Writer-director Michael Cooke’s debut feature Forget Me Not is in the home stretch. Principal photography on the Brooklyn-shot magical realism romance is complete, and the film has launched a crowdfunding campaign on Seed&Spark to fund post-production, including visual effects, sound, color, score and festival delivery. The campaign has reached 71 percent of its $35,000 goal with 8 days remaining.
Led by Derrell Meyers and Nazli Sarpkaya, the film also stars and is executive produced by Gbenga Akinnagbe, alongside Curtiss Cook, Rebecca L. Hargrove, Amber Iman and Matthew Maher. Emmy Award-winning filmmaker Anthony Hemingway serves as Supervising Producer.
The film follows Marcus and Sienna, two magic users who take a memory potion after the end of their relationship. The spell is meant to help them move on, but it leaves Marcus’s family wand missing at the worst possible moment. On the night they erased their memories, the Order of Magical Governance issued a decree requiring all unregistered wands to be turned in for cataloging. What should have been a private heartbreak becomes a ticking clock as the two are forced back together to retrace a relationship neither can remember, moving through Brooklyn on Halloween before time runs out.
“Who can’t relate to an ugly breakup?” said Cooke. “We’ve all had them. But what would happen if you could magically wave a wand, cast a spell, and forget the relationship ever happened? In Forget Me Not, we explore the consequences of that choice and the real-life ripples created by the decision.”
For Cooke, an Atlanta native who self-financed the film through production with a predominantly women-led department-head team, the decision to open the final stage of financing to audiences was deliberate. “A lot of people love magic and fantasy, and there’s a whole segment of people who love romance and drama. That combination doesn’t happen often. We believe there’s magic in this film and we want to open the journey so everyone can be a part of it.”
The campaign is live now at Seed&Spark.