HCP meets LBP

So we’ve returned, bruised, battered and weary, perhaps wiser, from the wilds of Rochester, NY.

A few months ago, Amy was recruited to take part in a new movie for Low Budget Pictures, helmed by LBP’s generalissimo, Chris Seaver. In a moment of madness, Chris asked me to take a part as well. Now, we’ve known Chris for… ever, it seems. At least since 2000 when Debbie Rochon recommended that I interview the young director/producer of a movie she appeared in called Mulva: Zombie Asskicker. Seaver’s movies take place in a world completely of his own devising, populated by characters who are all neurologically damaged, emotionally arrested and prone to Tourettes-like outbursts of profanity and bizarre vocalizations. His dialogue combines Shakespearean grandeur with impenetrable hip-hop slang, usually in the same sentence. Misogynistic, time-traveling simians and prehistoric Neanderthals occupy the same high school as a motley assortment of human teenagers—some of whom are cowboys, buck-toothed lesbians, sexually-frustrated and flatulent redheads and/or Metal-loving Caucasian Native Americans.

In short, nobody else on Earth can or will make a Low Budget Pictures movie. Whether you love him or hate him (and there aren’t many people who are ambivalent towards him), it must be admitted that Chris Seaver is a true auteur. He assembled a gloriously-talented troupe of actors who embrace his sometimes-juvenile silliness with glee, gusto and unbridled energy.

And since Mulva 2: Kill Teen-Ape (which seamlessly combines the LBP universe with that of Tarantino’s Kill Bill), I’ve wanted to take part in at least one LBP movie before I depart this mortal coil. Last weekend, I got that chance.

The first time the proposition was made, Chris told us about an insanely violent and raunchy movie he wanted to make, wherein Amy was to play a leather-clad bounty hunter, or somesuch thing, and my role would be determined later. By the time we got the synopsis for what we would ultimately shoot, it had changed into something entirely different. Between Cinema Wasteland and last week, Chris had been hired by a distribution company to shoot a movie called Close Encounters of the Alien Redneck Kind. In this new work-for-hire, Amy would be playing “Audrey”, a single mom with a breast-fetish website. My role was to be of a soldier named “Stack Brickmeat” (a name I continued to mangle as “Brick Stackmeat”) who, upon the verge of “kanoodling”—as specified in the script—with his one true love, Chaisey, is transformed, through alien technology, into a mullet-bearing redneck redubbed “Cletus”. As is poor Chaisey, who becomes the alien redneck leader, “Camel Toe Bobbie Jo”.

We received our script on Thursday and were due to arrive at Chris’ front door on Friday afternoon. Being consummate professionals, we cast our day jobs aside to study our parts and create back-story for our unlikely characters. Or, actually, the opposite of that. We glanced at our lines during the five-hour drive to Rochester.

Now, Chris lives with his lovely wife, Lauren, and their infant son, River, in a single-story house born from another single-story house next door, owned by Lauren’s parents. The houses are connected by a secret passage located in their enormous pantry. I didn’t find this out, however, until Saturday, when I noticed that Lauren would disappear into this dark room for very long periods of time and would return with things she did not take with her. Sometimes, she would take River into this room and return without him. As it turns out, the “Narnia” of the Seaver world is Lauren’s mother’s living room.

Our co-stars in CEARK are well-known to LBP fans. The lovely and talented Meredith Host portrays Camel Toe (she's also a master ceramics...ist - check out her site and buy some zombie bowls!), while the less-lovely but no-less talented Indovina brothers, Kurt and Travis, played Bronson and Papillion/Buck respectively. New to us were Billy Garberino (Stink of Flesh), Katherine Indovina and Brad Austin, who were playing other outrageous characters. While I was unfamiliar with these gentlemen and lady, I got to know them on set and through their fine work in other LBP movies like Wet Heat and the upcoming Ski Wolf—both of which are truly hysterical. The absent revelers, sadly, were Casey Bowker and Josh Suire, who have been highly entertaining in movies like Teen Ape Goes To Camp and Film Crew.

