immortal ron
Thank you for watching Immortal Ron.
This film was made on a small budget, with a close knit cast and crew, and a shared belief in telling honest, human stories. By choosing to watch and support the film, you have played a direct part in its journey.
We hope Immortal Ron stays with you, and that you return to it whenever you need.
Thank you for supporting Shushka Productions.
Included with Immortal Ron:
Page to Screen (Script Breakdown)
Floorplans
Alternate Posters
page to screen
Find out how we made Immortal Ron, making shots up on the day, actors working there magic and much more!
notes by Director Ash Arnold
The Opening Shot.
The heart of the film is the Brooklyn rooftop, the place Ron returns to almost every night to remember his brother, always standing on the ledge.
I wanted to open with the very shot that would carry through the film. Seeing Ron walk into focus and step up onto the ledge felt like the perfect way to start.
As you can see from the floor plan, this was a one-camera setup. Most of the time we see Ron on this ledge, it’s from this exact angle and framing. That consistency makes the rooftop not just a location, but almost a character in itself.
The First Flashback
Immortal Ron has a few flashbacks, moments where we cut from the present back to when Ron’s brother was still alive.
We only do it twice in the film, but they’re absolutely vital. This is the first one. It happens right after the opening and marks the first time we hear anyone speak. The connection between the brothers really had to land, if you don’t believe in their relationship, then Ron’s entire emotional arc falls apart.
Luckily, both Miller and James completely knocked it out of the park. Even in rehearsals, I knew they just clicked.
Visually, we wanted those moments with Jamie to feel warmer.
It was a conscious choice to show how Ron feels at ease with his brother, how Jamie brings that sense of light and warmth into his world.
Every other time we see Ron’s apartment, the palette shifts: cold, muted, full of blues and greys. But when Jamie’s there, it’s different. The light changes.
The tone changes. That contrast, warmth versus cold, became a way to show what Ron lost, and what he’s trying to find again.
Inspiration
This scene takes place within the first 30 seconds of the film, and there’s a lot to set up about the world Ron lives in.
We meet him just over a year after his brother Jamie’s death, and I wanted to convey the loneliness that’s been eating away at him ever since. In the first shot, Ron has just returned from the funeral.
Finally alone, it’s the first moment he has to truly take in what’s happened. Miller gave a beautifully restrained performance, nothing over the top, just quiet, letting the weight of realisation sink in.
As you can (barely) make out in my handwriting, I noted that Ron’s life is stagnant. We reflected that visually with stillness, shooting on a tripod with almost no camera movement. The frame itself mirrors his state of mind.
The second shot shows Ron in a therapist’s office. I didn’t want to reveal the setting just yet, so we kept it tight with a close-up.
I’d been playing with this idea for a while, but it clicked when I saw a similar shot of Bucky in The Falcon and the Winter Soldier.
The framing feels awkward and intrusive, like we’re watching something we’re not supposed to see. Overall, I love how these shots turned out. They not only captured what I wrote on the page but elevated it on screen.
From Singles to Two-Shot.
This scene went through a big change. On the page, it was your standard two-shot.
When Claire mentions “siblings,” Ron goes quiet, and we’d cut to singles – then back and forth between them. As you can see from the stills, that’s not what we ended up doing.
On set, we ran into sound issues, especially during the singles. The takes were still usable, but in the edit I found myself drawn to staying in the two-shot. Something about it made Ron and Claire feel closer.
We also had the reverse two-shot as a backup, which I love – the New York skyline was one of the big reasons I wanted to shoot this film where I did.
I fell in love with the city, and I wanted it to have its own character in the film.
Sometimes the best way to show that is to just let the characters and the audience, admire the view.
EXT. APARTMENT ROOFTOP - NIGHT
Claire and Ron have been on the roof for hours, and for the first time, Ron feels relaxed.
In the script, this beat was just a brief moment before the main chunk of the scene the first time we see Ron take charge of the conversation.
We shot it OTS (over the shoulder), focusing on the character in the back of the frame with the foreground out of focus. On the night, we decided to rack focus between the characters instead. It gave the moment a more intimate feel. After three or so takes, something still felt off.
The question Ron asks felt too scripted. So, I told Miller and Caroline to give me the moment before, ask a question that wasn’t in the script. I knew they could pull it off, but I never expected it to become my favourite part of the film.
Everything about it, the question, Caroline’s timing, Miller’s terrible joke, just worked. It felt organic and deepened the relationship we were seeing between Ron and Claire. Huge shout-out to Caroline, who plays Claire; she brought so much life to that character, and it really comes through in this scene.
What a view.
Three words. That’s it. This flashback says a lot without really saying anything.
The original scripted version was longer, but due to sound issues on set, the dialogue just wasn’t usable.
In the edit, it changed we stripped it back to the bare bones and became three words between two brothers.
We waited until golden hour to shoot it, holding off until the light was just right.
Luckily, the clouds parted at the perfect moment, and we caught something special, a quiet, simple exchange that now carries so much more weight than we originally imagined.
Sometimes less really does say more.
The shot that never was
When you write a script, you usually have an image in your head, the kind of shot that fits the dialogue or the moment on the page.
Then a cinematographer comes on board, they bring their own vision, and together you start to shape how the film will actually look. Eventually, a shot list is made, your blueprint for the shoot. Ideally, you stick to it. But filmmaking rarely goes exactly to plan. Sometimes, on the day, you feel something different, the light hits right, the actor moves a certain way and you end up shooting something completely new.
That’s what happened on Immortal Ron. We had our shot list. We were working through it. Then, somehow, we found ourselves with spare time on set, which, as any filmmaker knows, is a miracle.
My cinematographer and AC started grabbing extra inserts: buildings, planes flying overhead, small cutaways that might help in the edit. While they were at it, they got our actor, Miller to stand in frame, shot from a low angle against the sky.
It wasn’t planned. Just a quick, instinctive moment. Later in the edit, I used that shot for the handshake between Claire and Ron and it ended up becoming one of my favourites in the film. It wasn’t in the shot list. It wasn’t in the first few cuts.
But I realised we needed an extra beat to sit with Ron, and that unplanned shot became exactly that. Sometimes your favourite moments in a film are the ones you never planned for.
The floorplans
Floorplans give an idea of how we are going to shoot the film.
