Neil Chase | Leading the Resurgence of True Independent Cinema

The Canadian-based filmmaker talks about his feature film debut, "Spin the Wheel," true diversity in movie-making, and launching a studio during COVID.

When you look at the credits for the upcoming film, “Spin the Wheel,” you will notice Neil Chase’s name appears in many of the categories. Chase serves as co-director, writer, editor, visual effects co-creator, casting co-director, and he also stars in the film as the smooth-talking, devilish salesman named Lou. But there are also other names that serve in multiple roles, including his co-director David (Dave) Heacock and producer Preston Ewasiuk.

“Everybody did multiple things in order to get the best film we could with the resources we had. As for myself, I don’t know; it was just a culmination of things. I wrote the script. After writing it, I had this long discussion with Dave and Preston about who should direct it. Dave and I decided we’d both like to tackle that job mainly because there was this push for me to play Lou. I knew if I was spending time in front of the camera, things might get missed behind the camera.”

With both Heacock and Chase stepping into the director chair and splitting their time in that role, they were able to tackle different parts of the film. Chase focused more on capturing the story and the actors, he said, while Heacock focused on the cinematography and other technical aspects of the film. Both filmmakers had previously worked together on a short film called “Boneyard Racers.”

“We came up with this wonderful system where Dave really took over on that side of things when I was in front of the camera. Then, when I was behind the camera, I could put my two cents in on the directing side.”

While Chase has already previously established himself as a writer and actor, “Spin the Wheel” is a first for him in many regards. It’s the first film he’s directed, edited, and assisted with coloring and visual effects, among other things. When he was originally writing the screenplay, Chase did not have the initial intention of playing Lou, he noted.

“I actually had no idea that I would have a hand in making this film. I really just wrote the screenplay because I wanted to write the story. It was only after we made ‘Boneyard Racers,’ and we found a fair bit of success with that short [film]. We were looking at what should be the next thing that we do. And it occurred to me, ‘Wait a minute. I’ve got this one script in my back pocket that I wrote for a single location for a small cast and crew. It’s tailor-made for a low-budget production.’ And that was the first time it even occurred to me that I could actually be one of the characters in this.”

Chase is one of the co-founders of the production company Brimstone Pictures, which is focused on telling stories from multiple genres, including science fiction, horror, and drama. Both “Boneyard Racers” and “Spin the Wheel” have supernatural angles, as Chase describes it, but both projects are also “completely separate beasts.”

“That’s one of the things at Brimstone we want to become known for – telling genre stories. We love the idea of action and horror and science fiction telling these great types of stories. That’s our driving function.”

Chase has worked on other projects for studios and television networks, prior to launching Brimstone Pictures. His goal with the production company is to have the creative freedom to make movies the way he wants to be able to make them and not have much interference that usually comes with bigger projects, he said.

“I think there’s a wonderful freedom to making independent film, truly independent film, where you realize the only lanes are the ones I established for myself. And it’s really great, because then it becomes a much more collaborative process, a much more open one. We had a mantra onset where we wanted people to have creative freedom here. If an actor said to me, ‘I don’t think I would say this line like this,’ I would say, ‘Let’s talk. Tell me what you’re thinking.’ That’s how you get those little moments of gold, where somebody comes up with something that’s even better than what you wrote, or you intended. And I love stuff like that.”

Brimstone Pictures was founded in 2020, when COVID regulations forced all film and television production to cease in Alberta, Canada, where Chase resides. But Chase and his team were able to find creative ways to make something, even if it was a smaller production. One of the first projects they did was “Babageddon,” which was filmed in a single weekend.

“We just got together with a group of people, and we did that over a single weekend. We had so much fun doing it that it spun into ‘Boneyard Racers,’ which was really the genesis of Brimstone. We really put our heads together, and it was an outdoor only shoot because of the restrictions that were in place.”

There seems to be a shift in the current entertainment industry that focuses more on the marquee names that can be acquired for a film, the type of CGI that can be used, and how the set pieces look, Chase added, and that the story-telling element doesn’t get as much attention. What he is hoping his company will do is bring the focus back to telling good stories in different genres.

“I would love to be part of this resurgence in the industry of bringing good stories back to film. There are so many great writers out there, so many great filmmakers making great stories. I feel a lot of them aren’t give the opportunity to do so in today’s landscape, just because that’s not where the focus is.”

Chase also feels that a lot of what is deemed indie these days can’t be considered true independent films. The 1990s saw filmmakers such as Kevin Smith, Robert Rodriguez, and Quentin Tarantino making films for a few thousand dollars before they were given bigger budgets to showcase what they could do with them. Since then, that style has changed, and Chase doesn’t think it doesn’t truly represent what independent cinema once was.

“A lot of it is, basically, a studio film done under an indie label. To call that an indie film if you have a big name, A-list star, and you’ve got a multimillion-dollar budget with all of these bells and whistles, how indie is that? The things we’re doing is true indie. We’re making movies with nothing more than a small group of people that can bring their individual skill sets to something and trying to make something that’s of value.”