Now, while I am proud of my performance in A Feast of Flesh, I’ve never really considered myself much of an actor. Yes, I’ve been trained as one and, yes, I’ve pretended to be one, occasionally, but mostly I’m just entertaining myself. So it came as no surprise to me as I found my character’s voice evolving from Burt Lancaster to Dudley Do-Right, or later, when I went from an Elvis voice to that of Jim Varney. But, on the other hand, Chris encourages this sort of fluid absurdity, and never corrected me unless he had a really specifically silly line-reading in mind.

Chris also likes to shoot in order, so my first scene was also the first scene in the movie, where Meredith’s character and I are interrupted in our kanoodling by the intrusion of an alien redneck pod. “How much kanoodling do you think he’ll want?” I asked Meredith moments before the scene.

“Hopefully, not a lot!” she replied.

“Thanks,” I said.

(Now, Meredith has known Amy and me for years and we’re friends. Still, a little less horror at the prospect of our onscreen simulated kanoodling would have been nice for the ego.)

We shot these scenes and many others in a very lovely and highly populated Rochester area park. Sometimes, it was very difficult to continue with our scenes with the near-constant traffic of families and their dogs—many of whom came by to say hi and to shake off excess water onto us (I’m referring to the dogs, of course, and their penchant for leaping joyously into nearby ponds) while we were in the midst of recreating genuinely antisocial activity like neck-biting and crotch punching.

I should also mention that the temperature all three days was in the high 90s with near 200% humidity and the occasional oxygen fire for good measure. There also seemed to be a mosquito outbreak that left most of us swollen, itchy, blotchy and maimed. And sunburned and dehydrated. And that was just our dignity!

Our second journey to the park came later, with actors Heather Maxon and her significant other, Warren, in tow, where which we shot the first redneck scenes of the day. Of course, shooting at the opening of a park attracted a fair amount of attention. After about half an hour, the cops arrived. Chris held up the camera, Meredith explained that we were shooting a “student film” (attention Indie folks – you’re always shooting a student film; and you’ve always left your ID in your room, if you’re asked). The cop was agreeable, though, mentioning that the park authorities had noticed something “suspicious” going on. I don’t know what, exactly, we were doing that was suspicious—up until that point, we were just shooting dialogue. We hadn’t gotten to the suspicious activity yet.

Shooting with Seaver and company took some time to get used to, particularly the speed at which we were moving. Once, I thought that we moved fast at Happy Cloud Pictures. We’re glaciers compared to the LBP crew. Of course, Chris uses only available light and an onboard camera mic—he doesn’t even use a tripod, preferring to shoot everything handheld and dollying his body in and out as the scene progresses. He also shoots, again, as much in order as possible. No masters, no more than two or three lines at a time. He’ll also give specific directions if he has a line reading in mind, but no direction at all beyond “Let’s do that again,” if he didn’t like something (or if we fucked up a line, which was more often than not).

Some of you elitists might be shaking your heads, fingers or other appendages at the above—as I certainly was when we started—but let me ask: what makes Chris’ process less-valid than anyone else’s? You light a scene to get a certain look. Chris likes his movies to look natural while unreality unspools within the frame. His dismissal of rehearsal stems from his preference that the actors do what they do and to surprise him as the scene progresses. Since he has the camera right up in your face the entire time, using a boom mike would not only be extraneous, but very difficult to cram above the frame. This is the LBP style, similar to that of early Goddard and very similar to the Dogma school of filmmaking. And who the hell am I to question someone’s filmic process? He gets the results he’s happy with, I won’t judge how he gets them.

