This post was contributed by a community member. The views expressed here are the author's own.

Arts & Entertainment

Mill Valley Director Makes Splash with 'Piano Fingers'

With pit stops in China and the Czech Republic, Tam High grad charts a winning course through the film industry.

During the six months he spent holed up in a Shaolin monastery in Northeastern China studying martial arts, Mill Valley native Nicholas Carmen hardly could have imagined that his first widely-screened film would deal with the thoroughly un-exotic subject of Alzheimer’s Disease.

Indeed, a love story set among the ruins of such emotional devastation is an unlikely subject for any young filmmaker to tackle, but tackle it he did, with enough skill, compassion and flair to garner recognition and awards along the film festival circuit.

The film has its Northern California premiere tonight at the Tiburon International Film Festival, where it screens as part of the “Marin Filmmakers” spotlight.

Find out what's happening in Mill Valleywith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Carmen, a 1994 graduate of , co-wrote and directed the 25-minute film with two longtime friends and fellow Tam High grads, co-writer/actress Ava Bogle and tech specialist Marc Steinberg. All three participated in Tam’s Conservatory Theatre Ensemble (CTE) program, which Carmen describes as very influential in his decision to pursue filmmaking as a career.

Piano Fingers is the story of Howard and May, an aging couple who enjoyed minor celebrity in the 1950s as jingle-composers for cigarette commercials. As May’s memory fails and Howard struggles to hold onto her, the couple entomb themselves in an apartment piled with relics from their lives and careers, the TV tuned permanently to an unending loop of infomercials. Though their decline is heartbreaking and inevitable, the shared musical memories of their jingle-writing days remain intact and manage to keep them connected.

Find out what's happening in Mill Valleywith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Carmen says the story is loosely based on his great-aunt and uncle, and her struggle with Alzheimer’s. He says that even as her memory faded, she was still able to recall the piano pieces she learned to play as a child.

“It became a story I wanted to tell… I felt it was an issue that more people should be aware of, though I’m very conscious that I’m in a different demographic from most of the people who deal wit it,” Carmen said in a telephone interview.

As he co-wrote the script with Bogle, he says, “the story really took shape when we added the '50s aspect. It really helped to add specificity.” It also gave production designer Justin Benjamin an entire world to dive into and re-imagine. The flotsam and jetsam of Howard and May’s shared past, piled all around them, play an important role in creating both the nostalgic and suffocating feelings evoked in the film.

That such a touching and insightful meditation on aging could spring forth from three 20-something filmmakers is a testament to their dedication to this story. Carmen and Steinberg have been friends since their middle school days in Mill Valley, and met Bogle in high school.

“The three of us made films in high school our senior year, and we’d shoot films every summer during college,” said Carmen. Their Tam High roots played a strong enough role that for a film that they shot after their first year out of high school, they cast CTE teachers in the main roles.

Carmen cites another Mill Valley-rooted, source of inspiration for his filmmaking career: his interest in martial arts. A black belt in Tae Kwan Do (earned right here at ), Carmen’s curiosity took him all the way to Ji Lin Province in China’s Northeast to spend six months studying in a Shaolin monastery.

“At the time, my interests in film and martial arts were very intertwined. I do think it inspired me to move towards filmmaking as a career.”

Besides the “fantastic” physical training, his time spent in China also helped him form a worldview.

“Here I was, watching this culture caught between communism and capitalism, a whole generation living between the two. It taught me to look more critically at the world around me.”

Carmen attended UCLA, as did Steinberg and Bogle. As an undergraduate in the World Arts and Cultures program, he spent a semester absorbing European film culture at Prague’s FAMU (Academy of Film and Television), and back in Los Angeles worked on making films on his own time -- and dollar -- which completing his studies.

He and Steinberg made a short film, Pictures of You, during their senior year at UCLA, but spent a full two years in post-production before completing it. The reason for the delay ended up being fortuitous: after graduation, the two friends formed a post-production company, Radiant Images, and capitalized on rapidly changing digital technology to find a technical niche that needed filling.

Their success and hands-on experience were invaluable. “When we finally finished Pictures of You,” Carmen says, “we knew that [it] would not be anything like what it is now if we hadn’t gained that real-life experience.”

Parlaying that experience into a full-fledged filmmaking career is next on Carmen's agenda, and he'll have some serious momentum from Piano Fingers to help him along: so far, the film has won several awards, including an Audience Award at Dances With Films Festival and the Grand Jury Prize at the Hollyshorts Festival. It continues to screen at festivals both domestic and international.

For now, Carmen is happy to soak up Los Angeles' under-appreciated cultural scene while he continues to balance commercial film work with his aspirations as a writer-director.

"At the moment," he says, "the joy of making the finished product is enough to make me want to spend all my nights and weekends doing it."

Lucky enough to have made some actual money doing commercial work, Carmen's best advice for other young filmmakers is to "learn a skill.... The reason I've been able to do this is because I've made enough money in the film business by learning a technical skill."

His other parting advice: "You have to make sure you can find self worth in other areas that aren't professional. Because this business can eat you alive."

Fortunately for Carmen, Steinberg and Bogle, Piano Fingers may just be their ticket out of the shark tank.

The 411: Piano Fingers screens tonight at 7:00pm at the Tiburon International Film Festival as part of the "Marin Filmmakers" spotlight. Click here for more information or to buy tickets.

We’ve removed the ability to reply as we work to make improvements. Learn more here

The views expressed in this post are the author's own. Want to post on Patch?