Help Fund a Columbia University MFA Thesis film (the video has a cute toddler in it!)

I'm an MFA thesis student at Columbia University, and we could really use your support on this project. Movies, even short films, cost a lot of money. And, as students, that's the main thing that's in short supply. We need money to pay actors, pay for location fees, and pay for the travel of our cinematographer.

The film is called SMOTHER IN HUGS, and it's dark comedy about a man who begins to get anonymous adult phone calls at work.

There are a bunch of super fun videos on the page -- including one with a cute toddler!

Here's the indiegogo link: https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/smother-me-in-hugs-columbia-univ-thesis-film/x/10563128#/

If you just want to watch the cute toddler, go here: https://vimeo.com/160561961

To learn more about the film itself and the people behind it, you can visit ericschuman.com/smothermeinhugs

Here's a synopsis:

Garrett is a lonely, overweight middle-aged man. When he's not working as an attendant at a rarely used parking lot, he spends most of his time at home. Lying in bed at night, he makes Siri tell him jokes and cuddles with a body pillow. His only real human contact is with the woman who makes his sandwiches at the deli, Diane. Often, he'll awkwardly try to flirt with her. The most recent highlight of his life was almost choking to death on a Dorito’s Chip while home alone. Eventually, he dislodged the evil chip. He laughed about it.

One day at work, he begins getting anonymous adult phone calls from a woman. At first, he's confused by it, but when the calls keep coming, he gets interested and starts to play along. The calls become his reason for getting up in the morning. Soon, he decides he must meet the woman on the other end of the line. He musters up the courage and asks to meet her in person. Surprisingly, she agrees.

They decide to meet at a frozen yogurt store, and Garrett arrives there early. Wearing a Yankees cap so he'll be recognized, he scopes out the place for who the woman could be. Is it the woman across from him reading The Goldfinch? No, it is not. Suddenly, someone sits down across from him. He looks at her. It's a twelve-year-old girl (Fiona), and she's smiling. It was her. She was making the calls.

The rest of the film follows the heart-breaking conversation these two desperate people have over frozen yogurt and its repercussions on Garrett's life.

And here's a bit from me, the director, about why I'm making it:

When I was fifteen I got a call on my cell phone from a woman asking if I knew where Gary was. I didnʼt know a Gary. When I told her she had the wrong number she said I had hot voice and started asking me questions.

I told her about myself - including that I was fifteen - and she hung up. Itʼs been more than decade since then, but I still wonder what wouldʼve happened if I hadn’t revealed my age. Would we have met up? Would we have fallen in love? Would we still be together?

Around the same age Iʼd spend time in various online chat rooms. Sometimes I would be a man, sometimes a girl. But one time I chatted with a girl for awhile until she sent me a picture of herself. She was very overweight, and I never messaged her again. I still feel bad about that. Now I am overweight. Now I wonder if the photos I have on OK Cupid make me look too fat. Now I try to hide myself in larger clothes.

What would have happened if I had met either one of these woman in person? Would they have lined up with my fantasy version of them? Of course not. Thatʼs delusional thinking. But I still thought it. This is my connection to the story; Iʼm starting with my own fantasies and lustful thoughts and feelings of self-hatred, and turning it into a sad comedy, in the vein of Punch-Drunk Love, Buffalo ʻ66, and The Heartbreak Kid.

Why comedy? Well, what other way is there to go through life other than laughing at all the crap you’ve got on your shoes? If I laugh at Garrett, itʼs because Iʼm laughing at myself, and I’m always laughing at myself. Often, I laugh at how I look versus how I feel. I feel skinny on the inside yet my belly tells me different. And this year I noticed I have more stretch marks; they used to be just on my shoulders, but now they’re on my stomach too. Yet I still order Seamless in the middle of the night.

I donʼt usually see people who look like me in the leading roles of movies. There arenʼt too many movies out there about chubby guys and chubby girls who get together. Often, when a movie is about a chubby guy, itʼs about him accepting himself for who he is. What a bunch of bologna.

I believe in this story because Iʼm embarrassed by it and what it reveals about me.

TL;DR Columbia MFA Film student seeks your support to make his thesis film happen.