LBP movies are about the characters, first and foremost. Every LBP movie is character-driven. And if the characters seem too broadly-drawn or cartoony, that’s because they’re existing in a world both like and unlike our own. There’s a bizarre combination of classical theatrics, over-the-top radio voice tricks, hip hop, Borscht-belt wild takes, toilet-jokes and general tomfoolery that comes strictly from Seaver’s mind. The actors are called upon to create characters on the spot and the only rule is: be funny. Before any non-fans out there turn up your noses let me bring something to your attention: mugging isn’t easy. As I mentioned, I had to flip-flop from Burt Lancaster to Dudley Doo-Right in the space of three or four words. I had to deliver tongue-twister dialogue at the same time, not look at the camera, not burst into a fit of giggles while the off-camera folks watched and ad-lib sufficiently if I screwed something up and still had to finish the sentence. I’ve taken a great deal of improv and theatrical classes over the years, I’ve studied linguistics, vocalization and numerous accents and I was still having a tough time with all of that.

But Meredith, Travis, Kurt, Billy, Katherine—they handled this stuff without batting an eye. They were just used to Chris, what he wanted and how to give it to him. And he didn’t mind if I threw something in off book so long as it made him laugh and didn’t seem completely out of context with what we were doing.

Consider this exchange:

Chaisey: “Right here, Stack, I wanna fuck your balls off underneath this wide open willow tree.”

To which I was supposed to reply, “Chaisey, you hound.”

But I forgot that line, so, stuck, I rattled off: “Well, I took a SCUD missile to the left one, so you’ll just have to fuck off the right.”

Chris laughed. The line stayed in. Or, at least, we didn’t reshoot with the right line so…

Amy’s chores on the set were similar, though her character was painted in more narrow strokes. As “Audrey”, she was the literal “T” of the T&A, required to act in low-cut blouses and arch her back a lot. As the scenes progressed, Chris would shoot her line in a close-up or two-shot, spin around and shoot the reaction or next line with the next character, swing back to her, etc. When she was off-camera, she would react to the on-camera character to give the actor something to work with. That’s how she was trained. At one point, Brad lost his focus and flubbed a line. He turned to Chris and pointed an accusing finger at Amy: “What’s with the real actress over here?”

A similar experience had Chris stopping when I was doing the same thing. “You’re not on camera, you know?” I knew. “I’m giving Kurt something to focus on.”

Neither of these things seemed unusual to us, and it didn’t strike us as unusual either, as Meredith would frequently order one of the actors into their spot to give the on-camera character a focal point. But, apparently, because they move so fast, it isn’t a requirement on an LBP set.

One benefit that Chris has, however, is similar to a Happy Cloud set. He’s surrounded by strong, smart women who run his set while he concerns himself with other things. Meredith, this time around, was his producer, his AD, his grip, script supervisor and the shoot’s den mother. She was the one commanding, “Okay, what’s next?” Feeding lines, saying “Let’s move on,” when the others were tempted to dissolve back to the natural state of chaos.

And the chaos was my own misconception. I asked her, at one point, “Is it always this chaotic and hectic?”

“No,” she replied. “This is actually moving really easily. Usually we have a lot more to get done and there’s more… pressure. We’re ahead of schedule, actually.”

Though CEARK lacked break-out stars like Teen-Ape, Caspian or Heather and Puggly, there was still a sheer amount of goofiness and black comedy. LBP mines the depths of taste for laughs, many of them wrung from death, dismemberment and sexual misconduct. And violence. My character was involved in three fight scenes, all of which were staged against Kurt, who hadn’t even been born when I was his age! Kurt is also very agile, fit and fast. And strong. And hurty.

Chris announced towards the end, “Okay, go choreograph something, guys.” Suddenly, Kurt was outlining a very complicated series of fight moves and I was in pain just listening. During one scene, he leapt clear over me, landed, rolled, leapt to his feet and countered one of my kicks with a kick of his own to my shin, then a roundhouse that just cleared my head. I reacted to the kick and threw myself rolling to the ground.

And Chris didn’t shoot it! I’m on the ground, willing my lungs to re-inflate, convinced my shin had cracked in half, and he says “Let’s shoot it for real!” Meanwhile, Kurt isn’t even sweating.

