Up in the Woods, a film written, directed and produced by the fall 2013 Film Production II class, will premiere Thursday, May 8 at 6:30 p.m. in Bucknall Theater.

For the past two semesters, communication students, under the supervision of communication professor Paul Falcone, worked to complete the film. Up in the Woods is an original idea thought up by senior Matt Scripter, who directed, co-wrote and co-edited the film.

As part of the course, each student is to come up with an original idea for a film and pitch their idea to the class. Scripter’s idea was picked, and next, he and senior Chelsea Rowan, the first assistant director, wrote the script.

“Once the idea is picked, it moves into pre-production,” said Scripter. “This is when we do the casting and rehearsals, location scouting, and overall preparation for the production weekend. Then we filmed over the course of three 15-hour days. After the filming phase, it moves onto editing and other post-production things, like composing the music and promoting the premiere.”

The film stars three non-University of New Haven students, one of which only six years old. Filming took three full days of shooting on location, at a cabin in Kent, Conn. Two days of additional shooting were done on Falcone’s property.

“It was a very professional environment,” said senior Joe Adams. “We sent out a casting call, went down to New York and held auditions. We even had a catering tent with breakfast and everything,” he added.

What is significant about this film is that each student in the class worked on the film in some way. “In some way, everyone did something,” Adams said. Adams was one of two camera men.

Making sure to keep quiet on set and to stay on time were some the difficulties Adams said the students encountered why on location shooting the film.

He described the film almost as a psychological thriller with a powerful plot twist. Up in the Woods will be entered in film festivals around the country after its premiere.