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While working odd jobs related to the film industry, Joe Blank felt unsatisfied. He wanted to create his own work. This unrest inspired Blank to create his first feature film, “Roman Candle”.

While working as a production assistant in New York City after graduating from Syracuse University’s College of Visual and Performing Arts in 2018, Blank was filled with frustration. He didn’t know what his next move would be. Half of his film friends were moving to Los Angeles to pursue their dreams of being producers and directors. For Blank, who grew up just north of the city in Westchester, NY, severing his ties with New York was tougher for him than for some of his friends.

“For me and a lot of friends of mine [there] kicked in this sort of idea of ‘which path do I take’ and ‘which is the right move,’” Blank said. “For some people, that means going to Hollywood right away and going to an agency. I was kind of divided because growing up in Westchester, I felt like a lot of my base and knowledge was in New York.”

Blank stayed in New York and worked on true crime shows, a season of Project Runway, for a talent agency, and other jobs relating to production. But, after a while, it became clear that just being in the same field as film wasn’t enough to satisfy his need for creativity. He felt his mental health deteriorating, and the only way to improve it was to go out and create.

After watching “I Am Easy to Find”, a short film directed by Mike Mills for the band The National, Blank first became inspired to create “Roman Candle”. “I Am Easy to Find” pieces together small scenes of someone’s life into a short film. Blank was captivated by this idea and decided to structure his film similarly, except focusing on the intricacies of a relationship. The story centers on the evolving romantic relationship of a young couple living in NYC, according to Blank.

Blank reached out to former SU classmates to create the film. He brought on Derrick Owens, an S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications graduate, as a producer. The leading actors, Sarah Hubner and Noah Schindler, had been acting majors at VPA. The group began to film in September 2019.

“We all had full time jobs, and we shot basically once every month up until the pandemic,” Blank said. “So we just shot…basically when we could have the time [and] when I could kind of put together the money again.”

Everyone who participated in “Roman Candle” did so for free, with Blank self-financing the film when needed. Blank says he was lucky to be able to create this film with his friends who were very generous with their time and passionate about the project.

“We did it for no money, all the locations were just around New York,” Blank said. “Because we all sort of had this passion to do this movie, that was the way it unfolded. And I think because this was [filmed] every month, it became something—[since] all of us were working—to look forward to in a way and it felt extracurricular.”

Schindler, who played the male lead, feels similarly to Blank. Having worked together on VPA projects with Blank during college, creating “Roman Candle” was reminiscent of that time.

“It was really fun, it felt like college again,” Schindler said. “It was a very small crew…we would usually film in one of our apartments, so it’s very intimate. Small quarters.”

Blank has always been inspired by films created in unconventional ways. Many of the filmmakers he looked up to while growing up started out by creating low-budget independent films similar to his.

Blank used “Roman Candle” as a creative outlet to improve his mental health, and follow in the footsteps of some of his film idols. After its release, “Roman Candle” went on to be shown at 11 film festivals. It also won the Audience Award for Best Drama at Film Invasion LA and Best Director at Blue Whiskey Independent Film Festival.

“Roman Candle” has been on the film festival circuit for about a year now, with the next showing of the film at the NoHo CineFest on September 29th. It is in the process of being available to stream online.

When it was first submitted, Owens felt optimistic, but didn’t know what to expect.

“We had done the work to make the story as good as it could be, so at a certain point, it was just like, we’re gonna submit to all these festivals because we wanted to give it a go, but we sort of can’t control it,” Owens said. “[But] people reacted really well at festivals, [which] is exciting, especially for Joe who I know, it’s a personal story for him.”

Blank says he feels extremely thankful and humbled for receiving those awards, and in the future, all he wants is to continue to create films.

“If I’m able to just make movies with friends, I think that is totally satisfying on its own,” Blank said. “I’m really attracted to that community aspect of [film], and moving up with friends and kind of just making films with people that you meet along the way.”

Published on August 21, 2022 at 7:39 pm

Contact Shantel: sguzma01@syr.edu | @shantelguzman2