Belle native releases first movie

James Craigmiles plays Andrew in "Right Side/Blind Side," a film he conceived about four male friends - two gay, two straight - who experience a wide range of obstacles in their search for acceptance.
James Craigmiles plays Andrew in "Right Side/Blind Side," a film he conceived about four male friends - two gay, two straight - who experience a wide range of obstacles in their search for acceptance.

James Craigmiles sat speechless in front of his laptop that Thursday night in April.

It was a big moment for the native of Belle, Missouri. Craigmiles had just finished watching a final cut of "Right Side/Blind Side," a short film he conceived and pitched to his friends nearly a year earlier. Sitting in the living room of his Los Angeles apartment, the 34-year-old remembers feeling goosebumps form all over his skin.

When his roommate came home around midnight, returning from an acting class rehearsal, Craigmiles sat him down and played the movie once more. He didn't mind watching it a second time.

"I just couldn't believe what a beautiful thing we made with such a small budget and just a group of people committed to something," said Craigmiles, who will be screening the film at 4:30 p.m. today in his Missouri stomping grounds at the Showboat Theater in Hermann. "It just blew me away."

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The idea for "Right Side/Blind Side" came to Craigmiles around June 26, 2013, a day remembered by many for the Supreme Court's decision to strike down the Defense of Marriage Act. In Los Angeles, it was all anyone could talk about.

When Craigmiles scrolled through his friends' posts on Facebook that day, he remembers seeing the same DOMA graphic again and again. It showed two photos - one from a 1960's protest on race mixing and one from a 2000's protest on gay marriage. Underneath, the caption read, "Which side of history will you be on?"

The line struck Craigmiles each time he read it.

"I thought, "That's the craziest thing I've ever heard - race mixing. Who cares?'" Craigmiles said. "About 60 years ago, that was such an important topic. ... And now here we are today, and it's the exact same thing, just tweaked differently."

He knew he wanted to make a film about the experiences that go into landing on the right or wrong side of history. Change is always going to happen, he said, but individuals choose how they'll be remembered. Craigmiles started to conceive a story about four male friends - two gay, two straight - who experience a wide range of obstacles in their search for acceptance.

Many elements of his life in Belle inspired the story. The movie is ultimately about the importance of equality, he said, and that's what he was always taught in his childhood home.

His mother, Nina Henderson, 54, remembers telling him to never prematurely judge someone else. You'll never know what path someone has walked if you judge them, she would say. It's a message she didn't want him to forget.

Divorced and raising Craigmiles without any assistance, Henderson said she tried to foster positivity above all else. She encouraged him in everything he did, no matter the activity.

"I told him that you can be anything you want to be - sometimes it just takes longer if you dream big," she said.

Craigmiles always enjoyed acting. It came as no surprise to her that he fell in with the theater kids at Maries County R-2 High School, performing with his characteristically high energy.

One of Craigmile's favorite memories of high school theater came during a production of "Grease." When he yelled "it's automatic" to cue the music for "Grease Lightning," there was nothing to be heard. Realizing the song wasn't starting, he wailed, "maybe it's a stick shift" to roars from the audience.

But as much as Craigmiles enjoyed performing, he remembers he often got teased and taunted for it. One time, he was punched in the stomach and taunted with gay slurs. On a different occasion, someone threw a pencil and it stuck in his ear.

"It wasn't that they hated me because I was a certain way, it was that they needed something to latch onto," Craigmiles said. "But there were also so many people who were so gracious and so positive that I don't look on my days in Belle as a negative thing."

Craigmiles said many of his experiences in Belle - good and bad - ended up in the screenplay for "Right Side/Blind Side." He completed the script with three other friends about two months after he conceived the story, and he even signed on to play the character Andrew.

It wasn't the concept of the movie that worried Craigmiles, the Hollywood newcomer. As a matter of fact, he said that part came pretty easily.

It was finding money that proved to be the most challenging step in the process.

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Kickstarter, an online resource that helps artists pursue projects through monetary donations, gave Craigmiles' project life.

He still remembers the moment they reached their fundraising goal. It was a day before the deadline, and he was pulling up the Kickstarter app on his phone every 30 minutes, refreshing madly. At some point, the webpage displayed a new message - "goal met."

"When we hit (our goal), I texted all of the rest of the cast and crew that we got it, and we all celebrated," Craigmiles said. "It was cool to know we hit that next step."

But as he quickly learned, distributing $10,000 on the set of a movie is no easy task. There were people to pay - cinematographer, editor, sound person, cast - and locations to reserve. One expense he never expected was craft service for the set, feeding the cast on their rigorous 15-hour shooting schedule.

There were six days of filming total. Aside from acting in the movie, Craigmiles' main job was to draft the production schedule for the next day. It was the last thing he did before falling asleep, and he said he was often too exhausted to get through it.

"There was one night where I was doing that production schedule sitting on my couch and someone took a picture of me because I had my iPad in my lap and I'm drooling, passed out," Craigmiles said. "But that's what happens when you make a passion project like that - you go non-stop."

The last scene in the movie was shot at a house in West Hollywood, and Craigmiles was behind the camera when the final line was spoken. Although he wasn't the director, he got to say "cut" for the last time. On his word, the filming of "Right Side/Blind Side" was complete.

"Just the relieved look on their faces ..." Craigmiles said. "We were so happy to have made what we did."

The first screening of the film was about a month ago at the Lorenzo Theater in downtown Los Angeles. When it was over, numerous people approached Craigmiles. One of his favorite comments came from two people who thought the film communicated an honest love story. It didn't feel like there was any hidden agenda, they told him.

Tonight will be the first time the film has been screened outside of Los Angeles, and Craigmiles is excited to show the film to a crowd of people who have never seen it before. He never gets tired of seeing people respond positively to the material - much like he did when he first saw it.

"I don't watch the film at all when there are others, I watch the crowd," Craigmiles said. "Seeing that my two-dimensional image on a screen can affect people. ... That now gives me goosebumps every single time."

Want to attend?

What: Screening of "Right Side/Blind Side," followed by a behind-the-scenes film and Q&A with James Craigmiles.

When: 4:30 p.m. today (Saturday, June 21, 2014)

Where: Hermann Showboat Theater, 112 E. 4th St., Hermann, Missouri

Description: "Right Side/Blind Side" is about four male friends - two gay, two straight - who are similar in many ways and different in many more. As the film goes on, their differences and prejudices give way to conflict and pain.

Link:

'Right Side/Blind Side' Facebook page