Maine scenes biggest stars of ‘Bedroom’

Forget Sissy Spacek. Forget Tom Wilkinson. Forget Marisa Tomei. To local people, the real star of “In the Bedroom” is the mustache of Terry Burgess.

If you judge a movie by how much glory it gives your neighborhood, that mustache wins hands down.

At the Rockland premiere, the local audience applauded as scenes from Camden, Rockport and Owls Head were illustrated on the 40-foot screen. The film hired scores of local extras when it was filmed in the summer of 2000.

Burgess is the former police chief in Camden who has always dabbled in local theater. He hit the big time in “Bedroom” in the role of a district attorney who is trying to explain to a grief-stricken father the realities of criminal prosecution. While they stand on Rockland’s Main Street, the camera rolls in so close to Burgess that his lips and mustache fill the entire screen.

Talk about a close-up.

The game on Friday was to identify the location of each scene. The film opens with Tomei and her youthful lover, Nick Stahl, running across a grassy field, which is right off Crescent Beach in Owls Head. Stahl must love the area since he also was in “Man Without a Face,” which starred Mel Gibson and was filmed in the area several summers ago.

“Bedroom” was a notorious low-budget effort, and some expected it to go straight to cable, like the flop “Head Above Water,” which was filmed in the Boothbay Harbor area several years ago. But “Bedroom,” directed by Todd Field, went to the prestigious Sundance Film Festival and has generated industry buzz for Oscar possibilities for both Spacek and Wilkinson.

The movie is supposed to be set in Camden, but scenes in Rockport, Rockland and Owls Head are used interchangeably. Camden’s “Select Board,” nee Board of Selectmen, probably will issue a protest that any other community was identified as Camden.

Wilkinson drove under the Camden-Rockport arch several times, drawing applause from the local audience. The scene also was shown in “Peyton Place,” the 1957 epic that scandalized the nation.

The title refers to a section of a lobster trap and the story features numerous scenes on the waterfront. The Food Machinery Corp. building, which dominates Rockland Harbor, is used as a sardine-packing business called Strout Seafood. Other scenes were shot at Rockland’s public landing and Owls Head Light.

In a bizarre attempt at local color, a can of Moxie is shown in a refrigerator. How many cans of Moxie have you seen in the last six months?

At the local premiere, many locals ignored much of the dialogue to try to figure out where the scenes were shot. Wilkinson has several breakfast meetings at the Wayfarer Hotel in Rockland, with Port Clyde’s Eddie Black hovering in the background. Black also played a gypsy in Steven King’s “Thinner.” Other scenes were filmed at Rockland’s South End Market and Market on Main Restaurant and Camden’s Gilbert’s Publick House and the library amphitheater, the scene with the most local extras.

The former Rockland High School is used extensively in the film. The closing scenes are gorgeous nighttime shots of Rockland’s Park and Main streets.

The courtroom scenes offer face time to some local figures including District Court Judge Joe Field and Steve Betts of The Courier Gazette, both playing themselves. Copies of the Courier Gazette and Camden Herald are featured prominently in the movie.

The movie is also interesting for the cameo done by Karen Black who once appeared in the Indiana Jones series as Indy’s girlfriend. She plays a defense attorney in a very brief scene.

How the mighty have fallen, from Indy’s girlfriend to second fiddle to Burgess’ mustache.

Send complaints and compliments to Emmet Meara at emmetmeara@msn.com