Being a consummate professional, I only bitched a lot.

Still, I’d gotten what I’d hoped for: the Low Budget Pictures experience. We got to hang out with people we’d gotten to know over the years through their movies and from a few isolated minutes here and there at conventions. We laughed a lot, we groaned, we gave each other shit. And while there, I got to check out a couple of the LBP movies I’d missed, like the aforementioned Wet Heat and the very well-done Ski Wolf.

And I marveled, again, at the leaps and bounds with which Seaver has grown as a filmmaker over the years. His movies are tighter, now, with very good editing and cleaner sound. And while they’re just as silly, his characters now have arcs to their journeys and the gags are now character-specific. And there’s a sweetness that exists, particularly in the Heather and Puggly movies, that you didn’t find before. Even his frequent toilet humor is motivated, instead of shoved in for a cheap laugh.

You don’t get to witness growth too often in this business. Some filmmakers come and go, making no impact. Others retire because it’s just too goddamned tough to make something people want to watch. Seaver and the LBP crew have legions—friggin’ legions—of fans all over the world. I joke with him when I see him at Cinema Wasteland—“How many movies did you shoot on the way down?”—but I envy his speed and I envy his consistency. And this is coming from someone who couldn’t even watch his movies once upon a time. Now I look forward to them. Because he gives me something new each time. Bizarre, nonsensical, but consistently funny.

And I, for one, am very happy to have been part of one.

Now, sukkas, head over to Low Budget Pictures for some phat filmage from which you soul will verily soar to the highest heights of heaven and cosmically beyond and shit!!

The Map of Your Life

The past few weeks have been a whirlwind. The highlight was a 7000 mile (round trip) excursion to the Redwood Forest in California to witness the wedding of Bill Homan and Gwendolyn. As Bill has been one of my closest friends for more than 15 years, there was no way we were going to miss it. Plus, we had the opportunity to test drive a Prius, got 400 miles to the tank, saw trees that predated Charlemagne, had rocks thrown at me by the Pacific Ocean (I'm not kidding! The fucking ocean threw rocks at me!), drove through a tree (it had a tunnel cut through it) and got to witness the "Bay to Breakers" parade in San Francisco. Now, granted, half a million drunk people in and out of various costumes looked less like a parade and more like an evacuation, but it was still pretty amazing to see.

You can check out pictures of this adventure over at Amy's blog.

And this past weekend, we celebrated Memorial Day like consummate Americans: we drank heavily, consumed our collective weight in meat and fired off countless rounds of ammo (courtesy of the great Don Bumgarner's most recent additions to his arsenal, including a 12-gauge shotgun nicknamed "Thumper", two sweet little 9mm pistols and a friggin' AR-15 – not to mention Amy's .22 Henry Golden Boy rifle, which is literally the only gun I can hit anything with). We had a few people up who had never been to the house before, including our dear friendsTara and David and Splatter Movie's Aaron Bernard and Nikki McCrea. Also in attendance were the Haushalters; Sirens of Cinema's own Rhonda Baughman and her beau, Kyle; and the always-impressive make-up team of Eric and Lorena. Everyone showed up with embarrassing amounts of food and completely freaked out our trio of misfit dogs, who hadn't seen another soul save Amy and I since the beginning of the year. So they expressed their excitement by being insane. At one point, I had to lock them in our bed room with soup bones and a bowl of beer.

(Aside 1: I'm not a beer drinker. The only thing I actually like is Guinness on draft and only because of my Irish DNA. My drink of choice, aside from hard liquor, is the fruity girl malts like Mike's Hard Lemonade or Smirnoff Ice. But we live mere minutes from West Virginia, in a county known as the "Seventh Most Inbred North of the Appalachians" (true!). So buying my beloved girly malts always elicits disdainful stares from the toothy proprietors. They with their John Deere baseball caps and Pittsburgh sports team jerseys. Still, with Mike's Hard Lemonade in hand, I needed a beer selection and wasn't sure what to get. "Need anything else?" asked the banjo playing mouth breather behind the counter. "Yeah," I said. "I need a beer recommendation."

