THE CHALLENGER 4: URBAN LEGEND - November 2013 to June 2014

         In November of 2013, during the "Innocent Gun" filming sessions, Aramis Pacitto and I had finished writing "The Challenger 4" & "The Challenger 5" scripts early. So we decided that before snow falls , that we should begin filming early. We originally planned to begin filming in January with interiors for both "the Challenger 4" & 5, but with winter starting late we figured, why not knock out a scene early. The first scene we filmed was in mid-November with a new member of the cast, Liia Kajak who portrays Rick Sledge's dead girlfriend, Brooklyn.  Brooklyn was last seen on screen in "The Challenger 2: Unlimited" and was played by a different actress, Madeline. We were unable to bring the original actress back so we recasted her. Liia Kajak got the role and was given a bigger part than Madelin had in film 2, as we witness Brooklyn on a date with Rick Sledge years before he became "The Challenger." Theres two flashback scenes with these two that ultimately leads to Sledge's proposal. You may not realize this by watching the scenes, but it was a cold day in Toronto, minus 10 or 12 that night and it was a tough shoot because of the weather conditions, but we got through it. That was the first and last exterior we did until winter ended.

             The next scene we filmed was on December 2nd 2013 with Mike Covello (Captain Mora). We filmed all his scenes that day for both films, 4 & 5. The scene we filmed for 4, was the part of the film where Mora tells Sledge that the man that killed his father, girlfriend and partner is back. It was an easier shoot than usual with Captain Mora, as both Mike & Aramis brought their A game. After that day we took 25 days off to continue filming "innocent Gun." Then on December 27th, we were back on set in "The Challenger's Cellar" to film a fight scene between Lucas Wolf (Darius Ban) and Sledge. It was their first fight scene of Urban Legend to be filmed and it was a great one. That scene there was shot way better than any fight scene we've done and that includes all of our films ( The Challenger 1-3, Man of War, Life Is Hell & Innocent Gun). The fight looked real and some parts were as Aramis Pacitto went home that day with a bruise on his right cheek. I also made my return as Gunnerson that day in scene that followed the fight scene. Two d

ays later, we were back in the mansion which we classify as "our studio," to film a scene where Lucas Wolf tells the city of LA whos boss. That house that we film in is about 85% of where our interior scenes for "The Challenger" is shot. It has all the sets from The cellar, Wolfs hideout, Prison cell, workout/target area and many more.

       On December 29, we also filmed the final scene of the film where Wolf is being held "off the books" by "The Challenger." The scene would later be re-shot because it was too "Challenger One like." That tells you what we think of our first "Challenger" film. That was the final scene we filmed of 2013. Then on January 13th of 2014, Dino Mazza and Chika Mafiana made their returns to our "Web Series" for their two cameo appearances of the film. For that scene, we brought back the famous "coming out of the shadows" sequence where Walker (who's inside Ricci's cell) appears to give Ricci a heads up about the Lawman and Wolf. We also filmed a part of the final sequence that sets up "The Dark Triad film (which premiers on September 6)." On January 11, Alex Stacey (played a thug in "Innocent Gun") made his first and final debut in "the Challenger" series. He played a tech guy named Quan. The first part we filmed with him was the scene where me, the Lawman AKA Gunnersons pays Quan a visit seeking help at gunpoint.On January 18, we brought in another new cast member to Portray a new character by the name of Detective Savannah. Kendall ( Known for "Innocent Gun") took on the role. That scene is a set up scene for what is to come in "The Challenger 5: dark Triad." Towards the end of January, we filmed the Lawman fight along with the final fight of the film.

            The Lawman fight was the first fight scene that I've taken place in, in these "Challenger" films. My character pretty much stood no chance vs Lucas Wolf as the fight lasted 30 seconds. We had a new cameraman for that scene, Dominic Licorish. Dominic brought some good cinematography to the fold and he used it for both the Lawmna fight and the final fight. The final fight between Sledge and wolf was good and fast fight scene that was filmed in sequence. Aramis and Darius were very persistent on doing as many takes as possible. They had to do the same thing over and over for 20 takes, something Aramis regretted the next day when he became sore.  On February 1st we filmed the opening scene and at the midway point of the

month we filmed Angelo Di Pardo's return as Provenzano (the man behind the curtain of the crime in LA, in other words, the Ring lord). That was it for the interiors, next was onto the exteriors in April. We filmed the first and last scene with the 1973 Dodge Charger. The scene was well shot by Aramis and the tripod that he put the camera on. The other highlights of the film process was when I had to punch a thug (Matthew Quan Yin), making my return as Mr. V (for the first time since the first film) and a scene thats too good to describe, Marc Sameuls as the Barracuda and James dinella as Blake.

           With filming done, all that was needed to be sorted out was a few issues in the editing room. Aramis added some new effects, gun shots and cinema bars. But the issues were with the Brooklyn flashbacks. Some of the lines  that were in the scenes were cheesy, so I helped cut them out without making it noticeable. Another problem with those scenes was the visual aspect. It was in color, but it didn't look that appealing so we tried a few things and eventually got around to doing a surveillance type look but with better quality. After those problems were fixed, this film has by far beaten every film we've done and the surprising part about all of this is that... The best is yet to come...

- Andrew Di Pardo

The Challenger: Urban Legend