Actress and filmmaker Maria Tran and her good folks at Phoenix Eye are currently tracking the festivals in 2023 with their debut feature, Echo 8. The new psych action thriller, about an assassin who finds herself at an impasse with her organization when she’s assigned her latest target, has already lined up several official nominations and awards including and not limited to Tokyo and Singapore, while the company is now priming a continuation of the story in two back-to-back sequels, Echo 8: Beyond and Echo 8: Five By Five.
Reviews are also making the rounds in addition to mine which you can take a gander at here. For the sequels, Tran is reteaming with Echo 8 screenwriter Elizabeth H. Vu to outline the next two chapters. Plot and further casting details remain pending, while Tran and the producers rev up a script reading table event for this Fall, before announcing further details in 2024, and ultimately rolling cameras in the following year.
Check out the graphic below and read the following announcement:
🎬🎬𝗦𝗟𝗔𝗧𝗘-𝗜𝗡-𝗗𝗘𝗩𝗘𝗟𝗢𝗣𝗠𝗘𝗡𝗧: ‘𝗘𝗖𝗛𝗢 𝟴 𝗕𝗘𝗬𝗢𝗡𝗗’ & ‘𝗙𝗜𝗩𝗘 𝗕𝗬 𝗙𝗜𝗩𝗘’🎬🎬
Since ‘Echo 8’s reception, I’ve been working with screenwriter Elizabeth H. Vu who has been ambitiously outlining the next feature film instalment of Echo 8’s ‘Five By Five’ & ‘Echo 8: Beyond’ due to be in production in 2025.
Super ambitious indeed, but so was making a feature for 10k and that bucketlist was ‘ticked’ off with much gusto.
It’s really hard for me to explain to the common “Joes/ Janes” on why the heck I would put myself through the ‘Mission impossible’ slaughterhouse of making another low budge indie feature.
Why go through the painstakingly troublesome process on wearing multiple hats (actor/ producer/ director/ fight stuff/ editing etc…).
Why not do it the ‘professional’ way? Lean on the Australian film industry and their expertise? Funding & grants etc…?
Because the screen industry is so cryptic to myself and a lot of other culturally diverse creatives, to the point that it’s probably more easier to build your own community & make your own movies outside the system that reaches out to broader audiences outside of Australia.
I mean, what options do I have? I won’t be getting any younger and I want to make movies and tell stories the way I want to, the genre I’ve chosen and and work with the cast & crew that I’ve grew to love over the years.
So full steam ahead (while also juggling other work-related, sustaining self projects) & if anyone knows me, I’ve got a strong track record to deliver.
Anyhow, back to the next two films. I’m really, really excited. I’ve been connecting with potential casts and the talent we have will be having a script table reading event in August later this year & our full cast for both films will be announced in 2024.