Agoraphobia- come and get it." Psychological thriller" is such a misnomer when pigeonholing a film. Isn’t anything that involves fear and mystery, ultimately, psychological? Bah. Philosophy be damned. I’ll follow tradition.

Speaking of, Actor/TV Director Joe Rassulo’s had a good time lately, as he’s finished up a film, Bull Run, and his self written (soon to be self-directed), based-on-true-events story Damaged has been co-financed by Monarch Pictures and Crossroads Productions.

Damaged is the story of a girl who is psychologically damaged thanks to a fear of being unable to escape embarrasing situations– kind of like the fool pictured here. In fancy clinical terms, the condition is known as agoraphobia* . The real-life events the story is based on took place in both California and Arizona, home of many a psychologically-thrilling opportunity to embarass oneself (naked Lake Havasu coeds, I’m referencing you). Unfortunately for the heroine, she’s also being manipulated into thinking she’s killed some people in a manner most foul.

I really wanted to give you more background on the real-life events which inspired the screenplay, but I couldn’t dig any up. If you’ve got ’em, let’s hear it on the boards.

*Don’t be mislead by Variety and other sources- Agoraphobia is not the fear of open spaces- that’s a misnomer derived from the Greek roots of the word- Thanks, Wikipedia! No word on whether the movie will stick to the literal or popularized version of the term.