Three Ninety Five
The world has gone quiet. With no home and no memory, a nameless traveler searches for fellow survivors along a remote highway.
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Nicholas ThurkettleDirectorR&R, The Dinner Scene, The Retriever
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Nicholas ThurkettleWriterChildren of Ether, R&R, The Dinner Scene, The Retriever
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Nicholas ThurkettleProducerA Ghost Waits, R&R, The Dinner Scene, The Retriever
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Elizabeth SerraProducerSkin Deep, A Made Bed
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Nikki Nina NguyenKey Cast"Three Ninety Five"
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Project Type:Short
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Genres:Sci-Fi, Drama
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Runtime:6 minutes 58 seconds
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Completion Date:March 16, 2022
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Production Budget:3,000 USD
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Country of Origin:United States
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Country of Filming:United States
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Shooting Format:4K Digital
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Aspect Ratio:1.85:1
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Film Color:Color
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First-time Filmmaker:No
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Student Project:No
Nicholas Thurkettle’s short films have played over 50 worldwide film festivals, winning awards including Best Director and People’s Choice – Best Short Film. He also directed the web series pilot “Ass In Assassin” and the music video “Sitting on the Launchpad” for the band Freefall Rescue. A WGA screenwriter, he sold the comedy Queen Lara to Room 9 Entertainment (Thank You For Smoking,) optioned the thriller 7 Red and the comedy Sir Sandy to producers, and collaborated with director Antonio Negret (“Arrow”, “Lethal Weapon”,) on the action thriller Under the Knife. He wrote the sci-fi anime “Children of Ether” for the Crunchyroll Network, which debuted on over 300 U.S. movie screens.
He co-produced the award-winning horror/romance feature A Ghost Waits from director Adam Stovall, now distributed by Arrow Video and streaming on Shudder, and produced the horror film The Buildout from writer/director Zeshaan Younus. He is the co-author (with MF Thomas) of two sci-fi/thriller novels – Seeing by Moonlight and A Sickness in Time, and author of the short story collection Stages of Sleep. He spent five years as a short film programmer for the Newport Beach Film Festival, and regularly consults with other filmmakers on their own festival submission strategies.
People often ask “Where do your ideas come from?” And the truth is I still don’t know, but I’ve improved at tricking them out of wherever they hide. In college I carried a second major in music, and I never tired of feeling out unusual chords and chord progressions on the piano, asking “how do these notes together make me feel?” I’m still doing a version of that – looking for the unexpected resonance between elements, the path to a feeling that surprises you.
My life-long fascination with the line between humanity and artificiality, the landscapes of inland California that can look so astounding and so alien, the mythology of energy currents in nature, and yes, music as the key to it all…these elements combined struck a feeling in me I wanted to share; and as I described it to people, I saw in their excitement that this story had the potential to create that same feeling on the screen.
I believe filmmaking needs to have an element of adventure to it. There has to be something about a movie that you’re not quite sure how you’ll pull off yet. Venturing forth, three of us in one SUV, exploring for three days, setting up shots anywhere whose vistas captivated us, was one of the most challenging filmmaking adventures I have yet enjoyed.
To me, Three Ninety Five is about the mystery of what keeps us going when hope doesn’t reveal itself; and about the qualities that I think will save humanity in our darkest times - even if the character who shows us the way isn’t 100% human.