Winnipeg - Prolific U.S.-based producer Patrick Markey (The Horse Whisperer, White Oleander) and director Steve Berra (7-Teen Sips) brought their new feature The Good Life to Winnipeg because it doubles well for Omaha. That, and the tax credit.

The film, says Markey, is about "an incredibly complex kid" who isn't like everybody else in his typical football-crazy Nebraska town. It stars Mark Webber (Broken Flowers), Harry Dean Stanton (The Straight Story), Zooey Deschanel (Failure to Launch) and Bill Paxton (Big Love), who is doubling as executive producer. Berra also wrote the script.

According to Markey, who is producing with Lance Sloane from FarFalla Films of L.A. and Phyllis Laing of The 'Peg's Buffalo Gal Pictures, he had scouted Nebraska and his home state of Montana extensively before a colleague tipped him off about Manitoba.

"We came and looked around for about a day before we realized we could not only do this here, but really do it well here," says Markey, praising his local crew, Manitoba Film & Sound and Buffalo Gal in one breath.

"These people are really, really good at what they do, so it was a combination of having great service on the ground and these great incentives that you just can't ignore," he says.

Because the film is being financed privately from the U.S., and without studio involvement at this point, Markey says the 45% Manitoba tax credit - plus the 5% frequent-filming bonus it gets through Buffalo Gal ­- is proving very helpful. The shoot didn't qualify for the 5% rural bonus, but Markey says he might take advantage of it someday.

"I'd love to come up here and do a rural picture - sort of a Midwestern U.S.-based thing that could shoot out in the countryside - but this picture is much more urban," he says.

The Good Life began production on March 22 and is scheduled to wrap on April 28 after a final week of shooting on location in Nebraska.