Local film company -223 entered their very first movie in the NVISION Latino Film and Music Festival last fall.
That film, a 13-minute short named The Ranch, won Best Local Film honors.
Winning the award was a confidence-booster for partners Aiden Gonzalez, Ian Lopez and Antonio Gonzales. They had previously produced a couple of music videos for local musicians, but nothing on the scale of The Ranch. They shot the film entirely on location in Coachella and funded it themselves. Aiden wrote and directed, with Antonio credited as director of photography, and Ian as 1st AC (assistant camera).
“It’s never really stated in the film—but obviously, it’s where we are,” Aiden said. “… All of us grew up here, I would say, second generation. Our parents grew up here for the most part, and I have a lot of history here. … Back in the day, Palm Springs was the happening (place) during the Golden Age of Hollywood, and we’ve just been known (recently) for the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival. I mean, I grew up and still live about three minutes away from the Polo Fields. … I really like the culture that we have here and the community that’s within the valley.”
Aiden describes The Ranch thusly: “This film centers on a grandson’s dilemma of whether to sell his dying grandfather’s land that he grew up on, whether he should sell it and pursue his own path, or take up his grandfather’s mantle and run the ranch himself.”
The story grew out of a real-life situation. When he was 17, Aiden spent time caring for his mother, who died from cancer.
“It’s not autobiographical,” Aiden said. “I did draw from my life a bit, like, for instance, my grandfather, he’s still alive, but he does own the property that I’ve lived on my entire life.”
During the pandemic, Aiden, Antonio and Ian hunkered down and binged films. They discovered they shared a passion for great filmmaking; they enjoyed dissecting what they watched to learn what makes a good story good. They studied the greats and didn’t let the fact that they are entirely self-taught be an obstacle.
“We watched movies a lot,” Aiden said. “Watching YouTube, you know, they say when you copy someone, that’s the biggest compliment. Obviously, we don’t want to plagiarize, but you take techniques; you take compositions. When we were in pre-production for the film, I was texting Antonio and Ian a bunch of old Renaissance paintings. It’s such a great resource to just mimic their composition, because that’s one of those things where the average viewer doesn’t really think about it, but it does play an important role.”
One of Ian’s photos became the poster shot for The Ranch. He said he looks for ideas from music videos that he can incorporate into his photography.
“I draw a lot of inspiration from certain directors of music videos—not necessarily big-time movie directors,” Ian said. “You have such a little time in music, maybe a three-minute or four-minute song, to make sure every scene looks pretty. When you’re taking a photo, you’re capturing the moment and kind of making it last forever. … That’s the way I learned—just YouTube and drawing inspiration from shots that I think look nice, and trying to put my own twist on it.”
The trio has found creative ways to get around high production costs. Shoots are scheduled around their day jobs. They work with a small group of dedicated friends and family, and they shoot in the daytime—lighting gear is not quite in the budget just yet. Antonio said finding a way to make things work is part of the adventure.
“So, Ian’s in nursing school,” Antonio said, “Aiden works for a hospital; I work at a gym, and yeah, that’s just things to keep us afloat. Aiden’s more on the writing end, but visually for me, I’ve just always loved watching movies and trying to piece together how they light this scene, or why this looks that way. This is something I’m super-passionate about, and getting to work together with Aiden, on as limited of a budget as we had, to try to make something that looks beautiful, with basically zero lighting and just access to sunlight—you know, that was fun.”
They recently submitted The Ranch, which can now be viewed on Vimeo, to the Palm Springs International Shortfest. While they wait for word on whether it will be accepted to the Oscar-qualifying festival, they are in pre-production for their next film. The working title: Que? No Puedes? (In English: What? You Can’t?)
“I’m in the process of writing it, and we’ve all been kind of brainstorming the film itself,” Aiden said. “The gist of it is, a Hispanic Latino kid, who doesn’t speak Spanish, lives in a predominantly Spanish area. A lot of the people he interacts with are Latino as well and speak Spanish. It’s kind of a commentary and a little slice of life on how that affects his life and his relationship with his parents, his friends and his neighborhood.”
They are in pre-production for their next film. The working title: Que? No Puedes? (In English: What? You Can’t?)
They hope to have Que? No Puedes? wrapped by early spring. Their focus going forward is producing budget-friendly short films and getting -223’s name out in the market. They intend to eventually get into grant writing or finding outside producers to expand.
“We do have two feature films already written and ready to go,” Aiden said. “… We still want to gain more experience, and hopefully have some type of budget to work with on those ones. All of our gear is owned by us. In the future, we might have to rent some stuff, but that’s not too expensive. We’re hoping, at some point, we can get some extra funding for one of our films.”
Their friendship, they said, helps keep tensions low and creative visions flowing. They trade out ideas and roles and collaborate at every step of the process. They say the learning curve is not so much a challenge; it’s actually the best part of their process at -223.
“Because we’re so tight knit, we’re willing to share labels or credits or whatever the case is, depending on who worked on what,” Aiden said. “And Antonio and Ian won’t hesitate to tell me when something sounds stupid, or when something looks dumb. Whoever has an idea, they’ll take the lead in that way. It’s just ended up in the past that I had more time to write. But, depending on the project and who wants to head it, none of us feel uncomfortable taking the backseat and supporting the vision.”
Said Antonio: “We’re all keeping each other accountable. One person might have one idea, and then you bounce it off the other two and have complete trust that they’re going to tell you whether or not they think it’s a good idea.”
For more information, visit www.instagram.com/223visuals.
Edited on Feb. 21 to change the film company name from 223 Visuals to -223 at the company’s request.
