Busy UI freshman's film judged one of best at Hardacre festival

By Eric Clark / CEDAR RAPIDS GAZETTE / August 5, 2004

Scott Beck has made three feature-length films and he's working on a fourth. He runs a movie production company and his work has appeared in a handful of film festivals.

Quite a resume for a 19-year-old who just finished his freshman year at the University of Iowa.

Beck's latest release, "University Heights," will be screened at the Eighth Annual Hardacre Film Festival. More than 70 films were submitted for consideration. Of those, 20 films from around the world will be shown during the two-day event at the Hardacre Theare.

A panel of five judges named "University Heights" one of the top films in the festival. The 96-minute film is about the emotional struggles of four characters on a college campus: a love-struck teenager with drug problems, an English teacher with sex issues, a philosophy teacher who owes thousands of dollars to a drug cartel and a racist student who realizes he hates himself more than anyone else.

"I like to put people in certain instances and then figure out how they would get out of them," Beck says.

"University Heights" was shot digitally for $300 and features 55 actors and extras.

Beck made the film with assistance from his filmmaking partner, Bryan Woods, 19, a student at Scott Community College in Bettendorf. The duo run their own production company called Bluebox Ltd.