The camera is rolling in Colorado

Published April 24, 2006 at midnight

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Kristine Blackport, an attractive young woman who might pass for a rising star at a powerhouse law firm, has been given a gun and asked to use it.

It's not that the 26-year-old Blackport has a taste for blood; she's starring in Juncture, a locally made thriller that's steeped in one of the oldest of human motivations, the drive for vengeance.

In Juncture, Blackport hands out a major helping of hurt. She plays a foundation executive who funds programs for children. When she learns that she has three months to live, she decides to spend her time hunting various miscreants who have abused children.

Juncture is being directed by James Seale, whose previous movie, Throttle, was set entirely in a Denver parking garage. Working in a confined space, Seale whipped up plenty of tension.

It's something he's good at, having honed his craft in several earlier movies and short films. Seale, who five years ago moved to Denver from Los Angeles, is committed to making movies in Colorado.

To make Juncture, the 41-year-old Seale has spread out to a variety of Denver-area locations. He's currently traveling to San Francisco, Chicago and Philadelphia for some quick additional shooting of a script by Robert Gosnell, an Evergreen resident who has written for TV and the big screen.

The day I visited the set, Seale was working at Del Frisco's Double Eagle Steak House, south of the city. Blackport was seated at the bar with her fellow actors and several extras. The scene centered on a meeting between Blackport's character and her love interest, a clinical psychologist.

As Seale worked, I looked at a promotional reel, sort of an early trailer. Juncture is a low-budget affair, but it has the look of a much slicker production.

"It's rolling pretty well," Seale said during a break. The director, who has a real flair for action, talked about the origins of the project he's been shooting for the past month.

"We wanted to come up with a character whose circumstances are so extreme she has nothing to lose. It harks back to classic films like Death Wish where you have vigilante justice. In this case, it just happens to be delivered by a woman with a terminal illness. We wanted to change it up in a way, to put a fresh spin on the vigilante story."

For her part, Blackport couldn't be happier to be exacting this immoderate form of justice.

"I never thought anyone would give me a gun and give me a chance to show something gritty," said Blackburn, who earned her theater degree at the University of Colorado. "The essence of the character is extremity. She gets beaten up. She wonders whether she's fighting a battle that should be fought. But the movie raises a big question: If you only have so much time, what kind of action would you take?"

Juncture is a production of Front Range Films, a company Seale runs with Kevin Duncan, a guy with experience in investments and film. Seale and Duncan are both committed to filmmaking in Colorado, which means that almost everyone working on Juncture is a local.

"That's pretty exciting," said Seale. "It just proves again that you can do an entire movie based out of here and make it look spectacular for very little money."

Seale, who's shooting Juncture in high-definition video, says he hopes the film will be accepted for a September premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival.

It's not a far-fetched ambition. Toronto has often shown fondness for genre movies with unusual twists, and if Seale's right, Juncture won't come off as an exploitation flick.

"The way we handle the character's choices makes the movie almost the exact opposite (of an exploitation movie). . . . We follow the character through the story as she's getting worse physically. She takes on more and more anguish. She's completely guilt-ridden," Seale said.

"That's the interesting part for me. The challenge of this kind of story is how you make the audience stay on her side. It's a character piece with thriller elements and not vice versa."

In the darkness of the restaurant, the crew bustled, scurrying to finish before a lunch break and a 3 p.m. deadline. The restaurant had to be returned to working order for the evening's business.

I thought about a scene in which one of Blackport's targets - a pedophile priest - is pushed off a bell tower, tumbling through a spectacular 70-foot fall. I particularly liked the fluttering pigeons, which, I was told, were under the control of a pigeon wrangler.

Impressive stuff.

Look, when you're on a set - any set - you can't help but wish the people well because you can see how hard and proficiently they're working.

"I can't wait to get it finished and get it in front of people," said Seale.

I'm looking forward to it myself.

Seale's cinema

No one will mistake them for the work of Ingmar Bergman, but the films of James Seale have plenty of punch.

• Throttle (2005) - It's man versus truck in a thriller set in a parking garage.

• Momentum (2004) - This TV movie about a robbery conducted by men with telekinetic powers featured Teri Hatcher and Louis Gossett Jr. in principal roles.

• Scorcher (2002) - Scientists try to save the Earth after a nuclear accident in a movie that featured Rutger Hauer.

• Asylum (1997) - Robert Patrick starred in a story about a detective who goes undercover at a mental institution to search for a killer.

Robert Denerstein is the film critic. Denersteinb@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-892-5424

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