"Okay, what do you want?"

"I don't know," I said. "What do fags drink?"

I walked out with my Mike's and a case of Yuengling. The counter guy even carried it out to the car for me. Apologies to any Yuengling drinkers out there who are offended by the above. Your beer is delicious.)

(Aside 2: Don Bumgarner is another one of my close and very respected colleagues. But he possesses a political philosophy that can be best summed up as "bizarre". He's not a liberal by any stretch, but he's not a pure conservative, either. If this were the Revolution, he'd probably be a Minuteman. And a Whig. But he's patriotic to a fault and when we called him from San Francisco to inform him where we were and what we were driving, his later voice mail asked: "Were you also wiping your ass with the Bible and spitting on soldiers?"

To which, I replied, "I wanted to, but I was too busy sodomizing members of Greenpeace.")

Now, though a great amount of fun was had and it was thoroughly one of the best days I've had in a long time (watching city folk around our horses was particularly entertaining – "Don't they have really big teeth with which to eat you better?" Rhonda asked), I was still plagued by stuff weighing me down for the past several weeks now.

I go through cycles of not-quite-depression. It's more a mixture of self-doubt, insecurity and paranoia. Beside my constant Fear of the Big White X that keeps me from enjoying good fortune of any kind, this malaise of self-worth tends to lurk just under my consciousness for long periods of time. It's usually accompanied by my old friends Insomnia and Tension Headache, which, now that I'm old, also brings on Upper and Lower Back Pain and Restless Leg Syndrome. The only thing missing for me is Dutch Elm Disease and gout.

Basically, this malaise occurs when I look back at my career and notice that, if it were a hurtling meteor, it would simply burn up entering the atmosphere and not make the tiniest impression on the culture of the Earth. I feel very much like my ten years as a professional writer and semi-professional filmmaker has made no impact. Not that, in the giant scheme of things, any of our culture really amounts to a hill of beans, but still. I long for longevity.

Add to this my almost constant struggle with agnosticism and I feel quite lost in my own skin.

It's not something I intentionally dwell on, but it does scream at me during the long, dark nights. And there's no bit of self-cheerleading I can do to get rid of it.

So Sunday night, after our ATF party (alcohol, tobacco and firearms), after an evening of Tenebre, Slither and Sorority Babes in the Slimeball Bowl-O-Rama, Amy and I collapsed into bed, pulled the dogs up to our chins and settled for a long evening's unconsciousness.

And my subconscious decided to deal with my insecurity very directly.

My dreams are usually very cinematic. I dream in cuts and bright Technicolor. There are usually guest-stars in my dreams. Generally, they're either action packed or one of two different scenarios: 1) I'm searching for something that I know is in the room somewhere and I can't locate it; 2) I'm trying desperately to get somewhere and either make wrong turns or am delayed by one thing after another. Usually, these last two are extremely frustrating, allowing me to wake up on edge and irritable for the rest of the day. The action-packed ones, I prefer.

This Sunday night dream, as I mentioned, was very direct. I don't know who I was talking to, but it was just the two of us in a hotel lobby. I was bitching to this other person about my feelings of inadequacy. "I've made no difference in the world," I say. "I haven't changed a thing or made a single lasting contribution."

And this other person, whose face I cannot for the life of me remember, so it was likely an amalgam of dream faces, replied, without irritation but also without affection: "You can't see the map of your life because you're at ground level. All you see is what's around you. You can only see what is laid out before and behind you from above, and you can't rise above your own life. Only other people can, and they can't always explain to you what they see."

The scene actually repeated, with a variation of that speech coming again, and again, a dispassionate tone, but very firm. And "the map of your life" was repeated distinctly.

