HOT SPRINGS, Ark.—Students enrolled in the film class at the Arkansas School for Mathematics, Sciences and the Arts got a lesson in both history and film last Thursday, as they trudged through the Hot Springs Creek tunnel to capture footage for a documentary film about ’30s

gangster

Owney Madden.

With assistance from the Hot Springs Fire Department, the students, along with instructor James Katowich and the film’s director, Ben Meade, entered the tunnel at Whittington Avenue to shoot re-creations for Meade’s film, titled “Redemption.”

“He invited us to come down and help film and also as a chance to see a real filming project in action,” Katowich said. “So the kids worked the cameras and he suggested a few things for them to shoot but, for the most part, it was them. And their footage is going to end up in the final film, so that’s very exciting for them.”

Meade, Hot Springs Documentary Film Institute board chairman, is working on the film with Katherine Kinsey, a local antiques dealer, who owns Madden’s personal papers. The film will portray the “real story” of Madden and will also rebuff rumors that the gangsters used the tunnel as an escape route.

“It’s really a cool piece of work because nobody who we have talked to who knew Mr. Madden has anything bad to say about him, whereas I think there’s this myth that a lot of things went on in Hot Springs that didn’t really happen,” Meade said.

Meade, who is the co-founder of the Kansas International Film Festival and an associate professor of film and digital media at Avila University, helps teach the ASMSA film class one day a week. The students, he said, normally work with video and with this project they were able to work with film.

“I think that’s really important,” he said.

Students used 8mm cameras to shoot “subjective point-of-view” scenes.

“The camera acts as the eyes of somebody, maybe, trying to go through one of the tunnels to hide,” Meade said.

Meanwhile, another ASMSA student was documenting what the class was doing for the film.

“They’re pretty happy to get outside the building,” Katowich said.

“The workload is so intense at ASMSA a lot of students tend to keep cooped up studying and doing homework. So just getting out and going under the city with the firemen was fun for them. And shooting footage for a professional production is very cool, as well; simply watching Ben work teaches us a lot.”

The ASMSA film class is in its second year. It was developed in conjunction with the Hot Springs Documentary Film Institute.