Fan-made films are, understandably, a bit of a mixed bag.
Just because the passion and the love for the source material is there, it doesn’t mean the end result is always going to turn out great. Most of the time this is due to budgetary constraints, as the fans behind these films are usually self-funded.
More often than not, fan-made films are either forgettable or just straight up terrible. I won’t name any names, because the people behind these projects aren’t professionals and are usually working on shoestring budgets.
Sometimes they do have decent funding behind them though, in which case they may deserve some of the ire they receive (*cough cough* Spider-Man: Lotus *cough cough*)
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Once in a blue moon though, fans manage to produce something truly incredible.
One of the first projects Dan Trachtenberg released was the incredible fan-film Portal: No Escape, and he would later go on to direct both Prey and 10 Cloverfield Lane - two incredibly well-received, big-budget Hollywood films.
Probably the most well-known fan-film of the last decade is DARTH MAUL: Apprentice, which helped launch the career of one of Hollywood’s best stuntmen: Vi-Dan Tran.
Tran has since gone on to work on Into the Badlands, both of Denis Villeneuve’s Dune films, and Marvel’s Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings.
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Now, it’s Cyberpunk 2077’s turn - and thankfully, this one falls into the latter, incredible camp of fan-made films and not the terrible, no-good side where Spider-Man: Lotus belongs.
Cyberpunk Edgerunners: Rookie Move is based on the Netflix show of the same name, and is set just before its fourth episode.
The project was organised by its main star Cameron Rankin who plays David, and also stars Erica Hau as Lucyna and Danny Yang as Daiki.
The short film was partially funded through GoFundMe donations, and the donation page is still live if you fancy supporting the team’s future projects. The entire project is not for profit and the team is planning to release all of their upcoming shorts for free.
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The general response to the film (especially in the Reddit post announcing its release) has been deservedly positive, but one specific shout-out definitely towers above the rest.
CD Projekt Red’s Associate Game Director Paweł Sasko gave the team behind the film some love on Twitter, stating “Hats off chooms, what a fun production! Thank you for your passion”.
Here’s hoping we hear more from the team behind Cyberpunk Edgerunners: Rookie Move in the future, because, based on the quality of this project, their careers are looking bright.
And as the talent behind both Portal: No Escape and DARTH MAUL: Apprentice has proven, sometimes a fan-made project can lead to huge Hollywood success.
Topics: Cyberpunk 2077, CD Projekt Red