This Saturday, Columbus residents will have a chance to be extras in an independent film about faith, love and mixed martial arts.
The film, “The Fight Within,” is a production by New Life Cinema Productions out of Tuscaloosa. Though most of it has been shot in Tuscaloosa, the crew is spending three days at Trotter Convention Center, filming fight scenes that culminate in the film’s final climactic showdown, which audiences at Saturday’s “Strikehard 39” event can be part of as extras.
“We want the community involved,” Jim Davis, the film’s writer and executive producer, said.
The film centers around a young man named Logan, played by John Major Davis, whose father was an MMA fighter who owned a gym. After his father’s death, Logan tries to leave the fight scene — a feat made difficult by the film’s antagonist, Hayden, the gym’s champion who is still smarting over Logan having beaten him once. Hayden wants a rematch with Logan. The film also tells the story of Logan finding love with a missionary who brings him closer to God.
Jim Davis spent a year writing the film and another year in pre-production. He likes faith-based films, but feels they often are for people who have already found faith. With “The Fight Within,” he wanted to explore the conflicts about faith and God within people and hopefully appeal to non-believers.
“It’s really more about people questioning their own relationship with God,” he said.
Davis also wanted all aspects of the film — particularly the fight scenes — to be as realistic as possible. The actors playing Logan and Hayden trained for months with MMA fighters who helped with choreography and storytelling devices. It’s also the reason the crew chose to film the final showdown between Logan and Hayden at the Trotter Convention Center on a night when Strikehard Productions, an MMA group out of Tuscaloosa, is hosting their own fights in front of a live audience.
The film is one of the first independent films to be shot with the Red Dragon 6K, one of the highest quality cameras, according to Davis. The camera produces a high-quality image, similar to high definition.
The crew began filming at Trotter Convention on Thursday and continues today and Saturday. These three days in Columbus come in the middle of the entire film schedule, which began June 15 and will wrap up around the end of July.
The nearly two-month shoot has been an experience for actress Lelia Symington, who is from New York and now lives in Los Angeles. She plays Emma, the main character’s love interest. Symington had never been to either Alabama or Mississippi before she began work on this movie. On one of her days off, she and another cast member spent time in New Orleans, and for some of the scenes, she and the crew shot scenes boating and inner tubing at the lake in Tuscaloosa.
“I’d never experienced the South in this way before,” Symington said. “It’s a whole new world down here. I like it. I like getting to know new places, so this is good.”
Symington described her own character as the girl who is from out-of-town and intrigued by Logan and the world of MMA. In the final scene tomorrow night, Symington will be among the audience watching the fight.
“She’s in the crowd just hoping (the main character) keeps getting up,” she said.
She added that though the movie focuses a lot on faith and on fighting, it is about mostly a coming-of-age story about two young people coming together and learning who they are.
“The Fight Within” will be released either late 2015 or early 2016 and will be shown all through the South, Davis said. He hopes to release it all over the country.
To purchase tickets for Strikehard 39 and be an extra in the final scene, go to strikehardproductions.com. To learn more about the film, go to thefightwithinmovie.com.
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