May 2026 | Vol. 12 Iss. 5
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West Jordan
Pinwheels for Prevention See Community comes together for child abuse prevention Page 5 Inside...
A place for everyone
How West Jordan’s arts scene continues to grow
Page 15
Coming soon to a theater near you By Jet Burnham | j.burnham@mycityjournals.com In a world of big-budget Hollywood films, these high school students must take on demanding technical roles, gain work skills and master industry secrets in order to make a feature film that will impress audiences, propel them into future careers and earn an A. The setting:
T
he scene opens in Copper Hills High School’s Film 3 class. After months of the grueling demands of movie-making, students are thrilled to premiere “Fixing Benny”--a full length feature film they wrote, directed, filmed and edited--at a local movie theater some time in late May/early June. “I love seeing it all come together and seeing a finished product,” senior Ethan Edwards, the film’s director said. “One of the things that’s awesome about film is you put in so much effort in something and you actually get something in return, something that’s always there, a physical--digital--thing that you can see. There’s a representation of all the hard work you put in.”
The plot:
Film teacher Joshua Oman believes
CHHS is the only public school in the nation that shoots a full-length feature film each year. This is their fourth film, but his first at CHHS. After 25 years of working in commercials, TV and film, Oman left Hollywood and returned home to Utah to replace Kamiko Ho’okano, the film teacher who had helped students make three movies before leaving CHHS last year to work in the film industry. “He infused this place with passion, and I came, and I’m bringing the skills,” Oman said. “I’m just so grateful they had three years to work out the bumps on their previous films, because we’re definitely standing on their shoulders.” Oman’s film industry knowledge and resources raised the bar on this year’s production, students said. This year they are following industry practices and safety standards and using upgraded equipment including a high resolution professional cinematographer’s camera. The film had 10 shooting locations compared to last year’s three. “We’re networking a lot more, and this is becoming a bigger and bigger thing than we expected,” senior Jack Bowler said. “We’ve got a lot of people supporting this.” Each of the 19 class members had a specific role in filming, logistics, post production Lighting a scene filmed in a camper at night so as to look like daylight streaming through the Continued on page 10 window was Jack Bowler’s responsibility as gaffer. (Photo courtesy Joshua Oman)
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