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YANKEE OTAGO

Here are some pics to give you a sense of the fucking majestic landscapes of the Otago region of New Zealand, where Yankee Otago is set.

I didn’t want to bog down the read by trying to convey how much glorious production value can be put on screen by just setting up a camera and letting Mother Nature do her job. So feast your peepers below.

Synopsis

If you’re writing coverage, I figured I’d save you some time and write up a synopsis for you. This is about two pages, a little over 900 words. Take whatever’s useful and change whatever you need.

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YANKEE OTAGO is a character-based action comedy along the lines of GROSSE POINTE BLANK, IN BRUGES,  MR. RIGHT, or THE GUARD, about an overconfident American who believes that the best contract killer in the world is a Maori man from the Otago region of New Zealand.

As he travels from Los Angeles to Auckland and then hitchhikes down to the South Island, he happily tells his random traveling partners his theory -- the top three hitmen in the world keep their identities closely hidden, but are generally believed to be two men from Latin America and another from the Middle East. Our eager American, SAM (20s, cheerful and charming), believes that all three mystery killers are really the same person under different aliases -- a Maori man who fools people into thinking he’s a generic brown dude.

Sam wants to break into the international murder-for-hire business in a big way, and he figures the best way to make a name for himself is to find the top guy and murder him on spec.

Sam finally arrives in the small town of Taawhiti and finds work with a sheep farmer named WIREMU (50, a Maori ‘Southern Man’) while doing recon on the assassin in their midst -- a handsome, brooding man named KURT (30s, Maori, wealthy) who drives an expensive car and doesn’t interact much with the local community.

Sam quickly learns it’s harder to be a farmer than he thought, especially when Wiremu’s daughter ATARANGI (20s) runs circles around him. She’s tougher than he is and doesn’t take any shit; a spark kindles between them that might be competition or attraction -- even they don’t know for sure.

The rest of the tight-knit community seem friendly enough as they watch with amused bewilderment while Sam sneaks around thinking he’s being much more subtle than he really is. In particular the pub owner MOIRA (50s, white, a tough auntie type) takes a liking to him.

Living ‘undercover’ as a farm hand puts Sam in close contact with Wiremu. The farmer is a man of few words, but he provides something Sam has never had - a positive father figure who teaches him gently but won’t put up with his shit.

At the midpoint, Sam makes his move. He follows Kurt into the forest and corners the master assassin. But instead of killing him, he asks to be Kurt’s apprentice -- he has discovered from Wiremu what it’s like to have a mentor, and wants to learn from the best.   

Kurt has no idea what the fuck is happening. He insists he’s a banker who made his fortune in Auckland and retired early to Taawhiti. And frankly, it’s kinda racist of Sam to assume that a successful Maori man must be a criminal. Be better, bro.

Sam allows Kurt to run away. But as soon as he’s out of sight he’s ambushed and knocked unconscious by Atarangi. Sam is quickly disarmed by Wiremu -- who had been standing unnoticed behind him. Wiremu efficiently knocks Sam out.

Sam wakes up with Wiremu and Atarangi glaring at him. He’s gobsmacked to learn that the master assassin he’s been searching for is Wiremu, and Atarangi isn’t his daughter - she’s his apprentice.  When Wiremu says he’s been retired for years and demands to know how Sam tracked him down, he learns that Atarangi has been doing jobs on the side while pretending to be him -- the clues Sam gathered were accidentally left by the ambitious but not-fully-trained young woman. Wiremu is shocked and angry at Atarangi’s lack of patience, and Atarangi is furious at Sam for getting her in trouble with her mentor.

Wiremu says Atarangi’s just as childish and arrogant as Sam. Through her actions, she’s brought danger to their home. He’s of a mind to kill them both, or let them kill each other. He tells them to figure it out, and disappears into the bush.

Sam and Atarangi tramp back toward the farm together. They argue about who’s the better killer and each threatens to murder the other, but somehow they never get around to it.

They arrive back at Wiremu’s farmhouse, not knowing if the master assassin will kill them both. He marches out with a rifle in his hands ... but instead of putting them down, he says they’re under attack. He just got a call from Moira -- strangers are arriving in town, and they don’t look friendly.

As it turns out, the whole community knows about Wiremu’s foreign adventures and take pride in his international success. A network of observers send details -- five vans of INTERNATIONAL ASSASSINS are scoping out the town. When we cut to the vans we see that many of them are the “random” traveling partners that Sam so blithely told his theory to -- they’ve been tracking Sam this whole time, waiting for him to smoke out the master assassin.  Unlike Sam they don’t want to learn from Wiremu, they want to kill him to take out the competition.

This leads to a run-and-gun action finale, with Wiremu, Atarangi, and Sam having to work together (with the help of the Taawhiti community) to shoot their way across the town and defend the townsfolk from the international killers.

After the bullets stop flying and Wiremu, Atarangi, and Sam each save each other’s lives, they realise they could be a great team together. Wiremu agrees to take on Sam as an apprentice, and Atarangi grudgingly admits he might be fun to have around.

The Taawhiti community welcome their strange new brother and they live happily ever after...

...with no one noticing that one of the attackers triggered a TRACKING BEACON before he died.