THE CALLING is another short. Maybe 15 minutes, maybe
longer. It was shot in film and in color with sound in the Super 8 format.
It wasn't made for college, it was made to make a short film period.
The story was simple. My father, as an older person named Elder, gets a call
from Death literally over the telephone. He drives to the cemetery as Alice Cooper's WAKE ME GENTLY is playing and when
he confronts the Reaper standing amongst the head stones he is transported into a dark limbo. The Reaper talks to him about
how he must submit to his own death, but my father's character says "NO!" The spell is broken and daylight comes back and
to the theme of PATTON my father's character marches to his car and drives towards the cemetery exit. When the Reaper makes
a tree limb fall in the car's path, my father drives around it and out of the gate. The last shot is from the rear window
of my father's car and shows the shrinking cemetery as he simply told death he wasn't interested in dying, goodbye!
I'm not as comfortable with this casting. It's personal. I shouldn't have used
my father in the role. It will make it hard to watch, particularly given its story, when he really dies in real life. When
it was shot all of us were younger including him.
