Ex-Rental (Feature film)
Ex-Rental - A warm, funny, analogue‑soaked story of lost loves, rediscovered tapes, buried grief, and the healing power of cinema, music, and creativity itself.
A once‑promising singer‑songwriter chasing a romantic ideal returns to his hometown, only to meet a sharp‑witted filmmaker who pulls him into a nostalgic trip through old tapes, new songs, awkward memories, and the faded world of video shops. Together they discover that the stories they tell — and the films they love — are never quite as they remembered.
We are in the final stretch of shooting our no-budget, Bristol-based feature, Ex Rental, and we need your help to finish and return the film to the video shop on time. Over the last three years, we've exhausted our resources, and the final push is proving very difficult.
Paul and I met at university in the mid‑90s studying film. Twenty‑five years later, I'm still chasing music, and he's still chasing his first feature. Three years ago, we hit a now‑or‑never moment, raised £2,500, and started shooting. The money went quickly, but we kept going — helped by generous friends and a story that means the world to us.
We’re filming in the village where Paul grew up: the old video shop units, the parks, his old home - all woven into a story about why people hold onto dreams, how art, for good and bad, can shape our identity, and how creating it can help us heal. Despite the tiny budget and a crew of two, we’re aiming to create the kind of cinema we love to watch, with as much attention paid to the audio and visuals as to the character work.
So far, we have shot 80 percent of the film and have a rough cut standing at 70 mins, and now we are looking for a couple more actors to help us finish the rest of the film.
SONG SAMPLES:
We've also been having a lot of fun creating songs that our lead character wrote way back in the 90's as an angry and confused teen. Here's an advert for a crowdfunding perk that will be running in the lead-up to production:
Jules is fun, responsible, and social. She loves people and the community around her.
Back in '04 when she was 26 she decided to stay in her hometown ending her relationship. Her Ex, the film's protagonist, left to pursue his creative dreams while Jules, an equally talented musician, couldn't see a future in it and chose a more settled, stable life.
While the character only features in 2 scenes she is pivotal to the story. At the mid-point of the story she meets with Guy, the first physical encounter since he left 20 years earlier. That meeting has a lasting impact on the two of them.
Ideally, we would like to find someone who can, like Jules, play guitar and sing. The story includes a song she wrote about Guy which we need to record.
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