Guelph screenwriter Steve Duncan knows a secret that could make you rich. All you have to do is watch his movie.
“The concept is you watch the movie, you solve the mystery within the movie and you have the chance to win the prize of $250,000,” said Duncan. “It’s never been done before. It is a concept I came up with about 10 years ago.”
The idea fermented in Duncan’s head for about four years until he met his business partner John Coniglio, founder of local film company Digital Goo Productions.
“We discussed putting pen to paper and making this thing happen,” said Duncan. “Fast forward to two short years ago. I wrote the movie in about a year and a couple months later we were filming.”
The film is aptly named Money and without giving too much away follows the experiences of a young man Ryan and his girlfriend Amber played by Toronto actors Marcus Haccius and Chandler Loryn. Things go wrong for Ryan when he gambles with the wrong crowd.
“It is a legitimate movie,” said Duncan. “Some people may look at it as a gimmick but you can comfortably watch the movie without knowing about the concept behind it and it is an enjoyable movie to watch."
Duncan grew up in Guelph and has a degree in journalism and communications from Mohawk College. Money is his first screenplay and many of the scenes were written with specific Guelph locations in mind.
“There were a few scenes shot in Puslinch and scenes in the restaurant were shot in Burlington but I’d say 90 per cent of it was shot in Guelph,” said Duncan. “We used different locations like the covered bridge and Opus Lounge. We shot a lot of our underground poker scenes there.”
One scene shot at the Palace Nightclub in November 2014 featured 300 extras from Guelph.
“The entire film was shot in three weeks with no retakes,” he said. “Post-production took about a year.”
No one in the cast or crew, including director Jason Armstrong, knew about the mystery question concept while the film was being shot.
“People were wondering why I, the screenplay writer, was always on set,” said Duncan. “If I didn’t see it the way I needed it to be I had to point that out to my director. It would be arrogant of me to think I have written a perfect movie but at the same time nothing can be changed.”
The question is revealed at the end of the film but maintaining absolute secrecy about the clues and the winning answer is vital.
“John and I are the only two people that know the answer to the question,” said Duncan.
“When we do eventually sell this movie to a distributor, they are going to want to know who knows the answer because things can leak so easily. We decided the easiest thing is for us to keep it to ourselves.”
The cast and crew are the only people Duncan and Coniglio have shown the finished film to but they have clips on their website, TheMoneyMovie2016.com, and have shopped it around to distributors in Los Angeles and New York.
“That is John’s thing,” said Duncan. “I created the movie and John is the producer pounding the pavement trying to sell the product.”
They are hoping to get the film in theatres before the end of the year and get started on their next project.
“My focus is selling this one right now but I definitely have others in mind,” said Duncan. “It won’t be a sequel to this but it will be the same concept.”
