A new movie, "HÄNDS OF THUNDER", a West Seattle production, begins filming in Seattle this summer. It promises disco hand clapping choreography with a Swedish twist. Left to right are Peter Feysa, Brian Sutherland, & Kevin Harvey. Feysa & Sutherland wrote the film.
What may be the world's first 1970's disco hand clapping movie with a Swedish swagger begins filming in the Seattle area soon. Titled "HÄNDS OF THUNDER", this unique effort is co-produced by Abundant Productions, and West Seattle-based Corwood Productions. The same team produced the short "All My Presidents" filmed in West Seattle which opened at the Admiral Theater and was just screened at SIFF.
Corwood partners Lisa Coronado and Alder Sherwood live in West Seattle. Abundant's Lorraine Montez is a former West Seattle resident.
"All My Presidents" stars Coronado, West Seattle's David S. Hogan, and Brian Sutherland.
Sutherland created "HÄNDS OF THUNDER" with long-time collaborator Peter Feysa. They both star and Feysa will direct. We featured Sutherland in our articles about the web-TV super hero spoof, "The Collectibles". In it, he portrays "Super Star" and dons a blue leotard affixed with large gold stars.
"This film features an undiscovered dance medium of disco and hand clapping with a Swedish vibe," Sutherland explained. "So we're putting up a competition of who can actually create the choreography for us. We're looking all around Seattle for the right choreographer."
He and Feysa placed an ad on Craigslist here, and believes a talented hand/dance choreographer might reside right here in West Seattle. In it they state, "As you can see the job of the choreographer will be to create a whole new genre of Dance: "Disco Hand-Clapping";
"Peter and I started this project over a year ago," said Sutherland. "We've been making films about seven years together. It started off as a two-minute film and grew and grew and people loved it so much that before we knew it, it became this feature film. We are almost finished writing the script and begin filming this summer."
He acknowledges that "HÄNDS OF THUNDER" contains ingredients from (that other) Swedish band, ABBA, with some of the Will Ferrell film "Blades of Glory" and "Boogie Nights", with its 70's era of excess, thrown into the mix.
He said he has been learning Swedish for six months.
"We are hoping to have a whole scene in Swedish with subtitles," he said. "It's a beautiful language. I'll go on long runs and put Swedish music on my iPod which helps me learn the language."
When the two began brainstorming, the film was taking a different direction.
Sutherland explained, "At first we were thinking of clogging, not hand clapping. We thought, 'What if we did "This is Spinal Tap" with Austrian clogging?' Then, before we knew it, we had Sweden, hand clapping and disco."
"I remember seeing the Kickstarter video a while back, before I knew Brian or Peter, and cracking up," said Lisa Coronado. "I shared it with a ton of people outside the film industry because it was just so entertaining. Months later when Brian came to me about producing on it, I didn't hesitate to say 'Yes'. There are very few projects I'd sign onto that I'm not writing or acting in, but this one was different. The humor is so unique and I think Brian and Peter are the only ones who could pull if off so brilliantly."
"I'm very much looking forward to re-partnering with Corwood Productions," said Lorraine Montez. "They are one of our strongest production partners and have been over the past several years. We've partnered several successful films together.
"What else can you say? It's hysterical," she added. "It's a combination of all things that were kitschy around that particular type of pop star and all the tragic things that were kitschy, too."
One of the stars has a tussle with drugs.
"There's a lot of drama in it," said Sutherland. "The comedy will only be funnier if we take it completely seriously. We want to give the clap to the world."
Visit "Hands of Thunder" on Facebook. Their website is up and will be more comprehensive in a week or two, HERE.