From dream sequences to surreal suspense, Chris Cox’s recent films often touch on a subject that he and his teenage peers care about deeply: sleep.
“I’m a teenager. I think about a sleep a lot,” says Cox, a 17-year-old senior at Hammond High and winner of the first prize at the HoCo Student Film Fest.
Cox and Grant Fox, a 19-year-old Hammond High senior, co-directed and acted in the 6½-minute film “Somnium.”
Filmed over nine hours primarily in historic Ellicott City, “Somnium” explores the themes of consciousness and illusions and the ability to change outcomes when a teenager, played by Cox, falls asleep at the wheel.
“It has many interpretations,” says Fox, who specializes in six-second Vine films on Twitter (@GrantTheFox) and was the cinematographer for the project.
Corey Alston, another senior, was a lighting operator and worked the camera. Savannah Schubert, a 16-year-old junior, wrote the script and operated the boom microphone.
“This is outside the ‘and then I woke up’ cliché and works as macabre storytelling,” judges wrote in their comments. “Tells a good story economically, a key to a good short film. … I felt like I was watching a really talented filmmaker work out some interesting ideas.”
Cox, who plans on studying film next year at the Art Center College of Design in California, has been making films since he was 9 years old and debuted his first Nerf gun episode — short, sometimes comedic action films — on YouTube (CaCox97). He now has 200,000 YouTube followers. (He also took second place for his film “Knock, Knock” in the HoCo Film Fest.)
Fox also plans to continue filmmaking. Next up, he says, is a comedy.
Created in 2004, the Howard County Film Fest is a student-run organization dedicated to encouraging young local filmmakers to hone their craft.
“There’s really not a lot of outlets for creative storytelling,” says Danielle DuPuis, a media specialist at Hammond High who co-sponsors the organization and helps oversee the competition. “The students like to see what other students are doing. It motivates them.”
More than 43 films were submitted this year to the competition. After preliminary judging by a panel of teachers, the finalists are judged by a panel of professional filmmakers.