A fictional character, Mr Brick in 24 hours receives a bad-luck email, runs out of toilet paper, jumps in a cold shower, eats a bad apple, and worst of all, has the woman of his dreams whisked away by a greedy work colleague.
Mr Brick's world falls apart and it was all for the sake of the V48 Furious Film-making competition. Two Queenstown teams made the Otago and Southland-wide finals in Dunedin on Saturday.
Complex Films created its film, chain mail, within the 48 hours and on just seven hours' sleep.
Director Jonty Norton said the finished and polished product was worth the sleepless weekend.
"From 6pm on the Friday night we were given our instructions. We then began to brainstorm ideas till 3am, got up at 7am for filming, then video editing till 3am again, more shooting and editing until 7pm on Sunday night.
"I had school on the Monday morning so I was pretty tired," he said.
"It felt good to be finished and we were so stoked with the finished product as it was our first year to have done it ... It feels pretty amazing."
The hard work earned the team of 10 a place among 12 finalists, narrowed down from the larger pool of 60 southern entrants or 4000 nationwide.
"We were a young group - we did so well."
The Wakatipu High School pupil was joined by his older brother Max Norton, who filled the producer role, as well as part-time actor Matt Doyle (Nicky Brick) and cinematographer Stefan Haworth, and a few "extras".
Those who have worked alongside a family member could probably sympathise with the extra effort this team went to.
"Thought we were going to have a lot more fights than we did," Jonty said.
"I had a fight with the big brother the night before it all started ... that's why we are Team Complex, we have a diverse range of people.
"We got along in the 48 hours and that's where it counted."
The two brothers and Mr Haworth had a "passion" for making films and without a lot of experience were thrilled to have made it this far.
The film runs for only five minutes and features scenes from Queenstown, a slow-motion aspect, and one very unlucky Mr Brick.
V48 city manager Craig Storey said he was impressed with the high calibre of entrants this year and especially recognised both Queenstown entries, the second being team Super Best Friends which was also among the finalists on Saturday night.
Both teams gain automatic entry to the national finals on July 9 in Auckland.
"The potential certainly exists for them to go further," Mr Storey said.