Now, I know where a lot of it came from. You don't have to be Freud. I'd just seen Indy IV (and loved it, thank you) and the scene where Indy describes the Mayan pictographs carved into the ground, meant to be seen from the air, reminded me that I used to study that stuff in high school, fascinated with the idea that the Mayans were in tune to something greater than themselves. So the "map of your life" idea definitely came from there. The rest of it was just my subconscious getting frustrated with my constant phobia.

But I like that phrase, "The Map of Your Life". And since that dream, I've really relaxed – as much as I'm ever able to, that is. I'm not pre-occupied with the idea of leaving a mark on the world. Because I will never get to see "the map of my life". I won't know what impact I'm making—I may never know. And knowing that I may never know something is actually kind of liberating.

(Hey, everyone deals with their shit in different ways. It was either this literal-as-hell dream, or Don's AR-15 and a water tower. Which would you prefer?)

Comicon Aftermath

Got back from the Pittsburgh Comicon on Sunday night. Since we started going in 2000, I’ve had the same complaints—it opens too early (10:00 am on Friday, fer Chrissakes?), it goes on too long, it doesn’t bring in a crowd (to its defense, neither does any other Pittsburgh-based show), its admission is over-priced, the staff isn’t particularly friendly and it’s located in a part of Pittsburgh that’s always under construction and congested with traffic. Add a couple of Penguins and Pirates games into that mix, top it with an accident that shut down the half of the Parkway that wasn’t being blown up by PenDot and you wound up with an excruciatingly slow and unprofitable show. At least for the vendors.

Honestly, though, I was a little surprised. I thought sure the “ghoul factor” would have been more present this year around, given that the show’s creator, Mike George, had been recently convicted of the First Degree Murder of his wife in 1990. Whether or not you believe Mike is guilty or innocent, you have to admit the novelty of attending a convention that has this sort of brand new mystique to it. Quite the opposite happened, however. A number of folks—both attendees and, allegedly, guests—boycotted the show for this very reason. Rumor has it that some of the vendors referred to it as “Murder Con”, though I didn’t hear anyone refer to it like that directly.

The final tally, though, despite the heavy draws of David Prowse (listed as “Star War’s [sic] Darth Vader”) and Jim Balent and Holly Golightly, the crowd just didn’t want to come and, to paraphrase Yogi Berra, we couldn’t stop ‘em.

Now, we’ve long since resigned ourselves to the fact that it’s really difficult to make money at a Pittsburgh-based show, but we tend to enjoy ourselves at Comicon. For one thing, I love comic books. They hold a place in my heart right next to the movies. Plus, as far as the show itself goes, it was the first we ever attended professionally and it’s helped us establish a good base of close friends. If it weren’t for Comicon, I doubt I’d have as good a relationship with the comic artists I now count among my friends (for an abbreviated list, please see Sirens of Cinema Magazine). And it can usually be counted on to give us at least two out of three on our Fun/Contacts/Money Success Triangle. This year, due to low attendance (thanks to construction, traffic, games, weather, and Pittsburgh indifference in general), we barely squeaked by with Fun and Contacts.

As usual, there were some amazing artists there, a lot of whom I hope to work with in Sirens later in the year. And it was cool to see Jim and Holly, Joe Jusko, Billy Tucci, Mike and Diana Okamoto, Dave Nestler, Dorian, Louis Small Jr., Chris Yambar and many other Comicon friends. A couple of my students showed up to hang out, as did Jeff Waltrowski, Eric and Lorena (Splatter Movie, Black Sunday) and we got to have drinks with Kristen Blank and the Rev. Steve Foland. It was a bummer that several people we were hoping to see had cancelled, particularly Jimmy Palmiotti, Amanda Conner, Michael Kaluta and Kane Hodder (damn you, Kane!!).

