It's not often that our fair city is home to a worldwide movie premiere. And we could probably count on one hand all of the movies with well-known celebrities that have been shot on location here. But Rochester native Nicholas DiBella made both happen.

On Friday, February 16, DiBella's feature-length film Cherry Crush will premiere at Little Theatres before being distributed internationally. The film was not only shot in Rochester, but DiBella, who still lives in Webster, also called on local area talent to help in front of and behind the scenes.

"Any film you shoot in Rochester, there is just such a great pool of crew and actors," DiBella says. "Outside the main six actors and a couple of crew members, everyone was from Rochester."

Local photographers, musicians, and actors were tapped to play central roles in the making of the film, which DiBella both co-wrote and directed. The former employee of Eastman Kodak even collaborated with a local production company, Post Central Entertainment, to back the film, marking the company's first foray into feature film production. But this was not DiBella's first experience with movie-making; he has been selling scripts to Hollywood for years, including a remake of A Summer Place for which Mandy Moore (American Dreamz, Entourage, Because I Said So) is attached.

"The screenwriting came because I wanted to make a feature film," DiBella says, "But just because you sell a screenplay doesn't mean they will make the movie, or that you get to direct it."

DiBella realized that in order to direct any of his own screenplays he would need a film with some "name" actors to show to the Hollywood studios. And so he sat down with writer Paul Root in a Wegmans food court and began to hash out an idea for a film, which would become Cherry Crush. They spent roughly three months writing the script, working in locations they knew would be available for shooting in the area --- such as Nazareth College and Irondequoit High School --- and making sure to write characters interesting enough to attract high-profile talent. They pulled it off.

The film features several recognizable celebrities, including Nikki Reed, best known for her roles in Thirteen and The O.C.; Jonathan Tucker, who played Morgan in the recent remake of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and who will star in the upcoming NBC series The Black Donnellys; and Academy Award nominee Michael O'Keefe, from The Great Santini and Roseanne. The noir-ish story is set in high school and follows a photographer (Tucker) who gets caught up in murder when he falls for one of his models (Reed).

DiBella admits that some of the story has changed from the original concept, explaining that making a film is like being on "a runaway train and you just lose some of the concepts along the way." But he's just happy that the film got made.

"You always have to navigate these land mines to make a film," he says. "I wasn't making this movie in a vacuum. You're always compromising; it's a good lesson to learn. The best directors are the ones that navigate that process and still walk away with something good."

Cherry Crush premieres Friday, February 16, at 7:30 p.m. at Little Theatres, 240 East Avenue, and continues through Thursday, February 22. For more information on tickets and show times, visit www.little-theatre.com or call 258-0400. For more information on the film, visit www.cherrycrushthemovie.com.