'Supercell': Canadian filmmaker has Anne Heche chasing storms in one of her last roles

Born and raised in Montreal, first-time filmmaker Herbert James "Jamie" Winterstern's movie Supercell (available on VOD platforms March 17), is a story about family connections, told through a storm chasing adventure, starring Alec Baldwin, Daniel Diemer, Skeet Ulrich and the late Anne Heche.

Supercell's lead character is William Brody (Diemer), whose father was an infamous storm chaser. Following his father's death, William's mother Dr. Quinn Brody (Heche) left her storm analysis days behind her, now cleaning houses to make ends meet, with the help of her son. When William receives his father's journal from his "uncle" Roy (Ulrich), William is inspired to continue the family legacy of storm chasing, going against his mother's wishes.

Winterstern and his wife actually went storm chasing themselves in 2019, and he describes seeing a supercell thunderstorm as "scary" but also "magical."

"I went back a week later. I was addicted," he told Yahoo Canada. "I thought to myself, well this could be a good story."

Anne Heche in one of her last movie roles

Something about Supercell that is likely to catch the eyes of the public is the star-studded cast used to tell this story.

“A large part of independent filmmaking is you need to find a star that has value and then once that star attaches, everything kind of falls into place,” Winterstern explained. “So once we landed Alec Baldwin, and I remember it was right around my birthday, two years ago, and it was surreal.”

“Honestly, it's my first film … so I didn't have a lot of experience working with actors, and I was really intimidated. ... They’re far more experienced than I am at this craft, so I could just let them do what they do."

In terms of working with the late Heche in one of her last movie roles, Winterstern highlighted that she was "a kid at heart."