That Wonderful Sinking Feeling

Das Tub. Here's a fun little story and the fun little story behind the story. A little while ago a myself and a group of my mates where sitting around at a BBQ and we started rifting on a rather silly little idea. Why do aliens travel millions of lightyears to visit our planet? From this simple premise we came up with a series of very funny ideas. Ideas that I took away and wrote into a fun little short film.

Just an exercise in fun really. Anyhoo then I started thinking about how could I get my alien story on screen. It wasn't the usual dark, depressing kiwi short film. No poor Maori children being beaten by their drunk father. Nobody commits suicide. And their was a distinct lack of a quirky loner. So chances of getting it funded and made? Zero.

Then I remembered that my friend James Cunningham was teaching at the Media Design School here in Auckland. It's an excellent course and then end products come out looking pretty dam flash. Added to this James himself would be directing it. James is the director of the outstanding short "Poppy." So cheeky sod that I am I gave him the script. Maybe his class could make it as a project?

The answer was yes. James liked it and his class loved it. Just one small problem. They didn't have enough time or manpower to make it in it's original form. Any chance we could cut it down? As a screenwriter we live in a world where we watch our babies being interfered with on a daily basis, so since I was donating my work for free naturally I wasn't interested in compromising it.

However the doorway was open. They wanted a film and I wanted to write one for them. So I went over to James' house and we sat down over a few beers and came up with a whole new story. Something they could make in the time and would offer a suitable challenge. Das Tub was the short film we created. It was strange, fun and most importantly it was short. Sidebar: too many short films aren't short at all, sorry but fifteen minutes isn't short! I think short films should be ten minutes max.

Right putting my soap box away now.

So the class liked the new script and we were away. We were also lucky enough to attract the acting talents of two of our countries finest actors. The devilishly hansom Craig Hall and the multitalented Gareth Reeves. These guys brought their A game.

The finished result speaks for itself I haven't been this proud of something I've produced for a while so please sit back and enjoy...

DAS TUB.