Four Years in Five Minutes

The Highlander Journey and the story of a Highlander Cow.
Written by Robert - Director at The Film Guys

THIS STORY WAS WRITTEN COMPLETELY BY A HUMAN

The idyllic setting of Frederick Gunn, in Washington, CT, USA.

In the fall of 2024 the Frederick Gunn School called us to tell their story.

Before the project even started I was informed that a highlander cow (a “coo”) was booked and must be included in the video.

Especially for schools we haven’t worked with before, we try to keep as much of a blank slate as possible. This gives us the chance to get to know the school with no expectations or preconceived notions.

Knowing well over a month in advance that the highlander coo would be involved in the video, it started infiltrating on my beginner’s mind.

By the time we got to campus, I had a host of cow ideas. Each one witty and playful, full of cow puns and movie references. For a few days it was full steam ahead. We had a concept and an enthusiastic client.

We had already started collecting props when something began to shift. While in conversation with Emily Gum, the Head of School, it became clear to me that Gunn was in a different frame of mind than most other schools.

It seemed apparent that Gunn had circumvented the whirlpool that many modern schools are dragged into. That vortex of focusing almost exclusively on performance, while missing out on the person.

Gunn’s founders were abolitionists and outdoors people with strong values. In 1850, they created a place that could continue their legacy. A grounded place where fresh air and good people come together to grow and learn. It felt like the school had not strayed from that path.

The juniors charging toward the senior rock for the first time.

From where I stood, it was clear that Gunn was prioritizing health over maximization. Health is a broad word, and in this case it was about striking the balance between good learning and quality time. In other words, work-life balance.

Work-life balance is a hallmark of a healthy adult life, yet for some reason many of the top schools don’t appear to prioritize it. Work now, live later… it seems.

Frederick Gunn moves with the straightforward notion of go as you mean to go on.

Now with a variety of modern buildings, set in a picturesque corner of the New England woods that is not famous for cell service, Gunn is a school that is equally charming as it is beautiful. The students are friendly and mostly don’t have the heavy bags under the eyes that have become commonplace at many schools.

In my head I kept hearing the sentence, “What a great place to grow up.”

Five days into our two week visit, our cow concept was approved and ready for production, yet something didn’t sit right with me. I had fallen for this (intentionally) small school and wanted to do them justice in a way that the cow video couldn’t quite capture alone.

A student celebrating a victory of a made up game called “Burn” that the many students play regularly.

A familiar moment to many who have experienced boarding school.

So in a 48 hour fervor, we set about developing a visual story of growing up at Gunn. With 122 scenes that would add up to 5 minutes of film, our idea was to make it feel like a fond memory of those days at Gunn.

In five minutes, we would try to capture the experience of attending Gunn as though we were fondly remembering it years later.

With the full trust of the communications department, we hustled our way through the next week, making late nights and early mornings. What emerged was quite exactly what we had intended to make. The film was a smashing success for Gunn. It gave alumni something to remember and prospective students something to look forward to. The community was incredibly proud of the achievement and it felt like a truly all-school effort.

We chose this image of mature trees as the beginning of our fourth and final chapter: the senior year.

The Highlander Journey is a story of growing up and maturing at Gunn. We are so thankful for the trust The Frederick Gunn School has put in us.

Despite the success, we fell short on the one thing the client asked us to do. That is, to include the highlander cow in the video. As a fun twist however, we ended up making the cow video a year later anyway. Actually, we made two.

The Highlander Journey [2024] by The Film Guys