Ten Days, Ten Bullets, One of Ten Bodies in Estes Park - 04/25/2007

Two hunters happened upon a woman lying face down in the snow surrounded by blood. At Aspen Lodge. On Sunday, April 22. Over and over and over again.

Onlookers who could get close enough to the scene eventually heard the clue: “Cut!” Indeed, it was a full day of take and retake for the cast and crew of “Ten Bullets.”

The feature length film currently is being created exclusively in Colorado by ICEntertainment, an independent film company based in Parker. Approximately 40 Colorado residents, including local resident Josh Ostmeier, are members of the cast.

Ken Maskrey, screenplay writer and director of the show, brought the production to Estes Park after contacting Convention & Visitors Bureau staff member Julie Nikolai, who serves as the local representative for the Colorado Film Commission.

Director Maskrey promises that the plot for Ten Bullets has twists and turns that he hopes will leave the movie buff uncomfortable and unsure as to what’s real and what’s not.

The film with its Estes Park area scenes transports viewers from the time when a single mother returns home from work to find a ransom note for her two kidnapped young daughters. In order to get her daughters back, a psychopathic kidnapper gives her 10 bullets and 10 days during which she must kill 10 people. The kidnapper leaves all the details up to her, including who she chooses for her victims.

“They were looking for untracked snow in a wooded area for a murder chase scene and asked if I knew how they could get permits to film in Rocky Mountain National Park,” Nikolai recalls. “After I learned the name of the movie, we had a conversation about the scene and what the setting needed to look like. I knew we’d have to look for an alternate location because the National Park does not issue filming permits that include the use of firearms. With the predictions of a spring storm about 10 days ago, and current snow depths at Aspen Lodge’s higher elevation, it seemed like a good alternative.” The predicted snow never arrived, but there was enough ground cover for ICEntertainment to proceed with their plans.

Paula Foster, director of sales for Estes Valley Resorts, owners of Aspen Lodge, has worked with a number of production companies over the past several years that have utilized Aspen Lodge for filming. “We are fortunate to have a unique facility that offers a wide variety of location options such as the lobby of the conference center with its ‘mountain lodge feel’, our wooded areas, the panoramic mountain views, both historic and western buildings, and our open valleys,” Foster said.

Ten Bullets producer Jennifer Maskrey said Aspen Lodge was the ideal location for the winter mountain production. “By the end of my initial conversation with Paula (Foster), we’d decided to shoot four scenes in Estes Park, rather than just one. Their facilities were so versatile to meet all our filming needs.”

ICEntertainment hopes to complete filming all scenes within the next several weeks. The movie then goes into editing with prescreening set for late June. The film has already been accepted and will have its public viewing at the Los Angeles Film Festival in late July. They are currently looking at entering the film into the Estes Park Film Festival as well, scheduled for September of this year.