Director Eric Valette (One Missed Call) has wrapped production on Hybrid, sending the action/thriller into post after a ‘filmless’ shoot in Regina. The project claims to be the first in Canada to shoot on a Red One camera, which stores images directly on a hard drive and which promises to cut the time spent – and needed – in post-production.

The technology, as well as the level of action, stunts and special effects represents ‘the opportunity to step up to the next level of production and distribution,’ says coproducer Kevin DeWalt of Regina-based Minds Eye Entertainment, ‘resulting in a very commercial and sophisticated’ picture.

Featuring Oded Fehr (The Mummy, Resident Evil) and Thunder Bay, ON-born Shannon Beckner (American Pie Presents: Beta House), Hybrid’s real star might be the film’s eponymous car that terrorizes an automotive mechanic and her colleagues over one action-packed, horrific night in Chicago.

The thriller began shooting in and around Regina on March 31. The provincial capital is a very ‘accommodating, cooperative city,’ DeWalt enthuses. For the first time in the city’s history, its main street was shut down for 36 hours when the script called for car crashes.

The shoot, says DeWalt, ‘went off without a hitch.’

Produced by Minds Eye and Stallion Media of Germany, Hybrid is budgeted at $12.1 million. ‘Apart from the federal and provincial tax credits,’ DeWalt says, ‘we’re independent.’

Set for release in the winter of 2009, Minds Eye International holds the Canadian distribution rights and Voltage Pictures the international. As for its American distributor, ‘At this point,’ DeWalt says, ‘we’re not even looking.’