South Jersey director and filmmaker's works streaming on Peacock - Courier Post
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South Jersey director and filmmaker's works streaming on Peacock - Courier Post

EDGEWATER PARK – Maurice Paramore caught the filmmaking bug during his college years at William Paterson University.
Paramore, 39, was in his senior year and was assigned to do a capstone project, a culmination of what had been learned in the school’s communications program. He opted to make a 30-minute short film and fell in love with the storytelling process, deciding he wanted to tell more stories.
The 2001 Burlington Township High School graduate, who was once a DJ, started his own full-service production company called Dream Boy Vision after college graduation. The company does films, music videos, TV shows and commercials.
Paramore has now written, directed and produced numerous short and feature films and is currently preparing for the premiere of his third feature film, titled“Kodak”. The premiere will be held on Jan 6 at the Burlington County Library auditorium in Westampton. He has secured a distribution deal with Homestead Entertainment and hopes to see the same success with this project as he did with his feature film “Regrets,” which was released in 2021.
“Kodak” tells the tale of a young woman whose life has been turned all around after being separated from her mother. Expressing herself through photography helps the woman find her identity and gives her a much-needed outlet.
“I love to tell stories about young ladies, giving voice to women that sometimes they don’t always get these opportunities,” Paramore says.
“Regrets” is about an incarcerated boxer, who tries to reconnect with his daughter, who has been lost in the foster care system. The film follows the teen as she attempts to navigate the relationships with her father figures.
That film was picked up for distribution by Homestead Entertainment and was released on Tubi TV. In March, it was selected to be a part of Comcast/Xfinity’s Black Experience and can be streamed on Xfinity On Demand and Peacock TV.
Paramore has won numerous awards in the independent film industry and he feels like he’s just getting started. He also enjoys filming many of his scenes in the Burlington County area, which allows him to give recognition to local businesses and landmarks.
He says having supportive parents — Kim Paramore and Adrian Dace — has also made a big difference in his career success.
We asked Maurice Paramore about his life and career.
Answer: After about sixth grade is when I moved to Burlington. I’ve been here pretty much ever since. Moving over to Willingboro a little bit, then Edgewater Park. … I spent a little time in Camden, spent a little time in Delanco but once I came over from Delanco to Burlington Township in sixth grade, I’ve pretty much been here ever since. … I live in Edgewater Park now.
A: I always loved film. From the minute DVDs came out, I collected so many DVDs. When I went off to college, I used to have people rent DVDs from me, because I just loved them. I was never into making films. I think it was a natural progression. I started off being a DJ. I was always in the entertainment field. I was a DJ at a young age from like fourth grade on. I would DJ house parties, block parties in Philly, neighborhood parties. I went from DJing to producing and writing hip-hop music. Then I went off to school and I really focused on my hip-hop career but I needed visuals, music videos at the time. I got introduced to the communications program at William Paterson. My friend was working in the equipment section. I went in there, and rented out some equipment and I kind of just got the bug from there.
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A: I enrolled in the communications program and started doing music videos. I got the camera and shot my own music videos. Didn’t really know what I was doing but it was pretty cool. Then I had other friends that were doing music and I ended up doing some of their music videos. I was like this is pretty cool, let me do this for a little bit. Then my senior year, we had capstone projects, which is your final project before you leave. It’s kind of everything you learned up to that point. Communications was pretty much radio, TV, studio production and all that. It wasn’t truly filmmaking; it was a little bit of everything kind of mixed in one. We had a filmmaking program, but I didn’t take it. My final project — everybody was doing TV commercials, radio commercials, studio projects — I decide to do a 30-minute short film. Don’t ask me how, why. But I was like I want to tell this story. What I kind of blended was hip-hop music and live acting and made it one project. Got an A. I was like, I want to tell stories. It was kind of a natural progression of DJing, to being an artist, a musical director, to it’s time to write and direct my own films.
A: “Regrets” started out as a 15-minute short film in 2018 about the teen dealing with father issues. But I knew I always wanted to tell the full story, so in 2020 when the lead actress Jabriah Anderson (of Willingboro) was a little older, I wrote the feature script that was more mature as I knew she could handle a storyline that had deeper issues and required a more advanced level of acting. Soon after writing, we started production right in the heart of COVID. 
This story was always special to me because it gave a voice to young women. A lot of these absent father stories are often about a father and son, but I wanted to explore the effects of an absent father in a young woman’s life. I also wanted to touch on the effects of the foster care system as I know people personally who went through it. (The movie came out in December 2021)
A: I think the short film alone had won about five best film awards from some festivals in New Jersey, one in New York and one in Philly. Three years later, we did the feature film, it got accepted to the Urban Film Festival in Miami. Went down there and we won the best feature film award. Then it went onto win three other awards. Then we released it to the public and that’s when it got picked up by the two platforms.
A: It was amazing. I was doing the film festival circuit for so many years. I was doing a lot of short films year after year. I felt like I was running circles for a while. I was doing the same festivals which were really great for me. Really supportive but I was trying to figure out, what’s next and how do I go to that next level? It was amazing (getting it picked up) because I knew I was finally going to be able to get this film out to a larger audience. I would have so many people who wanted to see my work but they couldn’t go to the festivals or couldn’t make it to the premiere.
A: I started it two years after I graduated (college). That was in 2008 when I launched the company. I knew this is what I was going to do fulltime. I really didn’t have plans of working or another company. At the time, I was already doing my thing with music videos and I already started my film, so I was like it’s official.
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A: “Kodak” is about a young woman name Willow whose life has been pretty much turned upside down after being separated from her mother for very unfortunate reasons. Through this journey, she kind of finds an outlet through her photography. Being able to express herself creatively and kind of find her identity in a space where not a lot of people around her took her too seriously. It’s an amazing story about following your dreams, going against the grain, finding yourself and the arts have always been really important to me. … A lot of times you don’t see these stories being told following a young woman.
The “Kodak” movie premiere will be on Jan. 6 at The Burlington County Library auditorium in Westampton at 5 Pioneer Boulevard. Red carpet is at 6 p.m., the movie begins at 7 p.m. and there’s an after party at 10 p.m. at Il Portico Ristorante in Burlington.
General admission for the premiere is $30, VIP is $55 while $100 gives you “The Dream Boy Vision Experience” (automatic entry to Dream Boy Vision raffle, VIP swag bag, early event entry, poster of movie signed by cast and director and more).
Visit https://www.eventbrite.com/e/kodak-film-premiere-tickets-443354945577 for tickets.

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