Synopsis
When you’re one of the last human combat medics, underfunded and unappreciated for decades in a galactic war, you don’t always follow orders. So when Doc (Andrew Bowen) and Asher (John Asher) discover that command has abandoned a pair of injured soldiers on an alien planet, they concoct a risky and unauthorized plan to save them. The heroic but poorly conceived rescue doesn’t go quite the way they hoped, sending Doc and the soldiers (Lauren McFall and Taj Speights) on a wild and bumpy ride none of them expected.
About the Film
THE 716TH marks the exciting directorial debut by actor Andrew Bowen and the small group of talented artists who helped him bring this hugely entertaining science-fiction adventure to life!
Written, produced, edited, starring and directed by Bowen, the short film is the result of over a year and a half that he and his small team dedicated to realizing his ambitiously scoped sci-fi universe with a production budget of only 10K (12K total). With those budget constraints, Bowen also had to serve as the shorts production designer, drawing storyboards and building the films props in his garage and spending nights over the course of two months constructing the shuttle set with producer and friend John Maclay.
The short films combination of high energy, endearing characters, laugh-out-loud moments and impressive visual effects (lead by VFX supervisor/producer Jonathan Alvord whose 5 member team produced over 100 VFX shots) landed it at The Tribeca Film Festival where it world premiered in 2018. The shorts overwhelmingly positive audience and critic response at Tribeca led to it’s release on Amazon Prime Video in November – where it’s been tracking a 5 OUT OF 5 STAR Customer Rating (and a “9 out of 10” on iMDB). The short was also recently named “Best live-action sci-fi short” by the Solzy Awards.
