The Taiwan Oyster

The Taiwan Oyster is a 2013 American low budget adventure comedydrama Indie film directed by Mark Jarrett. The film marks Jarretts feature film debut, and was based upon his own experiences living in Taiwan and working as kindergarten teachers from 1999 to 2001. The events in the movie take place when a fellow expat dies. Described as a Texas road film in a Taiwan setting, the project stars Billy Harvey, Leonora Moore, and Jeff Palmiotti.

Nikita Leonora Moore, a sympathetic clerk, helps them steal Jeds body and joins them on their road trip across Taiwan looking for the ideal burial site. Their efforts are complicated by having to keep Jeds body on ice in the bed of their pickup truck while transporting it all over Taiwan.Mark Jarrett had lived in Taichung, Taiwan, from 1999 to 2001, and set his story to take place six months after the regions September 21, 1999 921 earthquake. Jarretts original idea was to think of a lowbudget road movie. He had been reading William Faulkners As I Lay Dying and decided that his story could take place in Taiwan. Based upon the directors own experiences, the screenplay was written by director Jarrett, his brother Mitchell Jarrett, and by Jordan Heimer, and was shot at locations across Taiwan using 5D and 7D equipment. The films title refers to the magazine published by the lead protagonists, which is itself modeled after one at which Jarrett himself worked. The Jarrett bros. returned to Taiwan in 2009 to scout locations. and filming was done through repeated acts of lowbudget, guerrilla filmmaking. Funding was chiefly acquired through Spoonbill Pictures, LLC with a large help from two Kickstarter fundraisers. ........

Source: Wikipedia