If you like old science fiction movies or enjoy making fun of them, you’ll want to cancel your plans tonight.

“Persistence of Vision: The Making of Harbingers of the Realm,” will make its debut tonight at 7 p.m. in Kocimski Auditorium in the Design Building. The event is free and open to the public.

Andy Langager, graduate student in journalism and director of “Persistence of Vision,” describes the film as a “fictional documentary of the making of a bad sci-fi movie.”

It’s a fake documentary – or mockumentary – which “follows the production of a very silly and inept science fiction movie,” says Dan Mundt, instructor of electronic media studies.

The focus of the movie is the character of Ridley Johnson, who is the writer and director of “Harbingers of the Realm,” Langager says.

Johnson is a lover of science fiction films and it is his dream to make his own sci-fi movie.

“Ridley has great intentions and grand visions but no talent whatsoever,” says Mundt, who plays Ridley Johnson.

The film starts with the pre-production of the movie, with director Ridley casting characters, and then moves into production of the movie.

“Things go south pretty quickly in the production,” Mundt says.

Langager got the idea for the movie from watching a lot of bad, old sci-fi movies.

He says it’s a rip-off of other science fiction shows like “Star Wars” and “Battlestar Galactica.”

“We are all fans of `Mystery Science Theater 3000′,” Mundt says.

Mundt says a Saturday morning conversation at Perkins triggered the start of “Persistence of Vision.”

“We thought it’d be really fun to do something like this,” Mundt says.

The group started shooting the film in early June of 2001 and finished it in late August, Langager says. Editing began in August and ended recently.

The money to make the film came directly from the pockets of Langager and Mundt. Langager estimates the film cost around $500 to make, which he says “is pretty unbelievably cheap.”

The “Persistence of Vision” crew has already worked on two other films, Langager adds.

They all love movies and they do it for fun. It has become an annual summer project for the group.

The documentary feel of the film was achieved by not having a script and having the actors ad-lib their lines, Langager says.

“I have to give a lot of credit to the actors because it’s difficult to ad-lib an entire movie,” says Langager. “We tried to make it funny as we went along.”

Langager, who has worked on TV shows like “Oxymorons” and “1800 Seconds,” says a lot of his film skills come from making mistakes and watching movies.

“I learned a lot from just hands-on experience,” Langager says.

Langager is looking forward to sharing his film with those who worked on it.

He is also excited to show it to the general public and get their reactions.

“I’m used to working on TV shows and I don’t really get a lot of immediate feedback,” he says. “I hope that they will laugh at the right places.”

“I’m anxious to see if the rest of the populace will find it as funny as I do,” Mundt says.

Depending on how the audience reacts to “Persistence of Visions” debut, Lanager says he plans to have it aired on CY46.

He is also thinking about entering it in the Iowa Motion Picture Association Awards.

Following the showing of “Persistence of Vision,” there will be another viewing of Mundt’s film “Escape Velocity” at 9 p.m.

“Escape Velocity” is a black and white film about a woman service pilot who served during World War II.