Whitefish natives win film award

The Daily Inter Lake

The independent film "Roulette," produced by Whitefish natives Adam Stillwell and Adam Pitman, along with David Blair, recently won an award for Best First Feature at the Fargo (N.D.) Film Festival.

The film, the first for BadFritter Films, premiered in October 2005 at the O'Shaughnessy Center in Whitefish.

The BadFritter Films team has returned to Montana to begin its next project, entitled "Paper Dolls," a thriller set in the woods of the Northwest to be filmed in Whitefish.

"Roulette" caught the attention of producer Kent Harper, who currently is working with David Lynch on the project "Surveillance." Harper also is producing and acting in the upcoming "The Other Side," which will star Brittany Murphy, Ryan Gosling, Giovanni Ribisi, Anjelica Huston and Tim Roth.

Harper has agreed to produce "Paper Dolls" and has brought a professional crew and cast to the project, including award-winning director of photography Michael Off and the post-production house Film Works, which is responsible for the special effects in "Donnie Darko," "The Matrix" and "The Cell."

Actors include Kevin Gage ("Blow," "Heat"), Stephen Collins ("Seventh Heaven"), Saige Thompson ("Life on a Stick") and Kelly Eviston ("As The World Turns," "The Basket").

Richard and Carol Atkinson of Whitefish were impressed enough by "Roulette" to become the sole investors for "Paper Dolls."

Production goes into full swing in mid-July in and around Whitefish.

Pitman wrote the script during college in 2000. "Paper Dolls" begins in a cramped police interrogation room where 18-year-old Travis Brooks, bruised and bloodied, relates the events of the past 48 hours during which he and his friends were attacked by large, mysterious creatures in the forest.

For more information, e-mail badfritters@hotmail.com or visit www.badfritterfilms.com.