Investor Business Plan
Above the Line Films was started by Tom Sims and James Trois, two friends since their first days in elementary school. Tom and James are filmmakers whose first feature, Bittercress, was screened at several film festivals and on cable network’s Education Channel. The movie was made on a extremely small budget, yet has been praised by audiences in several venues.
Repo Elf was developed from an article Tom published and copyrighted December 1993 in a parent's magazine. Cultivating the contacts and resources associated with this and other productions, the partners plan to make Repo Elf a box office success—and a healthy return for investors.
To provide some history, it wasn't until after high school that Tom and James collaborated on a few amateur productions. That continued through their college years. James moved to Los Angeles where he graduated from the University of Southern California and has worked on several films and television projects over the past 10 years. Among his accomplishments has been his work on such feature films as Titanic, Mannequin, True Lies, and Terminator 2. He has also done work for HBO and other television productions.
Tom stayed in Philadelphia where he worked as an Executive Director for several national medical societies. Through the years, he has produced a variety of stories, articles, and other writings. His works include an award-winning one act play, a column in a local parenting magazine, and short stories for literary periodicals.
Bittercress was written by Tom, and funding has been raised using Tom's years of business experience (and perhaps more than one dip into his retirement account!). The project was listed with the Screen Actors Guild as an experimental film.
The goal for Above the Line Films is to secure funding for the completion of Repo Elf and find a suitable venue for reaching out to a broader audience with Bittercress.
Other productions in the works include documentaries on a musical family history in Bluegrass and a Victorian home restoration.
