Echuca and Moama are set to feature on the big screen as the backdrop for a new and exciting film that will add a new twist to a classic movie genre.
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Fear Below, parts of which were filmed along the Murray River and in a studio in Echuca, is a shark film — but not as you might expect.
Set in the 1940s, it tells the story of a group of gangsters who lose their stolen loot at the bottom of a river. Desperate to get it back, they hire a dive company to retrieve it — only for the divers to encounter a bull shark below the surface.
Trapped between the gangsters on land and the shark in the river, the dive team finds itself between a rock and a hard place.
Matthew Holmes is the film’s director and the co-writer alongside Gregory Moss.
Mr Holmes said he wanted to come up with something unique with Fear Below, something that would set it apart from other shark films.
“I didn’t want to do that unless I could come up with an idea that I thought was quite original,” Mr Holmes said.
“I set myself a task of trying to come up with an idea for the kind of shark film that I would like to watch.
“I have always wanted to explore the idea of the bull shark because it does go upriver.
“I thought that would be something different to set it apart from other shark films by setting it in the river rather than in the ocean, and setting it in the 1940s, I thought, added another layer of difference as well.
“I tried to make it as different from every other shark film that I have seen before.”
Now, you might be thinking, ‘Hang on, there are no bull sharks in the Murray River’. But don’t worry, the filmmakers know that too.
While the movie has been shot along the banks of the Murray at Perricoota Station, the film itself is set about an hour out of Sydney.
Both Mr Holmes and one of the film’s producers, Blake Northfield, said the region around Echuca-Moama were the perfect setting for the film.
“I knew I wanted the movie to have a very, very Australian feel, so I wanted the river to look iconically Australian with the gum trees and everything you get with the Murray River,” Mr Holmes said.
“I always knew I wanted to shoot on the Murray somewhere and it was just about finding the best spot along the river.
“The historical and cultural stuff around Echuca and Moama — the port, the old buildings, the heritage — it fit the 1940s aesthetic really well.
“It seemed like a perfect fit.“
Mr Northfield said Echuca-Moama offered a wide range of features they simply could not get at other locations
“This place just gives us so much production value. The Port of Echuca, the river, the trees, we couldn’t find this anywhere else,” Mr Northfield said.
“The director normally has everything imagined, and so anything else is a compromise. Fortunately for us, this popped up we didn’t have to compromise on anything.
“If anything, it actually enhanced what was written, it made it so much easier.
“This is the dream location for the script.”
The Riverine Herald went out to the set at Perricoota Station last month to get a behind-the-scenes look at the film being made.
About 100 people are involved with making the movie, with 70 people normally on the site each day.
Trucks, crew trailers, props, lights, catering tents and scores of camera equipment all on site to help create the final product.
One of the most important elements in Fear Below, of course, is the shark itself.
While the filmmakers cannot use an actual live shark, Mr Holmes said they opted to go for a classic old-school approach.
Instead of using computer-generated imagery, they have built a life-sized shark prop to use while filming.
“Another exciting thing with the shark itself is our approach to visual effects, which is really old school,” Mr Holmes said.
“We are not doing any digital sharks or computer animation, it is all being done with practical effects.
“We are building a three-and-a-half metre shark and it will be puppet and cable operated. We are going back to the way they used to make films in the 80s, just to give it a bit more of that flavour, it is going to be a lot of fun.”
The film is currently about halfway through production, with hopes it will be released towards the end of 2023.
The recent flooding across the region has thrown a spanner in the works, however.
While some of the filming has been done in Echuca and Moama, the flooding has meant the rest of the movie will instead be shot in Queensland.
Once everything is finished up and when the movie is released, Mr Holmes said he hoped Fear Below would be a real crowd pleaser.
“I hope the audience enjoy the unique spin we have given it,” he said.
“We have all seen shark films and we all know how they go. But I just hope they really enjoy the characters and the unique setting we have given them, I hope that is what they take away.
“It is a genre splice. We want to make it a fun adventure film meets gangster film meets shark thriller and combine them all together.
“With this film I really wanted to go back to old fashioned adventures. I am a big fan of Steven Spielberg and those 80s movies that were good fun.
“We wanted this to be a little bit Jaws, a little bit Raiders of the Lost Ark. We have been very much inspired by the Spielbergian films of the 80s and that is the sort of energy and the fun that we want to bring to the screen.”
Mr Holmes has been directing his own movies for more than 20 years as an independent filmmaker, having also worked with an animation company for more than a decade.
Some of his other films include Twin Rivers and The Legend of Ben Hall, which featured at multiple foreign film festivals and have won multiple awards.
He has also recently finished a film The Cost which was released this year.