Vets, Camera, Action

Andrew M. Seder - The Times Leader

Tyler Wright returned to civilian life after four years in the Army wanting to write and direct movies.

Using the G.I. Bill, he enrolled at Penn State's University Park campus and majored in film.

A chance came along in the spring that combined his love of storytelling with his knowledge of the military and he jumped at it. Called "English 497: Narrative, Oral History and New Media Technologies," the course was created to help returning veterans become filmmakers by creating short documentaries about the experiences of the Iraq War. The project received funding from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting's Public Media Innovation Fund.

Dubbed "Back from Iraq: The Veterans' Stories Project," these films, along with student interviews, class footage and course materials, are now available for viewing online at http://wpsu.org/backfromiraq.

Wright's work is among eight documentaries created in the class. The Harveys Lake native said it was important to get the chance to create a work that will be viewed by others and tells the story of a veteran who might have kept his thoughts to himself if it wasn't for the project.

Though students could have used their own experiences for their film's focus, Wright, 26, opted to tell the tale of what it's like for a soldier, airman, sailor or Marine to be repeatedly deployed.

"It sucks," was the answer he got from the subject of his documentary -- Kevin Geisel.

He read a story in the school's student newspaper, The Daily Collegian, about Geisel, a 23-year-old from Summerdale, N.J., who was deployed three times in a four-year span while serving with the Marines.

Through a fellow student, Wright got in contact with Geisel and approached him about being the focus of the documentary.

"His initial reaction was he was interested but cautious," Wright said. The two talked about it some more and Geisel finally agreed to participate. The relationship veterans have among themselves comes in handy when trying to get them to talk about their experiences, said one of the Penn State professors who helped design the course.

"Veterans have a certain level of experience that other veterans can relate to," said Shirley Moody, assistant professor of English and a course co-instructor. "The course was designed to build on the experiences and the trust that can be accessed through two veterans having an opportunity to sit down and talk together."

James DeCosmo, 28, of West Hazleton, was also one of the eight students in the class.

He said the idea of having veterans interviewing fellow veterans was a smart idea.

"Two veterans talking to each other can share stuff and ask things that those who aren't familiar with the military might not know to ask and get the full story," said DeCosmo, a 1999 graduate of Hazleton Area High School.

His film focuses on Heather Strouse, a Marine from Schuylkill Haven who served two tours in Iraq.

DeCosmo said he was intrigued to learn more about not only what it was like to be a female in the military but also a female in a combat zone. DeCosmo served in the Navy and was on a ship in the Persian Gulf for six months. He was intrigued to hear from those who served on the ground.

He said the nine-minute, 53-second documentary gave him a chance to learn more from someone who was there and gives others who weren't on the ground to get some insight.

Wright's eight-minute, 55-second film features Geisel sitting in front of a Marine Corps seal wearing blue jeans, a T-shirt and a backward baseball cap. He talks about each deployment and what it did to his life and his family.

"I missed every Christmas for four years. Every Thanksgiving ... It was one gigantic life lesson being deployed that many times," Geisel says in the film. He describes his time overseas as having a "disconnection from my family and friends and American society in general."

Between Geisel's monologue and some photos of the Marine in Iraq, Wright splices portions of Ellen Geisel's phone interview. Ellen, Kevin's mother, talks about what it was like to know her son was constantly in danger and that every time he made it through one tour he had to head right back.

Wright said he wanted to tell the story not only from the angle of how the deployed man or woman is impacted but also from the aspect of the family left behind.

He said the final product wasn't too bad for his first foray into documentary filmmaking. The 2001 Lake-Lehman High School graduate will earn his degree from Penn State in May and he intends to head out in search of a career in Hollywood.

"I'm going to start at the bottom and work my way up. That's what you have to do," Wright said.

DeCosmo, a film and video major, hopes to land a job in the production side of the business. He said feature films would be great, but he could also picture himself operating a news camera for a television station. His experience on the project solidified his love of handling a camera and directing.

The students gained hands-on experience in documentary filmmaking and oral history interviewing while learning pre- and post-production video techniques. Most of the students in the class had no experience with making a movie or even using a camera.

Wright said the taste of filmmaking made him thirstier to do more films, though narratives, not documentaries. In the case of interviewing veterans and getting their stories and experiences on film, he said the documentary style is the right way to go.

"Documentaries are very powerful because they are very real," Wright said. Collecting the stories of veterans is something Wright said should be done more often, and he's glad this class encouraged students, veterans themselves, to get involved in the preservation of these experiences.

Wright served as a medical health care specialist in the Army. He was in Iraq for one year and served the rest of his time stationed in Hawaii, Texas and Georgia.

"We have veterans dying every day. It's been a scramble the past decade just to get all these stories down so we don't lose the experiences of what it was like. It's important to garner this information for people who don't understand. Veterans' stories are very important."

Although the students were making a documentary about someone else, they found themselves in front of the camera often. The Web site featuring the videos includes filmmaker interviews about their work and a look at the class. It also includes blog entries the students made as they were creating their projects.

The class was conducted in conjunction with Penn State Public Broadcasting, which airs WPSU and operates the Web site the films are found on.

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