In the near future, the shared economy dominates every industry

In the near future, the shared economy dominates every industry. You can order literally anything through the swipe of an app. When Chase, a freelance paramedic on the platform, witnesses another casualty, he’s all but ready to quit. But when the support centre promises a paid vacation on the horizon, he takes one last job that forces him to make a perilous decision. Freelancer comes from award winning Canadian filmmaker Zach Ramelan.

Then it clicked! What if the paramedic’s work was done through an app LIKE UBER?

For years I wanted to create genre/thriller focused on for hire paramedic who takes on shady nightshift jobs to makes ends meet. Think of the movie Drive meets the TV show House. Despite it being a fresh concept, the narrative didn’t sit with me; there was no creative hook that reeled me in as a storyteller. Then it clicked! What if the paramedic’s work was done through an app LIKE UBER? Working as a freelance filmmaker for the past ten years, I’ve longed for an app that I could simply open and find jobs with a single tap. As that idea grew, I began to think more about how this concept would work on a much larger scale and how well it would weave into the story of the paramedic.

The fun thing about Freelancer is that it kept things simple. The story didn’t need to go into deep sci-fi territory, but rather attached itself to themes that are relevant today. The film was shot in only 3 locations with a small budget of $5000. Zach also relied on neat camera and lighting tricks to bring the film up to the highest standards (Watch the Behind the Scenes below).

I asked myself: What if all jobs in the world were done through an APP?

As a creative, I’ve found that the problems of an idea are usually the best part! We just need to find the right tool to carve out the diamonds. The entire conceptual process of Freelancer contained many trips back and forth to the drawing board. Experimenting with nearly every single idea imaginable. From a Freelance police force to Freelance convince store clerks. Since the universe of Freelancer is so ambitious and also very close to my heart, it took over a year to land the RIGHT narrative.

Me and Neal Scheider (the writer) strived to make a short that was both entertaining and eye-opening.
Since we live in a world where singled handed technology is only consuming more and more of our daily lives, we felt it was an important theme to include deep in the story. That’s why the motivation behind the film is equally balanced between making a compelling narrative and opening the curtain on a darker (future) society that is even more reliant on app-based technology.

Hope ya’ll enjoyed it JUST as much as I did making it (;

Now let’s make this into a series!

Learn how Zach directed and created Freelancer on a pocket sized budget at Pocket FIlm School.