Catching up with Georgia filmmaker John Henry Summerour whose debut feature Sahkanaga opens at the Plaza

• Photo: Caryn Waechter
• John Henry Summerour: Do you like movies?

John Henry Summerour's award-winning film Sahkanaga opens tonight for a one-week theatrical run in Atlanta's Plaza Theatre, and Brooklyn's ReRun Theater. Shot and set in the Georgia town where the filmmaker grew up, Sahkanaga is based on a disturbing, embarrassing, and confounding real-life incident involving hundreds of rotting unburied cadavers discovered in a crematory.

Whereas so many Georgia filmmakers might have used this incident as the jumping-off point for a sensationalist Zombieland-style yarn (we are Zombie central, after all), John Henry Summerour takes a matter-of-fact tone that eschews sensationalism in favor of tepid realism, embracing the story's enigmatic qualities.

It is an ambitious, accomplished debut that hands Summerour the Southern Gothic art house mantle David Gordon Green left behind when jumped the Pineapple Express to the multiplex.

On the eve of the film's theatrical debut, we caught up with Summerour to ask some questions. In the coming week, he'll be dividing his time between Atlanta and Brooklyn to appear at screenings and answer your questions. (He's slated to do a Q&A with actress Kristin Rievley at the Plaza on Saturday, December 8 at 5:30 p.m. and Sunday, December 9 at 7:15 p.m.)

1. Give us the "elevator pitch" for Sahkanaga.

I grew up in northwest Georgia where over 300 bodies were discovered dumped on the property of a crematory in 2002. I went home and developed the film as an outreach project, imagining the story from the perspective of a teenager who finds the first body and casting local, non-professional actors in an effort to give ownership of the story back to the community....Do you like movies?....Is this your floor?

• Courtesy of Gran Gran Pics
• It's pronounced "sock-uh-NOG-uh"

2. Working with a non-professional cast is an extremely risky strategy, especially for a debut feature. As someone who's acted professionally, and with contacts in the industry, what inspired you to use locals, many of whom had a direct tie to the actual story?