AFTER TWILIGHT
Running time 34 min (approx.)
35mm Black & White
Widescreen Letterbox
Stereo

Bookish Jen Frazier seems an unlikely choice to be a freedom fighter, but when a theocratic new order occupies the state of Texas, Jen is pushed into action carrying contraband for the underground.

In the backroom of a closed antique shop Goldman, the proprietor, charges Jen with the task of delivering a mysterious package to an unnamed underground. But before Goldman can finish his instructions, the Apparitors (religious police) led by Sgt. Streetman raid the shop. Jen hides and escapes capture, but the police seize Goldman, and beat him to death for resisting arrest.

In spite of the danger, and driven by a desire to “Make up for something I didn’t do…” Jen decides to deliver the package to her contact. When she tries to return home, Jen is pursued by Sgt. Streetman, and flees into the night, leaving her normal life forever behind her.

At the appointed hour, Jen arrives to deliver the package to her contact. When the contact appears, the secret agents of the church, the Seraphim, quickly subdue him. Jen avoids capture only because the occupants of a mysterious white van snatch her off the street.

Not knowing who her captors are, and remembering Goldman’s admonition to “Trust no one, no one at all”, Jen escapes their grasp and is once again pursued on the streets of Houston as a wanted “person of interest”.

While hiding in a burned out studio, Jen meets Shad the artist, and hears his tale of torture and oppression at the hands of the theocracy. Shad also happens to be a member of the underground organization led by “Jessie the Liberator”, the same organization that had previously pulled Jen off the street. Against her will, Jen is drawn into the underground network of interfaith freedom fighters led by The Liberator.

Deep under the city streets, Jen meets the core of “witnesses” led by Jessie, and begins to grasp the full extent of the resistance forming against the theocratic order represented by Sgt. Streetman.

Jen strikes a bargain with Jessie to insure the package is delivered into the hands of its intended recipients. In so doing, Jen makes the ultimate sacrifice and the contents of the mysterious package are revealed to the audience.

“After Twilight” is a cautionary tale of the near future delivered in the form of a classic film noir thriller. The film’s central theme is the inherent dangers of combining religion with politics and the inevitable corruption of both.

“How do you fight a state, with God on its side?”