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Somnabulist Dreaming

Sean Townsend’s Dream With A Window, an evocative mix of music and film, comes to DVD

By Jim Mount

Fort Wayne Reader

2008-03-24

When film-maker and musician Sean Townsend began production on his short film Dream With A Window in September, 2004, he says he wasn’t even thinking of showing it to anybody. “I was just trying to see what I could accomplish with the resources I had available,” he says. “I have to say that I'm pretty happy with the way it turned out. For a no budget, underground release I think it looks pretty decent.”

Indeed, after enthusiastic response at the premier at C2G ministries and a screening at Cinema Center last May, Townsend is hoping to gain a wider audience for his film with its release on DVD at the end of March.

Townsend describes the process of making Dream With A Window as something that took an excruciatingly long time to both shoot and edit. “Part of the reason the process took so long was that I was learning the equipment as I went along,” Townsend explains. “Initially, I had the completed film but wasn't happy with it… I decided to start from scratch. I butchered the movie against my own initial misgivings but was much happier with what came out of it, a more organic, free-flowing movie that doesn't follow the traditional time line but relies more on intuition.”

The effort paid off. Townsend’s dream-like film leaves a lasting, surreal impression. There is no dialogue, which adds to the haunting quality of the film, but the soundtrack sort of becomes a character, replacing narration with resonant, audio emotion. "The way I describe the film is a meditation on suicide, depression, psychosis," says Townsend, "It's a different approach to narrative. As the film went along the idea became more and more clear. I had a mood or an essence and by letting it happen it came out a lot better than if I had forced it to be."

While Dream With A Window is his first film release, it is far from Townsend’s first production. As a local artist in the Fort Wayne area, Sean has been producing material for some time now and not just film. His band, Somnambulist Red, has been quietly operating in the Fort Wayne cultural landscape. Townsend describes Somnambulist Red’s work as an ”ambiguous, surreal meditative style of music,” which much like the style of his film, relies more on intuition and less on any set pattern.

He started the band with Alex Uelk in 1995. “One bass, one guitar, very incomplete songs but interesting stuff here and there,” says Townsend. “Never any vocals - something that was never meant as a final product. We just did a lot of creative work when recording.”

Not long after the band formed, Uelk left to join the Air Force; he returned in 2001 and Somnambulist Red released their first public venture, The Light In Our House Is Dead in 2004. When Uelk left again to pursue solo ventures in Indianapolis, Townsend decided to carry on alone, integrating SR's music with Dream With A Window. During the screening at Cinema Center last May, the band scored the film completely live (performances can be seen on Somnambulist Red’s myspace page below).

A 1997 graduate of Homestead High School, Townsend’s first exposure to filmmaking came during his sophomore year, making comedic, off-the-wall productions with friends from school.

After graduation, Townsend attended the Illinois Institute of Art for a year before transferring to the University of Saint Francis in 1998, graduating in 2000 with an Associate’s Degree in Commercial Art. It was during his time at the Illinois Institute of Art that he felt a serious turn towards film. In particular, David Lynch’s Twin Peaks really captured his imagination; the film-maker’s off-beat directorial style had a phenomenal impact on Townsend's developing vision. He saw in Lynch's movies a “new idea of how far film could be pushed” and has worked in applying that concept to both his film and music ventures.

Townsend has just finished the soundtrack for Darkness Aftermath, a new work by Allen Etter, another local filmmaker. Townsend also has another film of his own in the works. But for now, his priority is on the DVD release of Dream With A Window. “I feel that Dream With A Window was good starting point,” he says. It’s something I will always look back and be proud of how ‘guerrilla style’ it was made. Just one flashlight, a camera, a girl, an abandoned house and me — that was it.”

To watch trailers of Dream With A Window and check out video and audio of Somnabulist Red, visit myspace.com/somnambulistred. The DVD will be available at Hyde Bros. Books, Wooden Nickel on Anthony, Barnes & Noble or by email through the myspace site.