A deadly snake bite has a hitmen duo realising
their only chance of survival rests in the hands of
the cultleader they were sent to kill.
Written and Directed by
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Between Timmins and Ranson, they have created Novelletes, Music Videos, Podcast Scripts, and Short Films accepted and screened in festivals such as Show Me Shorts, Tropfest and more.
This film collaboration will be a significant step in both creator's careers, considered their most promising and exciting project so far.
Good Men is a 10 minute Short Film,
a character-driven comedy set in a wild west outback.
Set for a festival run and then an online release, a huge amount of both creative and practical work will be put into Good Men's shoot by the co-creator's on top of a partially Crowdfunded budget.
Cast and crew will be essential, but the project will need the support of everyone.
Sometimes Good Men must do bad things. And sometimes bad men must do strange things.
For the hitman duo: Jester, a hot blooded killer with a severe lack of patience and Ringo, spiritual by nature but not afraid to send you to the afterlife. It was your everyday routine. Take the target into the middle of nowhere, make the hit and dispose of the body. In this case their target, Guteman. A conman millionaire, doing his dirty deeds under the guise of being the next spiritual messiah.
Should have been easy. But like with any job, whether it’s life insurance or death insurance, bad days happen. One moment Ringo is standing there, gun aimed at Guteman. Par for the course. The next moment they are all in a car. Ringo at the wheel, foot on the gas, speeding for the nearest hospital. Jester deathly pale, sweat pouring off his forehead, lethal venom crawling up his ankle and Guteman in the back still tied up. ​
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Times like this it feels right to call bad luck. The fact that the best spot to kill a man also happens to be the furthest anyway from any sort of help. But of course, it’s completely logical. For instance, how many people get bit by a snake?
Surely most of them happen in the desert.
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Yep, it’s looking pretty bleak for Jester. The only thing still keeping him conscious? A burning hatred for Guteman, who by some sick twist of fate might also be Jester’s only chance for survival. Of course, this is all self proclaimed by the messiah himself. And very much reliant on him not being the con artist Jester certainly believes he is.
Luckily for the two, there’s a third party to mediate. Ringo, with the intent to keep his friend alive, mixed with a natural disposition to be conned, opts to give Guteman a chance. A chance to save himself before Jester completes his very last job and Ringo’s stuck digging a grave for two, all on his own.
Now, chips on the table, all the major players all-in. It’s down to Lady luck to once again roll the wheel.
Will Jester finally succumb to the deadly poison? Will Guteman perform a miracle and gain two new followers?
Will Ringo find a balance between this Yin and Yang?
Or will us, the audience, get to witness some extreme violence.
Styling
The wild, wild west.
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Hitmen with aesthetics you would expect from differing cultural ends of a working class 1970s traverse a wilderness and lawlessness familiar to western classic films. Their target captures a timeless and recognizable role - the questionable, materialistic cult leader.
The conversations and interactions may feel modern and snappy, but the shooting and editing will be intentionally slow and paced realistically.
Location
Desierto de Rangipo
New Zealand is known for its landscapes, visually dynamic and vast in variety. However, there is no other location in the north island that can compare to the Rangipo Desert. With the treatment of Good Men being a ‘Wild West’ setting, nothing can make this stand out from the rest of the genre like a snow-capped mountainous landscape and native New Zealand shrubbery.
Large, hand-crafted cacti will stand silhouetted in the distant background to add a subtle nod to the genre and a separation between the film and New Zealand itself, creating its own world.
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The scenes inside the car will both be filmed over one day, in Auckland. A projector screen showing the passing scenery, plus matched lighting and manual car shaking, will create the illusion of a moving car while we can have the freedom to shoot and retake shots without the stress and complications of shooting within a moving vehicle.
Two of the three shoot days for Good Men will be filmed on location in the Rangipo Desert, capturing scenes of Jester and Ringo readying to execute Gutemen, and of Guteman later attempting to save Jester from certain death. These shoot days will include a skeleton crew traveling down for a one night stay at Rangipo, filming for two full days. The equipment, set dressing and art department will be driven down with the cast and crew.
The timing of this location shoot is paramount - of course, capturing Desert road on camera to appear to be a Wild West type location is possible during the right season, but during the wrong season snow, wind and rain is prevalent. As well as this, the ideal weather for filming also coincides with the holiday season, which is unideal for a shoot in terms of road traffic and parking space.
So, the shoot will take place in March 2022, during the season where the landscape looks hot and the public interference is at a minimum. The exact dates will be narrowed down to multiple weekends according to the cast/crew’s availability during the season, and then selected specifically closer to the shoot according to the weather.
With a skeleton crew filming over three days and two locations, the landscapes and set design for the Good Men shoot will serve as essential foundations for the world and characters to be built upon. ​
The Budget
Good Men will be a relatively low-budget shoot for a 10 minute short film, with a total budget of $7,500. The funding will come through a combination of creator investment and crowdfunding. Ranson and Timmins will be investing significantly beyond the official fund, in particular with the Art Department and Set Dressing, accumulating and creating pieces to develop the world/characters leading up to the shoot day.
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40% (3000 NZD) Cast/Crew
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25% (1900 NZD) Location
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16% (1200 NZD) Equipment
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4% (300 NZD) Costume/Makeup
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6% (500 NZD) Props/Set Dressing
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9% Contingency
Crowdfunding will make Good Men happen. The Crowd Funding campaign will launch from December 28th 2021 till February 28th 2022, raising a total of 2500 NZD and bringing the budget up from the creators own investments to an amount which would be feasible to shoot with.
Although creative input and execution makes a good film great, funding is essential to actually get the film created at all and will be allocated to things such as:
Cast/Crew wages, Location (including travel and accommodation costs), Costume, Props/set dressing, and more.