AJ Arts & Entertainment

March 10, 2010

Motivated by fear

Joe Student Abington Journal Correspondent

Matthew Moyer is motivated by fear: yours, not his.

Building on his affinity for scary films like those made by well-known masters of the genre like Wes Craven, Moyer will record the independent horror movie “Within” in Lackawanna County later this year. Shooting will start in mid-summer.

“Ever since I was little, I have loved horror movies,” Moyer, known to friends as “Mattie,” said. “I have a passion for it.”

The son of Al and Daniela Moyer of South Abington Township, Moyer, 18, is a 2009 graduate of Abington Heights High School. He intends to use friends and other current classmates to fill out the cast of his movie, while holding auditions for some of the roles as well. As the project is self-financed, none of the positions are paid.

Moyer, whose prior experience consists of filming music videos and high school athletic events, will record his movie with the help of experienced filmmaker Johnny Braz, of Clarks Summit, whose resume features work on projects with notable names such as Clint Eastwood and Sylvester Stallone.

“I am working on the script now,” Moyer said. “It’s the story of five friends who need to do a film project on a local legend or myth. They go out to the woods to film and people start to go missing.”

One key setting of the movie is the now abandoned West Mountain Sanitarium just west of Scranton . The century-old, former hospital is often listed on Web pages dedicated to chronicling locations of real-world paranormal activity.

The aspiring filmmaker remembered the doll-gone-bad “Child’s Play,” as the first horror movie he saw. He listed bio-scare “Quarantine” and low-budget, high-fright thriller “Paranormal Activity” as his favorites in the genre.

Showing an entrepreneurial spirit, Moyer hopes to release his finished movie on DVD and through his Web site, www.imattiefilms.com, by the end of the year.

“I am going to hand it out to people. If enough people are into it, then I’ll sell it,” Moyer said.

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