Inside Movies

• Fifteen years ago, actor Michael Emerson was teaching a Shakespeare workshop in Florida. One of his students was high school student Kat Candler, who now lives and makes films in Austin. Recalling her teacher's talents, Candler sent Emerson her latest script, 'Jumping Off Bridges,' an event Emerson calls 'fateful.'

'It was too perfect,' he says. 'And when I saw how sweet and how good the script was, I had to do it.'

Emerson is talking from the set of 'Bridges' at McCallum High School. It's a broiling weekday and the tail-end of the film's five-week shoot, which wrapped Sunday. 'Today I have a major breakdown. I had one of my big scenes in the boys bathroom,' Emerson says with a chuckle.

Shot on film -- not digital video -- the family drama focuses on a clutch of teenage friends whose hobby is recreational bridge jumping. (The City of Austin permitted Candler to film stunt people leaping off local bridges.) Their lives are shadowed by deaths past and present.

The movie explores 'if friends and family can offer any comfort in times of grief,' says Emerson, who plays the father of one of the teens.

The cast includes young local performer Bryan Chafin, who starred in Candler's acclaimed feature debut 'Cicadas' and played one of Mel Gibson's sons in 'The Patriot.'

The leap from freaks to a father is a welcome onefor Emerson. 'I'm a guy who plays TV-drama villains, murderers and psychopaths,' he says. And he's good at it: He won an Emmy for playing a serial killer on 'The Practice,' and he was creepily memorable as one of the killers in the horror-thriller 'Saw.'

'This is a chance for me to play a character who is gentle and sympathetic,' says the actor. 'I'm just a regular dad. You like to mix it up in show business. It's really easy to get pigeonholed as a type.'

With a budget in the $200,000 range, Candler's show is no rinky-dink production. 'It's a tightly run ship' and Candler 'knows what she wants,' Emerson says. 'The homework and preparation on this shoot are amazing.'

Emerson will next be seen in 'The Legend of Zorro,' in which he returns to seething villainy. The sequel reteams Antonio Banderas and Catherine-Zeta Jones from 'The Mask of Zorro.'

'My role is basically to be beaten to a pulp by both of them,' Emerson says. -- Chris Garcia

• Oops, ouch: In this space last week, we mistakenly reversed the writing and directing credits for 'The Cassidy Kids,' the second feature from the University of Texas Film Institute, which starts shooting today. The facts, corrected: Jacob Vaughan is directing from a script by Bryan Poyser, Tasca Shadix and Tom Willett. PJ Raval is the cinematographer and Kyle Henry will edit. All of these people are UT alums. Casting is in progress in Texas and Los Angeles. -- C.G.

• 'Every Word is True,' the Truman Capote biodrama filmed this year in Austin and Taylor, has been given a title change to 'Have You Heard?,' and its release has been pushed to fall 2006, according to The New York Times. That's partly because a rival Capote biopic, 'Capote' starring Philip Seymour Hoffman, is being released on the novelist's birthday, Sept. 30. 'Have You Heard?' stars Gwyneth Paltrow, Sigourney Weaver, Kevin Kline, Ashley Judd and other top names, including Sandra Bullock, who plays 'To Kill a Mockingbird' author Harper Lee. Is Sandy becoming bookish? The sometime-Austinite will also portray 'Peyton Place' author Grace Metalious in the biopic 'Grace,' currently in production. -- C.G.

• UT law student Andrew Stock and co-writer Rick Stempson have won the nationwide Bluecat Screenplay competition out of more than 1,000 entries for their script 'Man Among Boys.' The scribes get $5,000 from Bluecat, which is run by 'Love Liza' screenwriter Gordy Hoffman, brother of actor Phillip Seymour Hoffman. The Bluecat Web site -- www.bluecatscreenplay.com -- will run an interview with the winners sometime soon. -- C.G.

• Submissions wanted: Enter your gay-themed films and videos -- shorts, features, docs, animated stuff -- for the 18th annual Austin Gay & Lesbian International Film Festival, which runs Sept. 30 through Oct. 8. Go to www.agliff.org for the lowdown. ... And Aug. 12 is the deadline to enter sci-fi, fantasy or horror shorts/features for Fantastic Fest, the brand-new genre-specific blowout Oct. 6-9 at the Alamo Drafthouse South. Go to www.fantasticfest.com. -- C.G.

• The Actors Place, an acting network chock full of advice, workshops and casting calls, has transplanted its HQ from Dallas to Round Rock to serve the Central Texas movie-making boom, says founder Will Boroski. Check for upcoming workshops, casting calls and other services at www.willboroski.com. -- C.G.

• 'Office Space' favorite Stephen Root -- he played the whimpering goober Milton -- and funnyman Johnny Hardwick -- the voice of Dale on 'King of the Hill' -- will perform a script reading of the feature comedy 'Rambunxious' at 7 p.m. Sunday at the Capitol City Comedy Club. And it's free! The script is by 'King of the Hill' writer-producer Jim Dauterive, so we expect yards and yards of yuks. www.austinfilmfestival.org. -- C.G.