The New Indiegogo Campaign For UK Action Short, DOG, Is Online

Initially, the film itself came first prior to the music project, according to statements from the director, Robin Schmidt, who has been making movies for the last ten years. He is also a part of the creative center for the official Facebook Page he shares with Simon for their own independent film group titled We Are Super Massive.

I had the chance to ask Robin a few questions recently, and he provided some further details about how it all began. “I was working with a record label called MTA Records. We were asked to create two back to back music videos for the artist Dream Mclean.” he says. “Basically the brief was all about trying to maximise a day’s shooting and really do something a bit different with their artist. We came back and said, ‘Well, um, yeah, we can’t do that. But if you give us the money we can shoot a short film we’ve been developing (sort of) and we’ll turn that short into these two music vids for you.’ They said yes. We said, ‘uh oh’, and knew we had to actually do it.”

He went on to say, “I’ve known Martin for a while through his brother Simon who I’ve been shooting with for a few years now. We’ve done a few bits and pieces together but never really had a chance to do things at the level we wanted to. This was a chance to do that.”

Robin also illustrated some of his own personal reasons why exploring the action genre was important to him this time around, stating “I just got fed up of trying to make the films that the film bodies in this country seem to consider is what should be getting made. I don’t do soul searching films about downtrodden communities in the northeast. I didn’t grow up in poverty, I wouldn’t be authentic. What I do know about though is fractured, complex personalities where what you see on the outside is not what’s going on inside.” He then added “I also just like action films. I always have, in the eighties and early nineties that wasn’t a crime. Now, seemingly, admitting you like action movies is tantamount to saying you’re a moron. Cineastes turn their noses up at them declaring the genre popcorn and bereft of true cinema. Which is true most of the time, but completely ignores the stunning work coming out of HK and particularly South Korea. I love Park Chan Wook, I love Hard Boiled and I love Let the Right One In. Where I sit personally is a grand fusion of all those different styles.”

I also spoke to one Simon, who plays the title character. Like his working partner Robin, shares an affinity for classic Asian action movies, citing the John Woo crime thriller, Hard Boiled, and Park Chan-wook’s revenge thriller, Old Boy, as references. He says, “Adding to the fact that Martin my brother had spent his whole life studying Kung fu classics and having a stunt team, it just felt right we should bite the bullet and try and make it.”. 

Simon also credited MTA Records for how amazing they were to the production, giving them what they needed to film the scenes for Dream Mclean’s music videos (as seen above). and was also very emphatic about the production, his experience working with the cast and crew, and his hopes for what lie ahead. He says “We hustled hard to get to this stage, selling all our gear, lenses, old DS’s, old iPods to scrape an extra two days. But we feel that another fight sequence will really make this stand out and also pushing it to a 30 minute cut. Long enough to care about the characters but with awesome fight set ups that make you go ‘fuck! That was awesome!'” He then added “The team we pulled together was amazing. Such love on set through very hard long wet and cold days. We had the cream of the rising crop, everyone without exception pulled the best out the bag and we’d love to get then all back and reward them with money that we hopefully raise from this Indiegogo campaign.”

“The best thing about my character is his hair! It really did it for me.” said Martin of the character he plays in the footage. Martin also owns and operates SG Action, as well as performs, produces, directs various projects with the team. Being that the film was what came first before the two music videos, Martin describes the reception received from the viewing audience prior to moving forward into campaigning for a complete film project. He says “From a stunts perspective, everything seemed to point to more. All of the stunt performers did a great job and we got some epic and brutal shots, but we had such a limited time a few other key fight scenes had to be removed. This didn’t affect the videos however, and they were released and had a great reception.” He continues with saying, “However a lot of people kept asking if there was any more. Could they see more of the fighting? What was happening with the footage? After speaking with Robin, it became clear that he already had an idea to expand the footage into a longer short film, and given our current stand point as an upcoming UK based noodle guzzling high kicking stunt team, we talked about getting some more action into the short film and making it just more epic in general, to make something we could all hold up and say ‘look world! THIS is what UL independent film makers and stunt teams are capable of with a short time frame and a small budget, we are on the map and we mean business!’.”