My personal highlight came on Saturday afternoon. Amy and I were guests on a panel with legendary writer/editor/artist Al Feldstein, creator of EC Comics’ horror line (Tales from the Crypt, Vault of Horror). I remember when we first ordered our table, I requested that we be included on this “Very Scary” panel, which also originally consisted of Al, Kane, Len Barnhart (Reign of the Dead) and others, but we never heard back. Flipping through the program on Saturday, I saw that we’d been added to the line up. And imagine my surprise when it was just the three of us and a three-quarter-filled audience! (I was half-terrified that Conrad Brooks (Plan 9 From Outer Space) was going to invite himself to the panel as well—something he’s notorious for—but he didn’t arrive until much later on Saturday, relief of reliefs.) So I got the chance to interact with one of my own personal heroes and influences! (And if you doubt any of that, watch The Resurrection Game and pay close attention to Necro-Phil!)

Still, despite long periods of crushing boredom—trying to engage the tumbleweeds in conversation just to keep the gun out of my mouth!—we still managed to have a good and productive time. A few things were discussed that could lead to a cool 2008 and some new friends were made who could also add cool to the coming year. But more than anything else, it made me wish that it was October and that Wasteland was right around the corner.

The Return From Wasteland

Last week, I sent out three copies of Splatter Movie: The Director’s Cut, started teaching at the Savini School of Digital Photography, wrote more of my new book, copied almost a hundred DVDs - none of that compared to the excitement of a new pending Cinema Wasteland.

Yes, this is another of those blogs that begins, "As you all know, Wasteland is our favorite show..." The Cleveland convention has always been a highlight of our year and this past April show was no exception. In fact, it was one of the best times we’d ever had, particularly as no one emailed me on Saturday to tell me that a company I was working for was no longer in business. Not losing a job first thing in the morning is a terrific way to ward off depression.

Wasteland is our "family" show. While we generally have an awesome time at every show, Wasteland is the show where we feel completely comfortable and welcome. The antithesis of the high school gym feeling you often receive at biz gatherings. If you’re a regular reader of this online screed, then you know how we feel about this show, Ken and Pam Kish the promoters, the staff, the hotel, the atmosphere, the humidity, etc. At the risk of alienating the new reader(s), I think I’ll forgo the Romper Room roster ("I saw Damien and Ed and Jill and Greg and Carrie and Mike and...) and just hit the highlights:

I somehow managed to con William Wright, one of my head writers at Sirens of Cinema, to drag his wife and young child (the amazingly friendly (clingy? Needy?) Harlan Hunter) 600 miles from Tennessee to join us in the insanity. Which was awesome. Hell, half the staff of Sirens was in attendance at this show, which was also, you know, awesome. Within seconds, Harlan had lept from mom Olivia’s arms into Amy’s, and then into Mink Stole’s. Mink’s response: "I love that fans are always giving me things at conventions."

I also loved that Mink loved the issue of Sirens containing her interview. (11, incidentally, with the Joe Jusko cover, still available through the site.) I hadn’t heard from her after what I considered to be the best interview I’d done all last year, so I was terrified I’d insulted her, etc. Turns out there was a family tragedy that kept her from responding. (What a relief!) So my terror was immediately replaced by, okay, guilt. Still, she liked the issue and that made me do the little "Happy Mink Stole Liked the Issue Dance". Not to be confused with the "Happy Wasteland Dance" and the "Happy Doughnut Dance". We do a lot of dances at Happy Cloud Pictures.

Five minutes before the dealer’s room opened on Friday, Ilsa herself, Dyanne Thorne, appeared in the doorway to introduce herself to the room and to wish everyone a terrific show. She looked amazing and that was a classy thing to do. One dealer grumbled, "Sure, that’s because she’s going to make all the money." He was summarily killed and eaten. We did the "Happy Devoured Grumpy Dealer Dance".

Sid Haig walked through the door and shook my hand instead of stabbing me in the throat with a letter opener. Not that he’s ever done this, but it always feels good when he doesn’t.

