By Ryan Marshall

The purpose of these interviews is to celebrate the efforts and ambitions of those who are about to embark on the grueling yet wholly rewarding cinematic journey that is SMCC’s annual Maine Mayhem Film Festival; and to shed some much-needed light on the school’s budding community of visual artists.

I sat down with Ben Rooker, who is currently enrolled in the pre-production course, to discuss his involvement with this year’s program:

RYAN MARSHALL: Let’s start off by stating your name and telling us a little something about your aspirations within the industry.

BEN ROOKER: My name is Ben Rooker, and I’m looking to get into the film industry to do a wide range of things. I particularly enjoy the art and design aspects of film, so I aspire to either do scoring, DP work, or VFX.

RM: Have you been involved with this process in the past?

BR: I don’t have past experience in Mayhem, but I am currently taking pre-production for it. It’s been eye-opening to see the level of dedication, planning and effort that goes into even shorter projects. I’m grateful to have such great friends also in the program, and even more who’ve been through it in the past.

RM: Can you tell us more about the project that you currently have in development for this year’s festival?

BR: My upcoming Mayhem film, tentatively titled “The While,” is about a college student struggling with an anxiety disorder who discovers she’s being stalked by creatures from another world. It’s a sci-fi horror with elements of surrealism thrown in for good measure, and while I’m still in the process of crewing up, I couldn’t be more excited to get this project off the ground.

Make sure to keep a look out for “The While,” just one of several similarly auspicious directorial debuts, when it premieres at the Nickelodeon Cinema in Portland, where the festival has been showcased since 2011, next Spring.