French production company, Indeprod, and Lisbon-based Luckymatrix have inked an innovative co-production deal for simultaneous filming of two €1million ($1.1 million) budget feature films in Portugal, in a 20-day shoot planned for the third quarter of 2024.
Both films are auteur-driven, French language genre films – slasher horror pic, “Mr. Morgan,” and paranormal thriller, “Behind.”
The co-producers are seeking funding from the CNC and French broadcasters and plan to present both projects to Portugal’s cash rebate scheme – which offers up to a 30% rebate – when the call opens this spring.
They believe that the twin shoot will generate economies of scale, lowering the cost per pic by 30%.
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The creative team, crew, and equipment will stay in the same location, while shooting in two nearby locations – a lighthouse and a period building. They are currently scouting locations along the coast of Portugal.
Luckymatrix producer, Phil Ox said that “’Mr. Morgan’ brings Alexandre Laugier’s exceptional screenwriting to life—truly original, bloody, and terrifying, whereas David Aboucaya’s ‘Behind,’ is a spine-chilling paranormal reality show.”
“Mr Morgan” follows a group of delinquent youths who have debts with a drug dealer and go to rob an old man living in a mansion, but find they’ve messed with the wrong person.
“Behind” is about a team producing a reality show about paranormal forces that inadvertently awaken actual supernatural forces in the shooting location.
Indeprod’s producer Emmanuel Saez explains that helmer David Aboucaya was inspired by U.S. reality shows about psychological ghost hunters. “At one point reality is going to overtake fiction.”
Saez, who is based near Marseille, is also president of the French association of Independent Cinema (A.F.C.I) and founder of France’s SMR13 International Independent Film Festival.
“I think it was more the scripts and the idea that appealed to us for these two projects, rather than making genre films,” said Saez.
“I am dedicated to producing and directing independent films and the SMR13 film festival has played a pivotal role in promoting independent cinema, with high profile guests such as Francis Ford Coppola, Sean Cunningham and John Carpenter. Many of the world’s leading filmmakers began their careers by making low-budget independent films.”
“I think what counts is the concept, the idea, as a starting point,” added Ox. “What is good in the case of genre films is that spectators have certain expectations which the director can explore, transforming what could be a cliché into something that is interesting. Young audiences in particular are attentive to genre cinema and are looking for alternatives to the Marvel model or blockbusters.”
Indeprod and Luckmatrix are also prepping Saez’s upcoming action thriller, White City, about a new municipal police force that attempts to quell inner city riots. Sean Cunningham, (“Friday the 13th”) is the script consultant. They plan to shoot in either Portugal or Turkey.
The producers say that for the twin shoot in Portugal they plan to incorporate new tech, post-production tools, AI, and reevaluate the productions to create a sustainable and eco-friendly shoot. Savings made possible by the twin shoot are expected to deliver a boost of up to one-third per film, which will be further leveraged by the 30% cash rebate.
“The idea is to propose a way of producing that is completely different from the usual approach,” says Ox. “But in my opinion, given that it has become commonplace to produce high-quality TV series with elevated budgets it’s natural to bring this kind of productivity and creativity to feature film production.”
Indeprod, based in the South of France, has previously produced “Roads of Fear” (“Sans Peur”) and is currently co-producing period cop show drama series Décade with Tarantula in Belgium.
Luckymatrix, based in Lisbon, is run by producer Phil Ox, who has previously worked for the BBC, Channel 4, Nickelodeon, and Canal+, and is currently producing a biopic feature film on maverick journalist Peter Millar, based on his best-seller “1989: The Berlin Wall, My Part in its Downfall,” and is working with Alphanso technology to build independent music and video streaming platforms.
