Producer
hopes to film
on Kahoolawe

'Five Stones,' budgeted at
$12 million, will be shot
mainly on Maui

---

By Tim Ryan
Star-Bulletin

A television writer-producer hopes to bring the first motion picture production to Kahoolawe this fall for three days of filming the interracial love story "Five Stones."

Jeff Kramer plans to film the picture for six weeks on Maui in October and November. Kramer wrote the script and will make his directorial debut in the effort. The Magellan Filmed Entertainment production also will film three weeks in Los Angeles.

Kramer and his production team did a preliminary scout last month on Maui and Kahoolawe and will return late this month or next for a technical scout.

Kramer, a frequent Hawaii visitor, said he has talked to some Hawaii cultural groups and the Kahoolawe Island Reserve Commission, KIRC, about the project but has not yet applied for permission to film on the island.

"There is one scene that we really want to film on Kahoolawe," he said.

"Five Stones," with a $12 million budget, ties loosely to the return of Kahoolawe to Hawaiians. The story "blends fact and fiction" and is not a documentary, but "a dramatic piece," Kramer said in a telephone interview from Los Angeles.

The script is based on the life of Iwi Henere, originally from New Zealand, who now lives on Maui.

"Five Stones" chronicles a family's migration from southern Polynesia in the late 1700s to Hawaii. The story briefly deals with the introduction of the missionaries, then fast-forwards to 1942 after the bombing of Pearl Harbor and the training missions that fly over Kahoolawe.

There are three main characters in the film: a 20-something Caucasian woman from Boston who meets a man of Maori heritage training as a bomber and navigator, and a Caucasian man in his 40s, the son of a Baptist minister in Texas, who is a pilot trainer.

No actors have been signed though offers have been made, said Kramer, who expects to hire at least two dozen local extras for the film.

Kramer wants to base the production in Hana with possible filming in the Keanae Peninsula, and the Seven Pools area for a waterfall sequence. There may also be some filming at Iao Valley.

Neil Geraldo, husband of singer Pat Benatar and a sometime Maui resident, is writing the music for the film.

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