Slick No-Budget Indie Flick “Currency” Screens at 2011 Santa Rosa International Film Festival
Low budget is no longer synonymous with low quality. Advancements in technology coupled with plummeting equipment costs have brought powerful filmmaking tools to the masses. One result is a noticeable increase in the quality of DIY film projects. A good script in the right hands can now be translated into a good movie, regardless of financial factors.
Among the many creative films resulting from this revolution is the indie feature “Currency” which screened at the Santa Rosa International Film Festival this September. Made on a shoestring budget, “Currency” was written, directed, produced and edited by Indiana native and first-time filmmaker Brad Rosier.
“Currency” weaves together a tapestry of stories as several lives are observed over the course of eighty years. A writer asks why we live. A child asks why we die. Mobsters ask why life has value. An old woman asks why we are alone. A scientist asks why there is anything at all. Part mystery, part drama, “Currency” is a simple story about the complex questions we all wonder about. We all ask why. And we all die.
Though “Currency” was made for practically no money compared to big-budget Hollywood fare, the film’s impressive production values would lead you to believe otherwise. As a micro-budget project, the movie cost less than $10,000 to complete. All the actors and crew were volunteers and the production modeled the community attitude of local theater. Rosier is an Art Director at Villing & Company, a full-service marketing and communications agency in Indiana.