Fulton house set for resident’s first film

Neighbors of Brad Hildebrandt must have wondered what was going on this summer at his house in the Fulton area. Bright lights, cameras, people coming and going, and the smell of lasagna wafting through the air.
Hildebrandt and Cullen Arbaugh, who had been students together at the University of Minnesota, decided to put together their first film called “Bram,” and shoot the whole film in the house that Hildebrandt and his partner had recently bought.
The film is about a mother, Fiona, who has been estranged from her son, Dalton, for about three years. They reconnect, and she finds her son has left his wife and children to be with Bram, a man that he loves.
“She has no problem with this, but she is surprised that she didn’t see it coming,” Hildebrandt explained. “She then finds out that Bram is an ex-con just released from prison. Dalton was a prison guard. And that is how the two met.” Over a dinner, Fiona finds out some more things about Bram that are not so great.
“It’s a funny, goofy, raunchy take on a Lifetime original movie,” Hildebrandt said. “I guess you could call it a dark comedy, with a lot of tension between Bram and Fiona.”
Hildebrandt said the whole movie was shot using mostly a local crew, with some Hollywood people brought in.
Dalton is played by Ryan Maltz, another friend who attended the U of M who moved to LA a few years ago. “He was recently in Monsters, the movie about the Menendez brothers,” Hildebrandt said.
Lucinda Holshue plays Fiona. “She is a good friend of me and my writing partner, and was our voice teacher at the U of M. She worked for 20 years as the resident vocal coach at the Guthrie and is still a professor at the U of M. We wrote the part of Fiona for her,” Hildebrandt said. He plays Bram, which was a last-minute change.
“Two days before shooting our regular actor got COVID, so I stepped in. I knew the lines already, so it worked out.”Hildebrandt said shooting an entire film in his home was a way of testing the limits of his relationship with his partner.
“We had 14 people in the house with cameras and lights, and we shot everything in four days. The result is a 20-25 minute film,” he said.
“We had an incredible group of people. We used Line Break Video, a local production company were very helpful, giving us the equipment we needed. They shoot a lot of commercials and want to expand to more creative pursuits.”
Hildebrandt said his crew was made up of a lot of talented people in the Twin Cities. Aaron Martinenko is a photographer who does a lot of commercial work for the Timberwolves, and he brought in high-end equipment. “We had a really great lighting guy, Luis Morales, who brought his friends. They worked way below rate and were really generous. It speaks to the generosity of the community here.”
Hildebrandt and Arbaugh wrote a feature-length screenplay last year that was a finalist at the Omaha Film Festival. Hildebrandt grew up in Omaha, and he said they were excited at being finalists and felt they needed to keep writing. Both had attended theater school at the U of M.
“We decided we might as well try and make our own movie, and we wanted to write something that was doable. They both produced and directed “Bram.”
“The most challenging part was raising the money,” Hildebrandt said. “We secured $10,000 and reached out to people in the community who donated to other theaters. But we did not hear back from them. I understand. My day job is going door to door.
“We bit the bullet and asked a lot of family and friends for help. That got us within 70 percent of our goal. So we each chipped in $1,500. Most of the money went to pay for the crew.”
Hildebrandt said that his favorite part of the whole process is directing. “I was surprised at how much it seemed like hosting a party every day. The crew would show up, and we would put on music. My partner even cooked lasagna and burritos.”
He joked that the crew was so gracious, even when one night the lasagna had so many layers it did not get completely heated. One crew member was heard saying “That’s okay. I really like cold lasagna.”
“I just wanted to make it a good, hospitable environment for everybody. We were lucky to have really collaborative actors.”
Arbaugh has a friend in LA, Nick Gallucci, who will be editing “Bram.” “He knows timing and how to edit comedy,” Hildebrandt said. “He’ll get a rough cut and we’ll go back and forth, and we ope to have a finished product before Christmas. Then we hope to get it out to all sorts of festivals: Tribeca, Sundance, LA, Omaha and Minneapolis. Some with LGBTQ themes. “
Hildebrandt said the goal with this first film is for them to get their names out there, get something on record to show and say “This is what we do.”