By Kevin Zimmerman
When filmmakers Raymond Deane and Phill Hammond were finishing up their first movie “Travail,” the daily newspapers were loaded with stories providing the idea for their next project.
“There were a lot of kids who were committing suicide because of bullying,” said Hammond.
Hammond, who serves as producer, believes bullying is at an-all time high especially when it involves gay, lesbian and trans-gender youth. Neither he nor Deane is gay, but the two wanted to address the issue of bullying, particularly homophobic taunting. So being filmmakers, they figured the best way to do that was to write and produce a new movie called “Red Head Randy.”
“We were like, let’s think of a film where a kid is bullied, but with a twist,” said Hammond. “It’s a horror twist to make it more appealing to kids and teens.”
On Sunday, the two filmmakers will premiere the movie’s trailer in Long Island City as the first stop in their Red Head Randy Stand Up to Bullying Tour.
In the movie, Randy is bullied every day at school because he is gay. It gets to a point where he sees suicide as the only way out. But before he kills himself, he vows to get revenge on all his tormentors. And that’s exactly what he does.
“He does come back for revenge, but it’s really about teaching the bullies a lesson,” said Hammond.
For instance, one of Randy’s bullies is a pretty classmate who values her looks above all else. Randy’s revenge leaves her scarred and without her all-too-important beauty.
“It’s revenge with a lesson,” said Hammond. “Lessons will be learned by the end of the movie.”
And it’s not just kids who are the bullies, said Hammond.
The school’s principal and basketball coach behave just as badly as some of the teens by ignoring Randy’s plight, said Hammond.
“Basically, we are building on the concept that bullies can be from one kid to a bunch of kids and even parents can be bullies,” he said.
Deane directed the script co-written by the two filmmakers and started shooting this past January.
The film is populated by dozens of young actors who were required to share a common trait: each one needed to be the victim of some type of bullying.
Along with unveiling the movie’s trailer, Hammond expects a few special celebrity guests at Sunday’s events. Anyone interested in attending the preview this weekend should RSVP to either raymonddeanefilms.com or to Red Head Randy’s Facebook page.
After this weekend, the two filmmakers plan on entering the movie into festivals and continuing the conversation on bullying.
“We were like, let’s do a film to attract a teen audience and build awareness,” said Hammond.
