Roxbury natives releasing first feature film

ROXBURY – Joe Gawalis and Timothy Reeves first shot videos together more than a decade ago in their TV and Film class at Roxbury High School.

“Our careers started in that classroom,” Gawalis said. “It pushed us toward the film industry.”

The Class of 2003 graduates spent many high school nights watching movies and making their own, eventually moving to New York City and starting their own production company. This month the pair will release their first feature film, which was partially shot locally.

“There was something special about doing it in Roxbury,” Reeves said. “Where we’ve been our whole life before moving to New York City.”

Gawalis, 30, and Reeves, 29, run a production company, Cliffside Production in Astoria, Queens, and had developed short films and television shows prior before deciding to work on a feature-length movie last year.

“Around Every Corner,” a drama about a drug addict reconnecting with his estranged family, filmed for about a month in September and October 2014.

“We wanted to make a movie about characters,” Gawalis said. “Something people can relate to that had a message.”

Gawalis produced, wrote, directed, and acted in the film, while Reeves serves as an associate producer and director of photography.

The pair operated on a small independent film budget, and they wanted to complete production in less than a year to show their company could produce a film efficiently.

Editing took until February, and Gawalis and Reeves have been marketing the film since, growing a grassroots social media following that includes more than 16,000 Facebook fans.

“We’ve got a really nice fan base full of people who like dramas about family and spirituality, so we need to hit those demographics and branch out from there,” Gawalis said. “We’ve also got a lot of great actors coming up right before they break through that glass ceiling who will help promote the movie.”

While the majority of the film was shot in New York City, a large part of took place at a lake house in Andover and on the waters of Lake Hopatcong.

“In the movie the family owns a lake house so when they reconcile they decide to take a trip to New Jersey and go out on the lake,” Gawalis said. “It’s about 25 minutes of the film, right in the middle. It’s the first real happy point of the movie. And Lake Hopatcong couldn’t have been more beautiful that day, a perfect setting.”

Gawalis and Reeves were both happy to shoot close to their hometown, which provided plenty of inspiration growing up.

“Roxbury was a great place to be creative growing up because there’s so much in town,” Gawalis said. “You had malls but you also had all these woods to play in. You weren’t pinned down.”

Gawalis said he followed a fairly traditional path from high school to film production, starting small and steadily building to a point where he and Reeves now have enough cache to make a film.

“I just want people to know that this field may be difficult, but two guys from Roxbury made it work,” Gawalis said. “Anybody who wants to can do it if they try hard enough.”

Gawalis said his next project may also be a feature film, but one with a larger budget and “name actors.”

“Around Every Corner” will premiere on iTunes and Amazon Friday, May 29, before expanding to other devices and media. Gawalis and Reeves hope to screen the film locally soon.

Staff Writer Michael Izzo: 973-428-6636; mizzo@GannettNJ.com