SCHEME A scheme is a dream with street smarts…. but doomed to fail. A modern urban film which recalls I VITELLONI or THE LIZARDS, SCHEME C6 is a film about people with a plan, a self-defeating mechanism, a reach which exceeds grasp.

Bid is a self-styled urban commando, determined to live outside the system and the law. A hustler in high end auto parts, he is homeless by choice. All his gear in a storage locker, he plies the city on a motorcycle, counting coup on the cops which include his father who is trying to get him to reconcile with his family -- including his grandfather Ponto. His friend Grey is older and on the decline. A white rapper, with a plan to promote hip-hop acts, he works as a chauffeur, using his limo to help Bid transport stolen parts.

Yve is Bid's girl friend: bi-sexual, ambitious but without direction. Neither she nor Bid want to make a commitment, and their high energy relationship mates guerilla warfare with a high tensile romantic innocence. Neither wants to compromise, but their friendship always seems about to go up in flames. Bid's sister Reva, an aspiring singer, is having an affair with Rico, a lawyer Bid believes is fleecing the family and nobody understands Salowitz, Ponto's eccentric assistant.

Bid sets up Grey to ask Ponto to fund his music scheme which sets off a tragic series of events. Finally schemes and dreams both give way to something stronger: accident, fate, it's hard to say how the story lines we choose for ourselves suddenly dissolve and we're face to face with a disaster we never saw coming.

SCHEME C6 Credits

Bid………………………...... Cory Duval
Yve…….………………….... Monica Cortes Salowitz……………….….. David Fine Grey……………………...…. MC Mars Qually…………………….... Bruce Marovich Ponto…………………..…… Frank Marovich
Reva …………………..…… Ciara Arnette Rico……………………..….. Mark Douglas

9 at Night - A Cinema of the Streets 9 from the '90s... bodies in limbo and souls on the lam, in pain or out of pocket, dreamers on a roll and lovers out of luck, secret seekers and losers weepers, at home in the streets but strangers to themselves... nothing you've ever seen before and everything after... NINE AT NIGHT.

The nine stories of NINE AT NIGHT all take place in the homes, streets and shadowy places of an American city in the '90s. They all begin at 9:00 PM as last light leaves the sky and night begins. Every film is linked in some odd way. Maybe its just a stray detail, something seen outside a window, where characters may witness strangers who look back at them from their own film. Or maybe there's a larger context wherein a particular film may affect the circumstances of one or more of the others. Or the lives of characters can be extended from film to film, clarified or made more mysterious by their varying roles in this nocturnal universe. A pattern will emerge for those who see all the films, but it will not be the solution to a puzzle. It will be itself an enigma which sends us back to check on details which continue to haunt and tug at us, as we recognize how the singular and odd blend with the common and universal in human experience.

THE WORK IN PROGRESS In 1991, the Tenderloin Action Group (now the Tenderloin Ygroup) was born. A drama workshop for homeless people and inner city San Francisco residents, it has met every Wednesday night for almost eleven years in an atmosphere crackling with challenge and emotion. The Ygroup's videotapes of those Wednesday night sessions are a collective cry of humanity's pain, outrage, humor, joy and personal catharsis. People from all races and nationalities, bad luck, no luck and down on their luck, people with limited material means but rich in human capacity sit in the "circle of protection" and tell buried truths, look for emotional bridgeheads to blow, encounter the 10,000 selves, the blood, sweat and tears of human confrontation, and bring their personal cries, songs, rants, tantrums, brainstorms, unique visions and quixotic poetry into the circle.

In 1996 the first feature film cast from this pioneer group of seekers was completed. CHALK had its U.S. premiere at the San Francisco Film Festival, in April, 1996 and its International debut at the Locarno International Film Festival in August '96. It has since played to sold out audiences at the Toronto International Film Festival and has played theatrical engagements in 15 American cities, making the Village Voice's Top Ten Film list in 2000. Last year the Mill Valley International Film Festival hosted a Special Tribute to Rob Nilsson's work and sponsored three World Premieres of his films, including two, SINGING and STROKE, from the 9 @ Night series. Made with the contributions of labor, services and equipment from top flight San Francisco film artists, technicians and film/video facilities, these films were also financed by the contributions of generous believers in the cause The long standing dream of a cycle of feature films as close to the street as to the bone, made with a committed troupe of unknown street actors, and a top flight crew of dedicated professionals, has now been realised.

The Tenderloin Acting Workshop has now been transformed into a rehearsal and production session, where the new films are being developed and produced. Future acting workshops and other community outreach programs are being contemplated and will be announced.

Rob Nilsson and Direct Action
A San Francisco based director, Rob Nilsson won the Camera d'Or at Cannes for NORTHERN LIGHTS and the Grand Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival for HEAT AND SUNLIGHT. He is the first American film director to have won both awards. Nilsson is a pioneer in the techniques of video to film transfer which led to today's digital revolution. In 1985 SIGNAL 7 was the first small format video feature to be blown up to film and distributed around the world. CHALK, his first feature with the Tenderloin Action Group (now the Tenderloin Ygroup) a San Francisco inner city acting workshop is now in theatrical distribution around the country and has streamed live over the Internet on ifilm.net. Two of Nilsson's 9 @ NIGHT film package, nine digital features cast from the Ygroup, were finished in 2000. STROKE and SINGING had their World Premieres at the Mill Valley International Film Festival and two more, SCHEME and NOISE, are in the final stages of post- production. ATTITUDE has just finished principal photography. In collaboration with studio malaparte in Japan, Nilsson recently completed a digital feature film shot on Sagi Island off the coast of Hiroshima. WINTER ORANGES had its world premiere in March at the Fukuoka Film Archives in Fukuoka and its US Premiere at the Mill Valley International Film Festival in October 2000. In September 2000, Nilsson shot another digital feature in Jordan, working with a cast of young Jordanians assembled by ZENID, a Jordanian institute for social development.

Nilsson recently directed A TOWN HAS TURNED TO DUST, a feature film for TV, from a script by Rod Serling. Rob Nilsson's film criticism has been featured on Ifilm and the Adobe Motion Channel and he has a regular editorial column on RES, the world's leading magazine on digital filmmaking.