FORT

In this idyllic meditation on the concept of home, two boyfriends wander the beaches near New York City, finding shade under crude shelters they build from driftwood.

They build forts with sheets, rubber bands, and driftwood scavenged from the shore. These temporary shelters become an oasis for sunbathing, relaxing, and listening to music together. FORT deliberately subverts and disregards both chronology and geography to focus on the very process of constructing a beach fort.

Using notes, drawings, and mood boards, Ryan and Craig approached the filmmaking in a transient, ad-hoc manner, resulting in a sensorial and experiential document of the filmmakers’ summer together and the forts they constructed on the beach.

Thematically, FORT engages process, craft, nature, labor, transience, and a relationship, in both its subject matter and its formal filmmaking approach.

As a film, FORT is inspired by process films, queer cinema, experimental documentaries, ‘How It’s Made’ YouTube videos, nomadic architecture, Christopher Larkin’s 1974 film A Very Natural Thing, Charlotte Posenenske’s Sculptures, Bruce Brown’s film The Endless Summer, artist Tracey Moffatt’s video Heaven, and Dick Proenneke’s documentary Alone in the Wilderness.