Barely two months since their appearance at Filmapalooza, the hardest working crew in show business is back at it! This weekend, Pilotgroove Pictures wrapped production on Get Your Hands Dirty—their 2022 entry in the Boston 48 Hour Film Project. Live screenings are back this year, and the latest short will get a live theatrical premiere on Monday, May 23 at the Somerville Theater.

Get Your Hands Dirty takes you the 13th Perennial, Northeast Regional Floral Design Championship, where underdog flower shop owner Martin Shatternick (played by Aaron Compagna) takes on the heavily-favored Cristobal Levile (Pilotgroove newcomer, Ira Jones).  The broadcast team of, Bob Boreman (Ben Peirce) and Bob Windlehavenson (John MacAskill) and Kelly Clemens (Jennifer Peirce) bring you all the action,  in this mocku-sports event, written & directed by P.J. Huot and Ben Peirce

“Get Your Hands Dirty” is the 13th 48 Hour Film Project from Pilotgroove Pictures. It was conceived, written, shot, and edited between May 13–15, 2022 as part of the Boston 48 Hour Film Project. The required elements were:

Character: Martin Shatternick, Florist
Prop: a Letter
Line: “Who said that?”
Genre: Mockumentary

Writer/Director, Ben Peirce talks about taking on the mockumentary genre again:

“We’ve done mockumentary before, so we wanted to take a different approach this time. Besides a traditional film, what else could we mock? Our crew’s origin-story is set in live sports production, and we’re all life-or-death fans of various teams. This film is a love letter to sports and a natural fit for a film competition designed as a sporting event.”

“Get Your Hands Dirty” has a lot of nods and winks, contained within its script. Peirce and Huot—as well as Greg Giorgio, John MacAskill and many others in the Pilotgroove family—met while producing games for the American Hockey League’s Manchester Monarchs, making the live sports spoof a natural fit. The 13th Perennial, Northeast Regional Floral Design Championship is a nod to the 13th film in the Pilotgroove catalogue. And the event itself bears some striking similarities to the 48 Hour Film Project, and gives a tip of the cap to Boston city producer, Andrew Osborne in the character of Judge, Ozzie Andrews (played by Greg Giorgio). This year’s production is bolstered, by the addition of two Pilotgroove newcomers. Ira Jones, gives a stirring (albeit silent) performance as the film’s villain. Dave Distilli joins the picture crew, bringing a kinetic, sports energy to the visuals—and creating the graphic package that gives life to PGV Sports.

EXTENDED ONLINE PREMIERE

An extended cut of Get your Hands Dirty will be available here at pilotgroove.com immediately following the premiere screening. This full version of the film features over 2 minutes of additional content that would not fit in the competition version.

“There was just too much here to edit contain in 7 minutes, and complete in 48 hours,” said Peirce. “I’m excited to release a version that better captures all the magic our cast and crew made happen.”

WATCH THE EXTENDED ONLINE PREMIERE
(Available after the live Premiere)