The shift in independent cinema could be a result of some of the requirements from certain film festivals, Chase added.

“They’ve become much more mainstream and, in doing so, they’re kind of a disservice to truly independent film. I would also take that a step further and talk about what I see as the gatekeeping in place with a lot of festivals these days. It seems like the messaging of the film takes precedence over the content of the films. There’s a lot more emphasis on, ‘Who made this film?’ ‘What identity do they belong to?’ ‘What check boxes do they fill?’ And, in my mind, what the hell does any of that have to do with the movie?”

Chase is not against diversity in a film, and he mentioned how proud he was of the people he attracted to help make “Spin the Wheel.”

“We have true diversity in this film on every level. We have people of all nationalities, all backgrounds, orientations, viewpoints, all of that stuff. I think we have true diversity, but it came from a very organic way. We did casting calls for the best actors we could find for the roles and the best crew members we could find for the positions, and we just went with those people. It just so happened, in the end of everything, it’s like, ‘Oh, my gosh, look at this wonderful collection of people we have working on this.’ To me, that’s how you achieve true diversity.”

“Spin the Wheel” is the first feature film to be released by Brimstone Pictures and had a budget of $25,000, which, Chase noted, is a small amount in comparison to what a lot of bigger-budgeted features get.

“There are most films that have a coffee budget bigger than that. The fact that we were able to pull off an entire film for that speaks volumes to it.”

The movie takes place on the eve of the Apocalypse. The story focuses on a group of strangers who are stuck in a bar with a man named Lou (Chase), who claims to be the Devil. He challenges them to a game of Russian Roulette, with the promise that, if they play and win, the apocalypse will be undone.

Chase noted that, as an avid fan of disaster movies since he was a child, he wanted to take a different approach to the genre.

“Usually, the world is ending, or there’s some kind of big thing, and you see these people doing these great, big, heroic things. I was watching one of these films, I can’t remember which one exactly, and it occurred to me, when these world-ending films are happening, we’re usually following the hero who travels across the globe and doing these phenomenal things. I thought to myself, ‘What are the other 99% of the world doing in those moments?’ That was sort of the genesis for the story.”

When Chase discovered how he wanted to angle his story, the next thing he did was approach those he knew, and he asked them all the same question.

“I said, ‘If you knew the world was going to end tomorrow, what would you do?’ And every single one of them said, ‘I would spend time with my loved ones. I would be with friends or family.’”

Chase then challenged them all to think of what they would do if they could not be with their loved ones if the world was coming to an end. And almost every one of them had the same response to his follow-up question, he said.

“They said, ‘I’d find the nearest bar, and I’d get drunk.’ And I thought that was a hilarious answer and that was what kind of started the script. I started writing this literally from the point of view of this little motley group of people who have no one to spend the end of the world with. They’re alone for one reason or another. They all end up at this little dive bar in the middle of the city and wait out the end of the world.”

With the supernatural twist thrown in, Chase noted that “Spin the Wheel” also serves as a morality tale.

“At the end of the day, when the chips are down, what do you hang onto? Is there anything worth hanging onto anymore? I’m the type of person where I like to think that, as bad as any situation is, the one thing we should never lose is hope. Because it really can do miracles.”

The focus of the film is on what the characters do during this situation in the last 90 minutes of the world. Chase said those 90 minutes are mostly told in real time, which proved to be a challenge considering the limited access he and the rest of the crew had to the bar in which they filmed.

“We didn’t film this in a continuous, say, two weeks. We only had access to the bar on Sunday nights and, I believe, Monday nights, because it was closed for those two days, and those were our filming days. Our 14-day film schedule was just consecutive weekends. That’s a big challenge, because, when you spread it out over that much time, you really have to be careful in terms of continuity. You always want to keep a level of consistency, and that is challenging when you have a five-day break in between each set of shooting days.”

To make it less challenging for everyone involved, Chase said there was a lot of pre-planning and scheduling done in advance. This way, when they went on set on the filming days, everything would go smoothly, and they could avoid having to work 14-to-16-hour days, which is usually the normal schedule for feature films.

“I think that’s where we really succeeded. Just about every single shooting day, we wrapped early, which we were really happy with that. It’s a nice feeling as an actor and as a crew member to be told, ‘Hey, you know what? We can wrap an hour early.’ Everybody loved that. We did it as much as we could, and it really kept people’s spirits up.”

Chase also commended the people involved for their hard work during the making of “Spin the Wheel.”

“I can’t say enough great things about the people that worked on this. Everybody just poured their hearts and souls into it.”

“Spin the Wheel” will release to numerous streaming VOD platforms on May 14. In Canda, the film will be available on Apple TV, Amazon Prime Video, Google Play, Bell VOD, Rogers/Shaw VOD, and Vimeo VOD. In the U.S., the film will be available on Amazon Prime Video and will release to additional platforms in the coming weeks.

To learn more about Neil, be sure to visit his official website.