By Dan Tortorice
Friends of Lake View Hill Park
Lake View Hill Park is well-known as the home of native plants and animals along with beautiful views and hiking trails. It now has a new claim to fame as a movie location.
On a bright Sunday morning in July, a dedicated director-producer and her crew of actors shot three scenes of “Grim Whimsy” near the former dormitory in our Northside county park.
Alissa Kulinski lived near Warner Park when she first moved to Madison from northern Wisconsin in 2007. While walking her dog in Warner, she often noticed the big sunny hill just to the north. Kulinski,who has actively participated in the theatre since middle school, now has her own movie production company and is the producer, director and co-writer of “Grim Whimsy.”
“I always had my eye on sanatorium hill and was over‒the‒moon when I got permission to film there.”
“Grim Whimsy” is a thriller-suspense film about a psychiatrist who is trying to prevent the murder of his wife. He must find one of his ex-patients in order to find the unknown assailant who is about to carry out the murder. There are lots of plot twists and a compelling personal struggle to find out the truth.
Kulinski was able to meet her quota of three scenes and might come back to shoot two more in the parking lot area. The main challenge of filming on the Northside is dealing with noise from the airport, but this was manageable on a Sunday morning.
She has been working on this project for several years; this is her fourth attempt to complete it. Things are progressing well and she hopes for a release in the summer or fall of 2019 with a premier at a big theatre in Madison followed by trips to state and national film festivals and a future release on Netflix or Hulu.
“It is so important to prove that indie filmmakers, working with great people, can produce great art anywhere.”
It is part of Kulinski’s ethos as a filmmaker to showcase as many local landmarks as possible. It’s fun and pleasing to see our park play this new role in the cultural landscape.
Learn more about the park at www.lakeviewhill.org or find us on Facebook @lakeviewhill.