Izzy is mean. She’s mouthy, profoundly depressed. She has bounced around in foster care for eight years when suddenly, at 15, she has a run-in with the man who killed her parents.

As P. Seth Roberts describes his new movie, there’s little happy. No comedy. And, he warns, no feel-good ending.

“This is ‘The Empire Strikes Back,'” he said. Dark, brooding, disturbing.

Roberts, 43, of Turner, wrote the thriller/drama screenplay for “Bad Kid” based in part on his own experience in Maine’s foster care system as a young boy. Fortunately, the grisly murder is added fiction.

Shooting the movie started in Lewiston-Auburn in early September. He’s looking to raise $20,000 to finish the film and fronting the money himself for now.

Roberts remembers being written off as a bad kid from a bad family. He wasn’t. Neither is Izzy.

“For me it’s about writing what you know,” he said last week. “It’s intended to be a call to action for those who do nothing, especially those that do nothing but could.”

He’s directing the feature-length film, a joint production of Killatainment Films and Freight Train Films. Bill McLean from Freight Train is a contributing screenwriter, assistant director and the creepy killer — emphasis on creep.

At a line reading in character this summer, no one wanted to sit next to him. 

“I’m a little nervous; I’m excited for it,” said McLean, adding about his character, “This guy truly is a piece of work.”

The pair had worked together on McLean’s “How to Kill a Zombie,” and after it wrapped, “I helped my friends bring their films to life; I figured it was their turn to help me,” Roberts said.

As a child, he entered foster care for a few years at age 11. His family was very poor, living in central Maine.

“I had some really great homes and I had some really not-so-good homes,” Roberts said. “When you’re a mom of six kids, things can get rough. I don’t blame my mom; I think my mom is this fantastic role model of strength and courage.”

In foster care, he said, he longed for someone to tell him he mattered. To feel like he had a purpose. To have anything even resembling a father figure. That never happened.

“‘Hey, how are you? Let me teach you something.’ I would have given anything for that,” Roberts said. “In that way, Izzy and I are very similar.”

Unlike Izzy, he was eventually reunited with his mother.

He’s poured despair and hopelessness into his lead and balanced her with best friend, Sam.

“She feels unworthy of love, she has no purpose, she’s taking up space,” Roberts said. “He’s sunshine, he’s happiness, he’s peaceful.”

In “Bad Kid,” teenage Izzy is played by Deidre Sachs, 16, of Freeport and Sam by Nik Whittemore, 16, of Auburn. The movie, which also touches on themes of mental illness, is being shot on weekends, racing to wrap exteriors before summer changes to late fall on camera. Actors are working for free until, if, the movie is sold.

Roberts is hoping to have it filmed and edited in time for the 2016 spring festival circuit.

He’s running a campaign now on Indiegogo to raise money for expenses such as  equipment rentals, insurance, scoring and editing and minimal pay for the cast. So far, the movie’s gotten donations of between $2 and $100.

“That $2 donation put a smile on my face,” Roberts said. “Somebody cares. Somebody wants to see this message made.”

He’s working with a Maine charity involved with the foster care system and vowed to give it 5 percent of the initial $20,000 raised and 5 percent of net film profits, annually if the movie is sold.

“I’m so glad there’s no happy ending,” Roberts said of “Bad Kid.” “A happy ending indicates it’s finished, it’s over. When you give them warm and fuzzy,” he said, the audience walks out thinking “‘I don’t have to do anything, I don’t have to get involved.'”

kskelton@sunjournal.com

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