An Industry Case Study
Narrative | Dramatic Features
Film Name: Sad Orangutans Rob a Bank
Genre: Comedy
Date: July 2019
Director: Grant Raun
Producer: Sam Frickleton, Stephanie Furtun and Alanna Field Hoffman
Writer: Grant Raun
Cinematographer: Jacob Harbour
Editor: Grant Raun
Production Company: Student film from USC
Budget: $20,000+
Financing: Crowdfunded, student, and self financed
Shooting Format: RED
Screening Format: 1080 ProRes
World Premiere: Nót Film Festival
Awards: NA
Website: NA
The Official Trailer for Sad Orangutans Rob a Bank
Watch The Trailer for Sad Orangutans Rob a Bank directed by Grant Raun
A Short Biography of Grant Raun
Grant Raun is an editor and director interested in making things that look as weird as life feels. Grant Raun is an alumni of Rice University, USC School of Cinematic Arts, and Google Creative Lab.
The Grant Raun Interview
indieactivity: What is your film about?
Grant Raun (GR): It’s about a guy (orangutan) who comes to a moment where he’s about to realize that he has to do the hardest thing there is to do — which is work on yourself — and instead he pivots as hard as he can into something as out there as he can possibly imagine.
Walden, the main character, is the version of me that I’m scared everyone else sees. I’m scared I’m actually some bumbling creature who is pursuing film in order to distract himself from his real issues, and that everyone knows it but me. Anyway, it’s a comedy.
Tell us about the festival run, marketing and sales?
Grant Raun (GR): Sad Oranges debuted at Nót Film Festival in Italy, had it’s US debut at Brainwash Drive-In/Bike-In/Walk-In Movie Festival, and is just wrapping up HollyShorts. It was nominated for Best Comedy at USC’s First Look awards in March.
Give the full Official Synopsis for your film?
Grant Raun (GR): A tragi-comic caper about three orangutans (this is a talking-animals-and-humans-living-in-harmony kind of world) setting out to rob a bank (they don’t need the money) as an escape from their persistent ennui (they’re very sad).
Development & Financing?
Grant Raun (GR): I had this writing assignment due the day after Trump was elected in 2016: write 5 one sentence pitches for short films. It was my first semester of film school and I had been up until like 3AM watching the results come in, feeling very bad about them, and prepping a short film to shoot later that week. So, instead of doing the assignment, I just wrote 5 jokes. One of the jokes, “Sad Orangutans Rob a Bank,” just stuck around in my head. About a year later I realized they weren’t robbing the bank for the money, and I wrote the script.
I showed it to a few friends who were also in the program, and I was surprised by the response I got. I thought it was just going to be sort of a funny thing that I had written, but I could tell the energy was there to actually make it. Once the thought took hold that I could actually see this thing, I had to make it. So I did some research into prosthetics and realized the budget was actually workable. Once we had a core crew together, we decided to do it as our thesis film (it was also my producer’s thesis and my DP’s thesis). From there financing was a combination of crowdfunding, working the USC system and self-funding.
Production?
Grant Raun (GR): The real start of production was the makeup test, where we realized the prosthetic we had designed wasn’t going to work. In hindsight it was inevitable that the first draft of the prosthetic wasn’t going to land — the first draft of everything doesn’t land — but at the time it felt like a major crisis. The original design was sort of a direct combination between an orang’s face and a human’s face, and we tweaked it to be more like orangutan translated to chimp translated to human. After all, these orangutans talked and drank Matcha at cafes — I don’t think anyone was expecting to them to be particularly accurate. We also decided to make the skin itself orange, which I think adds a level of cuteness that’s really helpful for the film. I can’t claim much of the success for the final design, by the way, our makeup artist, Delaney McIntyre, really got the script and the story in such a way that she understood what we were going for even when I was stumbling around for exact descriptions of the masks.
We landed our biggest location, the biggest location, the bank, thanks to a city of LA student discount. Budget wise, we needed a break like that, and we got it. The building is actually the LA Department of Water and Power, but since shooting there I’ve realized it’s in tons of movies. Most notably it’s the building in the deepest level of Inception. Once the bank was in place the rest of the locations were easy to fill around.
We rehearsed on a stage at USC. I knew we weren’t going to have much time on set (the prosthetics take 3 hours to get on and 1 to take off), so I wanted to have everything set out beforehand.
We shot over spring break. Like any production we had our bumps, but we had over prepared, and were never in serious danger of losing an important shot. So, while I remember a lot of stuff from the shoot, there aren’t a lot of war stories. The dumbed thing I remember is eating a lollipop on our busiest day. It was the day we shot most of the bank robbery and had by far the most people, and whatever was in the lollipop turned my mouth and lips electric blue. Like nearly clown makeup. I didn’t think it was that bad so I didn’t want to stop shooting to wash up, but you can go back in BTS photos and see which ones were from that day just by looking. Anyway, very grateful to the entire crew for just accepting that’s who I am.
One more thing that sticks out now that I’m looking back was what a blast we had putting the finishing touches on the film. All of the phone noises are my producer’s voice pitched up and around. The rideshare app they use is called “Swing!” and features a little cartoon monkey on a vine. One of the best jokes in the film “I didn’t know it was a picture of a bank. I just thought it was a cool picture,” came from ADR. This was the first time I actually got to like to sit with a composer and work on stuff, and the way Sara was able to translate my basically one note “get weirder” into an entire soundscape.
Overall it was a surreal, validating experience. There’s stuff I’d want back but I’m really proud of the film we made.
Festival Preparation & Strategy?
GR: We basically had a meeting with the industry relations people at USC, who were very supportive, and helped us pick out some festivals. Then halfway through our first round of submissions there was this big virus (maybe you’ve heard of it), and somehow we’re still in festival season?
The Release?
GR: It’s been to a few festivals. Hopefully it’ll see some more festival time. If that happens and no one pays us a bunch of (read: literally any) money for it, we’ll try to put it up online. USC technically owns the copyright so at the end of the day it’s up to them.
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