PLAISTOW, N.H. — In real life, Main Street's historic Town Hall operates like a hub of government and the address is Plaistow, N.H..
But in a little while, moviegoers may glimpse Town Hall in "27 Down," the movie now in production by Haverhill, Mass., independent studio director John Depew.
He was back on Main Street over the weekend to reshoot a scene in front of Town Hall.
Depew, who also wrote the script, shot the film last summer and used Plaistow in a couple of scenes to breathe reality into his fictional town of Canada, Maine.
An exterior shot of Canada's fictional police station, for example, is actually Plaistow Town Hall. He also used the Plaistow District Courthouse and Selectman Charles Blinn's auto repair shop in other scenes.
Town Manager Sean Fitzgerald said Depew included some familiar faces in the film as extras.
Blinn also has a cameo role in the film, but he's not one of the five main characters, Depew said.
"It's a murder mystery about a cop who runs over a kid accidentally and he's assigned the case the next day," he said.
The film explores "the paths we take when we do something wrong," he added.
In the police officer's case, he becomes romantically involved with the dead child's mother before she discovers he is the culprit.
Depew said he chose Town Hall partly because of the cannon on the front lawn.
"Plaistow was so helpful in everything we did," Depew said.
Blinn also loaned Depew a "couple of Corvettes" for the movie.
In addition to the Plaistow scenes, Depew also used a number of Massachusetts' locations — Boston, Andover, Lawrence, Middleton and North Andover.
Except for Boston, where shooting on location posed problems, all the communities were helpful, Depew said. He ran into few glitches — except for one incident in North Andover. He had obtained a convenience store owner's permission to use her store as the setting for a robbery. In the middle of the holdup scene, someone dropped a dime to the real police.
"I should have anticipated someone might do that," he said.
He said it was his first film and he was learning on the job.
Depew had alerted police about location shots on public property, as required. But because this scene happened on private property, he hadn't thought to notify the North Andover police before the camera started rolling. In retrospect, he said he wishes he had.
About 500 people saw the film at the Regent Theatre in Arlington, Mass., including North Andover police officers, he said.
A couple of film distributors are interested in "27 Down," according to Depew. He redid the Plaistow scenes to improve the film after seeing audience reaction.
He made the film on a budget of around $100,000, he said, and took advantage of the Massachusetts incentives and tax credits for filmmakers.
His film company, Wild Beagle Productions, is based in North Andover.
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