A Collaborative Film Project
In 1982, a synopsis and a first draft of the script
became the inspiration for members of a fledgling
Austin film-making community to collaborate on
a film to be called: Manifest.
Local talent and crew, along with Austin businesses,
institutions and local authorities, contributed in-kind
to the project with the dream of fostering film-making
as an art form in Austin.
The Manifest film shoot was carried out on weekends
to accommodate cast and crew who worked weekday
jobs or attended school. Pre-production crew meetings,
casting calls, auditions and screen tests started in late
September of 1981. Initial shooting began the weekend
of January 16, 1982, with final scenes wrapping almost exactly a year later on January 15, 1983.
Myriad life events hindered the film’s post-production,
completion and distribution. The untimely passing of
Leah Ann Riklin (1960-1992), a UT graduate and the
film’s producer and casting director, left behind a
profound void.
In addition, the dramatic plunge in oil prices in 1986 became a core issue of the era, creating an economic crisis heavily impacting Texas through the late 80s and into the early 90s.
That next decade marked the beginning of the internet and HDTV broadcasts, and the dawning millennium would see the looming digital revolution force old-school celluloid film production into the background.
The inevitable aging, shrinkage and decay of the film’s celluloid footage seemed determined to make Manifest a relic of another time, if not just a faded memory.
Since the project’s onset, all film footage had been stored and archived by the film’s executive producer, Cecilia Garza-Treviño, who invested heavily into the project with equipment, film stock and self-financing of all lab processing. It was Garza-Treviño who had also originated the story and acted as cinematographer and director during the production phase.
