The film follows a group of college students who venture into a school after hours for some nighttime fun — but their game of looking in windows for thrills takes them on an adventure full of unexpected twists and turns.

Writer and director Jon Wolfe said he was drawn to Dixon Middle School in Provo after he and producer Cameron Holdaway drove by the building one night and thought something about its exterior architecture gives off a sinister vibe. “Him and I were here at about 2 a.m. and it just spoke to us. It just looked so scary,” Wolfe said.

Ironically, the timing seemed to align as Dixon just wrapped up its final school year. “We know that the school is closing and we thought we cannot let the school go without having a scary movie being filmed here,” Wolfe told the Daily Herald.

The Provo City Board of Education voted in 2021 to close the current campus, built in 1931, due to its age and extensive renovation needs.

Courtesy Jon Wolfe and Sarah Utley Millar

The group also filmed in other areas of Provo that people who watch the film may recognize.

The film with a seven-member cast was shot over the course of about four days last July. Wolfe and Holdaway, along with Sofia Guadarrama (director of photography), Elizabeth Castillo (gaffer/key grip) plus actors and extras returned earlier this year to make some minor adjustments.

Holdaway says this experience has taught him the importance of being able to wear multiple hats as an indie filmmaker. “Even though I was the producer, I also acted sort of like a human multitool. So I would help do some of our special effects, whether it be like making a door open really creepily, or I was an assistant sound mixer, so I would help with doing some sound effects and things like that,” he said.

Although “Just One Look” may fall into a subgenre of horror films, Wolfe says they didn’t want to rely on stereotypical conventions that every scary movie uses. “We kind of wanted to do our own thing and kind of make it more unique. So we don’t overly rely on, you know, the predictable elements of most horror movies. And so we’re hoping that we can surprise people with our own unique take on the horror genre,” he explained.

On Saturday, the public can get their first look at the short film on-site at the school, located at 750 W. 200 North. The free movie premiere will start at 7 p.m. In keeping in true fashion of scary movies, Wolfe says attendees may be in for some surprises. Without going into too much detail, he shared, “One of the characters walks in here (the auditorium) and the room looks a certain way.”

Though students of Dixon will attend a new school in the fall, the building will remain in use. “Just One Look” aims to honor the school’s rich history while creating a sense of imagination of what happens in a nearly century-old school. “I don’t know what they’re going to do with it afterwards. I know it won’t be an operating school. I don’t think they’re going to tear it down. But in the case that anything happens at all, we wanted to get in right now and make sure that we could make some good cinematic use out of it,” Wolfe said.

Beyond Saturday’s premiere, Wolfe and Holdaway are hoping to get more eyes on the movie at indie film festivals. “The (festival) circuit is a very important way for us to get our names out there. And hopefully the movie has a life after the premiere, rather than just playing a couple of times and then being archived somewhere,” Wolfe said.