The Great Ape - MA Film Project

About the film

Late at night, a vampiric figure stalks the streets, putting up mysterious posters challenging local wrestlers to attempt to defeat the unbeatable "GREAT APE"...

The film follows Kat, a young woman struggling to make ends meet and keep herself and her wrestling-loving brother Jack afloat. When Jack's valuable family heirloom is stolen by a shady wrestling promoter, Kat must enter a local tournament and beat the animalistic and undefeated champion “The Great Ape” to win it back. In creating a wrestling persona to compete, Kat channels a previously suppressed, more fearless side of herself in order to reclaim what is rightfully hers. 

The Great Ape is a love letter to kayfabe wrestling, community, childhood imagination, and all the wonderful weirdos who never stopped pursuing their passions.

What we need

In order to create the wonderful world of The Great Ape, we need your help. As our final project at MA level, we are all dedicated to making a film that reflects everything we've learned in the past year, and to make something we're proud of. This includes casting amazing actors who we can pay expenses for, creating wonderful costumes for our wrestler characters, and getting access to amazing locations that suit our requirements. The key areas our funding will go towards are:

• Production design, £200 - Due to the setting and fantastical elements of the film, production design is very important to its overall look and feel. From wrestling costumes, to blanket forts, to mysterious carnival-style posters, production design plays a key role in much of the plot and themes of The Great Ape, so we want to make sure we can dedicate a decent chunk of the budget to it.

• Catering, £75 - The hard work of our cast crew should be rewarded with more than a sad ham sandwich! To support the amazing people working with us, we want to be able to provide meals, snacks and drinks on set without worrying about costs.
• Transport/accommodation, £300 - To ensure that our cast and crew who don't live locally can get to set.
• Festival submissions, £100 - With your donations, we hope to make the best film we can, and to submit it to film festivals around the UK would be incredible.
• Contingency, £100 - In the event of reshoots, pickups, additional requirements or anything else we didn't see coming, we want to ensure we're covered. If this isn't required, it will be allocated to marketing.

We are initially aiming to raise £700 to cover the majority of the costs of production - the rest of which will be covered by the core crew members.

Perks

To thank you for your generous donations, we are offering a range of perks for different amounts, including:

• A"thank you" in the credits of the film
• A printable poster
• A postcard from the crew
• A high-quality poster signed by the cast and crew
• An "executive producer" credit

Impact

Your donations will allow us to put everything we've learned on our MA course to the test, and create a film we can be truly proud of. We hope to submit The Great Ape to festivals, and with your contributions, we can make this a reality. We appreciate any and all donations, no matter the amount, and hope you're all as excited about this project as we are!

Crew

Hello, my name is Daniel Cook, and I'm the director of The Great Ape. I am best known for my work in documentary film, most notably directing Monkey Business (2022), which explored widespread misconceptions about primates. After transitioning to cinematography for a wrestling-themed documentary, I considered combining two of my most valuable projects. We're here now, and I'm thrilled to watch everything come together. 

Hi, I'm Elliot Fox and I'm the producer of The Great Ape. Having produced a variety of different projects, both student and independent, and successfully crowdfunding my undergraduate final project last year, I feel ready to take on the challenges of this film. I am excited by its heartwarming story, ambitious production design, and unique style, and can't wait to bring this film to life.

Hi, I'm Farah Sadek and I'm the DOP for The Great 
Ape. I have previously shot my own documentary, Please Don't Tap on the Glass and I helped shoot Off The Ropes; both of these helped me develop my technical shooting skills. Shooting in vastly different environments like a cat cafe and wrestling ring helped me learn how to utilise my skills and curate them for each project. I know The Great Ape will be another great adventure and I'm looking forward to experimenting with shooting and lighting fiction, which would be an exciting challenge for me to take on.

Hi, I’m Kalon Torr and I’ll be the head of sound for The Great Ape. I love being able to express my desire to tell stories through sound. I’ve worked with sound multiple times in the past, most recently with The Halloween Special, where I got to try out loads of fun techniques during the editing process. I want to constantly push myself to be the best I can as well as to learn new and exciting techniques in filmmaking. I can’t wait to apply my training to this film and to bring the sound design to a standard of which I can be truly proud.