The brand-new, black stretch limousine parked between an abandoned building and a Baptist church in Clairton on Sunday looked out of place.

After all, this was Clairton: a city highlighted last month in a housing study by RealSTATs as experiencing the steepest drop in home prices in Allegheny County -- 43.3 percent between 2005 and 2008.

Why would a shiny limo be here?

Turned out that Roy Jones Jr. -- fighter extraordinaire and a current light heavyweight boxing champion -- had landed in town.

But he wasn't here to box.

He was here to act.

In a movie.

To supplement his boxing career, Mr. Jones has branched into film. He appeared in "The Devil's Advocate" in 1997, and, in 2003, he had a speaking role in "The Matrix Reloaded."

And that led him to Clairton.

But let's back up.

Earlier this month, Deidre Howard, a filmmaker based in Phoenix, launched the Inner City Film Project, intending to "shine a light" on Rust Belt cities. Ms. Howard has roots here and has begin her latest cinematic endeavor in Clairton.

"We target [places like Clairton], and we want to educate kids there -- to show them there's something else out there," she said, standing by the limo. "We're here to film two movies -- a documentary about the people who live here and a film about life in forgotten cities like this one."

Her "film about life in forgotten cities" is called "My Destiny." Written and directed by Ms. Howard, the film is about a young woman named Destiny who grows up in Clairton and becomes a famous pop singer after high school. She heads to Los Angeles but soon receives word that her mother has been murdered in Clairton. She vows never to return home.

But one day, Destiny flies back to Clairton for a funeral. She's floored by the city's poverty; she has almost forgotten the hard choices her friends have had to make in destitution. At that point, she's forced to decide between leaving Clairton again or staying to help her friends and her hometown.

Ms. Howard explains that while her ultimate goal is to produce a feature-length film, the Inner City Film Project also collaborates with Clairton High School to show kids the business of film production. Eight Clairton High students got the opportunity to shadow members of the "My Destiny" crew on the job for two weeks.

Daryl Price, one of the movie's producers -- and owner of Rhythm House Café in Bridgeville -- points out that the project goes further than that.

"Most of these kids don't really have anything," he said. "There are some who won't eat between when they leave school Friday and when they get back to school Monday. And so this project is giving back to the community in a lot of ways. We help them. We feed them sometimes. It's just an all-around positive experience for everyone."

Which brings us back to Mr. Jones. He's not from Clairton and doesn't have any connection with the region. But his business manager, Tammy Ridgely, is the trainer at Clairton High School. She heard about the Inner City Film Project through Mr. Price. Mr. Jones thought it sounded like a good idea.

"I want to give my time to do projects like this," he said. "This is the type of thing I think God put us on the Earth to do. To teach kids about the film industry is going to give them the desire to do something in life, to have a vision of where to go."

"My Destiny" also stars Pittsburgh-based actors Alan Lee and Haley Holloway, and Margot B -- a New York-based singer and daughter of former Steelers linebacker Craig Bingham. Blake Steigerwald, son of Penguins announcer Paul Steigerwald, is the film's director of photography.

As Ms. Howard's crew of 15 or so prepared to film a scene outside Mount Olive Church, Bob Jones, a Clairton resident, dropped by. He was born here, then moved to Philadelphia for 24 years and came back in the '80s.

"I hope things like this bring some attention and interest to Clairton," he said. "Sometimes people forget we're out here. Maybe if people film movies here, they won't forget so easily."

First Published: September 23, 2009, 10:30 a.m.