George Woodard sets up his projector Saturday evening at the Hardwick Town House before a showing of his Vermont epic, The Summer of Walter Hicks. Photo by Joseph GresserHARDWICK — Few black and white films are made these days. Of those that are, almost none are epics, and likely only one of those epics was made for $35,000 — The Summer of Walter Hacks.
Waterbury Center director and dairy farmer George Woodard spent a year filming and another five years in post-production work for the movie that showed Saturday night at the Town House as part of The 100% Vermont Hardwick Fall Film Festival.
The film is both an homage to the great western films of the 1940s and 1950s, and a coming-of-age story set in 1950s Vermont.
Eleven-year-old Walter Hacks lives with his brother and father on a struggling dairy farm. He is obsessed with western movies — he fills his schoolbooks with photos of his film heroes, wears a floppy cowboy hat and regards his bicycle as his trusty steed.
Walter and his brother Clifford, played by Mr. Woodard’s son Henry and Matthew Woodard, his nephew, suddenly find themselves on their own after their father is killed in what appears to be a farm accident. The brothers decide to bury their father and hide his death from the outside world, so as not to be separated.
In order to fool the townspeople into thinking that nothing unusual has happened, the brothers are forced to unravel secrets kept by their father.
One of the first is the discovery that their father owed money to every business in town. To find money to pay off the farm’s debts, Walter asks John, the local mechanic, for a job. He turns out to have an aptitude for the work and spends much of the summer bicycling down country roads with his friend Margaret, played by Francesca Blanchard, to repair the tractors of incredulous farmers.
Although he and his brother struggle to keep the farm running, Walter finds time for adventures.
Walter and Margaret hop a freight train to Burlington so he can try to win the $150 grand prize in a fiddling contest. He fails, but his fiddlingIn this film still, Margaret (Francesca Blanchard) encourages Walter (Henry Woodard) as he tries to hop a Burlington-bound freight train. and singing prove entertaining enough to earn him a radio show. Like the Lone Ranger, though, he’s gone before anyone can discover his true identity.
The film abounds with neat plays on familiar scenes from western movies. Walter emulates the hero who rescues the girl from a runaway stagecoach in a scene where he saves Margaret when she accidently sets a tractor rolling down a steep hill.
When Walter is forced to race for his life aboard his trusty fat-tired bike, the chase scene is absolutely classic in its style and intensity.
In over two hours of running time, The Summer of Walter Hicks delivers everything one could expect from a film, and more.
Mr. Woodard spent a long time watching old films to learn the tricks of lighting scenes, and his movie has the authentic feel of classic cinema. His story goes beyond the obvious parallels with old westerns to evoke moments from such classic books as Treasure Island, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, and Tom Sawyer.
As a writer, Mr. Woodard has a gift for creating three-dimensional characters, and as a director he gets excellent performances from his cast, many of whom were new to movies.
George Woodard directs his son Henry and Clarice Dickinson in a scene from The Summer of Walter Hacks. Mr. Woodard said he came to Barton in 2005 because he remembered the Municipal Building’s theater and ticket booth from his days of touring with the Ground Hog Opry. Photo by Joseph GresserMr. Woodard showed up in Barton in February of 2005 and shot a scene in the lobby of the Municipal Building. Clarice Dickinson was cast as the ticket seller at a movie theater, and Mr. Woodard filmed her scene over and over as she sat inside the old-fashioned ticket booth and talked to Henry Woodard.
At the time Mr. Woodard expected that his film would be finished within a year and cost about $6,000 to make. As it turned out, it took another five years, he said Saturday night and cost $35,000.
Part of that money went to pay for the lavish film score, composed by Pete Sutherland and played by members of the Vermont Symphony Orchestra, Mr. Woodard said. “We needed a soundtrack like they would have had in the fifties instead of someone just playing a guitar,” he said.
He also explained that he hadn’t realized when he started out, how much he would have to pay for the rights to use classic film clips and famous western tunes. They proved affordable after he promised that the movie would only be shown at film festivals.
That presents a problem, according to the film’s producer and co-writer Gerianne Smart, because most film festivals want pictures that are about one and a half hours long and have famous actors. Neither applies to The Summer of Walter Hacks, she pointed out.
Mr. Woodard said that he was able to pay for the film with money he made over the years touring The Ground Hog Opry around the state.
After the Hardwick showing, Mr. Woodard took questions from an audience that included several members of his cast. One person asked if he plans to make a sequel.
“No,” was the quick reply. “Henry is 18 now and this tall,” he added holding his hand well above his head.
Asked if a radio drama was a possibility, Mr. Woodard’s face took on a dreamy expression and he mused about the possibilities offered by the theater of the imagination. But he made no promises.
Although The Summer of Walter Hacks won’t be coming to a theater near you, anyone who wants to see the film and is willing to travel can head to the Vermont International Film Festival in Burlington on October 26, where it will be shown at 6:30 p.m. They won’t be sorry for the drive.
