, the film follows the journey of two friends after one of them loses their hearing.
The deaf friend, played by Klauk, is being comforted by his hearing companion, played by Wachtel, but he personally struggles to accept his situation.
Over time, the deaf friend lashes out and leaves to wander the streets, battling thoughts of self-hatred and shame.
This results in the friend ultimately deciding to harm himself by standing in front of a moving car, but he is suddenly saved by a hooded figure.
Faced with this new revelation of life and this new opportunity to accept who he truly is, the deaf friend reunites with his companion, understanding the importance of who he truly is beyond his struggles of silence.
A film that captured the importance of not only friendship, but individual embrace through struggle was not an easy process.
The boys had a month to get everything in order, but scheduling conflicts left them with only a week to spare for the film.
Reynoso, the man behind the camera, laughed while being asked about this week-long period of work. “I thought we were done for, actually, because we had a week to do it and we were like, ‘man, low-key, we’re not getting it done at all,” he said.
“We had a lot of trouble deciding on our story because we had a big time crunch, but after that we storyboarded our script and then spent a few days recording everything, and then we spent the last two days or so before the deadline editing it,” exclaimed Wachtel.
And to undergo such a difficult process of leveling the film to the festival’s judging standards, according to the H-F Chronicle, “story narrative, development, camera work, lighting and editing,” served as a testament to their work ethic within this project.
Another aspect of their work ethic that contributed to the film’s success was their adaptation to the prompt of, “The Silence Between Us,” which required no sound and no voice.
“The hardest part is the fact that we can’t use any dialogue to move the story along. We have to rely solely on visuals. We kind of worked around this with sign language, as our story was about a deaf person learning to accept their hearing loss,” said Wachtel.
This win for the young, talented trio marks a standard for the next generation of kids who are curious about what film awaits them.
For Klauk and Reynoso, finding themselves and finding companions that they trust is the ultimate blueprint.
“Find a good group of friends that are as driven as you and just kind of keep doing [film], keep getting better at it because the more you work on it, the more you’ll produce and the better you’ll get at it,” Klauk voiced.
“Just be who you are. Don’t ever limit yourself to film, because whatever you can think of or imagine, I want you to start. Then just make it better later, and just keep going from there. You’ll become who you are, and someone that you wouldn’t think you would be,” Reynoso voiced.
