The story is straight from the evening news in any major city. A normal everyday activity escalates into an officer involved shooting. How did this happen? And why? Tuesday 10:00 a.m. shows how quickly things get out of hand and the deadly consequences that occur. This short film explores the emotionally charged topic of a police shooting by taking a fresh approach that does not judge the actions of the police, the bystanders, or the victim. The shock of the shooting and what follows builds into a suspense-filled thriller.
Circumstances catch young SIU investigator (Bea Santos) in a police shooting. She witnesses the death of a distraught man (Dwain Murphy) close at hand. After the Police Chief (Martha Burns) officially exonerates the two officers involved in the shooting (Fraser Elsdon, Andre Sills) the SIU inspector seeks to understand what really happened that morning at Tuesday 10:08 a.m. The audience follows her as she applies her skills with highly sophisticated digital audio equipment to cut through the cacophony of cell phone, CCTV and TV News camera recordings of the shooting to hear the truth.
Tuesday 10:08 a.m. will remind audiences of two great films: Coppola's The Conversation and Antonioni's Blow Up. It shows the skill of the filmmakers (Thomas Pepper and Jane Tattersall) that they are able to accomplish the same high level of tension and anxiety in under fourteen minutes that these earlier films achieved as feature-length movies. Unlike The Conversation or Blow Up conspiracy theories do not factor into the storytelling. But like these films Tuesday 10:00 a.m. peels back a mystery to reveal a disturbing truth. What happens next is unresolved, leaving another mystery with the audience. Some may find this ending unsatisfying. And yet, the onus of knowing the truth and what to do with it is as controversial as the police shooting itself. This movie sticks with you long after it ends.
Funding for Tuesday 10:08 a.m. was crowd-sourced. Despite being an indie production it is clear from the high production values that the filmmakers put all of the money they raised (and likely more) on screen. There are strong performances by the entire cast. Jonathan Goldsmith composed the original score.