Henrique Couto arrived with a friend of his from New Jersey. Her name was Regina. She was dressed as a school girl. Eventually, she overcame her shyness and joined in on the fun. Henrique had dropped 30 pounds or so from the last time we’d seen him. He also never wore pants the entire time he was there.

Low Budget Pictures was represented this trip by Chris Seaver (genius director of Mulva 2), Travis (genius actor of Carnage for the Destroyer) and Josh (genius star of Film Crew and now legally allowed to travel within the state of Ohio once again). They yelled a lot and refused to give me a copy of Ski Wolf. No matter how much blow I hooked them up with.

We presented Tom Sullivan with the very Grendel mask he wore in Splatter Movie. He was pleased. Then he went back to constructing a seven-foot-tall manniquin of The Dread, from the film of the same name. Later, we learned he’d exchanged the Grendel mask for a taco and some duct tape. His partner, Pat Reese, stole the mask back and ate the taco.

Our executive producer, Fred Obermiller, gave us a copy of "Cinema Skin" that contained a rave review of A Feast of Flesh and two screen grabs of the ever-topless Rachelle Williams. I conned William Wright into going up to her in the bar to have her sign it. (Jeez, I can get him to do anything.) It was funny. She only slapped him twice before autographing it. He only slapped her once in return. Now they are legally married in Dubai.

Mike and Carolyn Haushalter joined us for dinner at Applebee’s on Friday, which rocked. The company and the food. As we were leaving, there were two hosts at the door talking as we left. As we passed the first one, he said, "Have a great night." The second one, thinking he was speaking to her, said "What?"

I said, "He said ’have a good night’."

She said, "Oh, no - I thought -"

"Oh, so I’m not allowed to have a good night?" I said. "Jeez, the service at this place."

She turned beet red. I did the "Happy Embarressed and Confused Applebee’s Hostess Dance".

David and Tara joined us on Saturday. They were supposed to join us Friday as well, but, fortunately, they were not killed on the way. Just delayed. We did the "Happy Still Alive David and Tara Dance" (that joke never gets old). Tara had created a Tara-sized shirt out of the Happy Cloud shirt we’d given her for Christmas. She’d snipped away almost three yards of material. Now it’s useless as a bed sheet. Jeez. Amy dragged them all over the dealer’s room to introduce them to all of our con friends. Tara met Unky Lloyd Kaufman and got all verklempt. (Tara gets star-struck during card tricks, though. She once met that guy who dresses in question marks and tries to sell you a phone book-sized tome on Free Money. It took her two hours to blink or breathe again, she was so impressed. She bought six books.) Unky Lloyd followed her around for several minutes trying to convince her to be in Troma’s new "Pornogeist". He wrote his number on the back of David’s head for her. Next week, we all drive up to New York to write our names on the side of the Troma building and then run. They’ll be awestruck by our penmanship!

Saturday night, Splatter Movie: The Director’s Cut (what I thought was the final version, but I found four bad sound cues) screened to a packed room. We were astounded at the amount of people in there. Some of them weren’t even in the movie! There were three guys in the back row talking back to the movie the whole time and were actually 93% as funny as the movie itself. Amy and I introduced the movie by saying "Not in the face," and then drinking every time we had a panic attack. It’s like "Quarters" for neurotics.

Al Tuskes, from Precinct 13, joined us for the screening and claimed to have enjoyed it immensely. He obviously wasn’t lying because he joined us for drinks afterwards. A lot of drinks. Apple Juice, ice water and bible passages.

"Bible Passages" is made with vodka.

At one point, I was talking to Regina and this dumb blonde dressed like Milia in Resident Evil came over to my table, looked at me, then took Regina’s arm and said "I HAVE to interview you for my show." Then proceded to yak at her in front of my table while I shouted "No, that’s okay. Ignore the guest and interview the attendee. Very classy, Queen of the Peroxide!" Actually, I didn’t shout the latter. But I thought it loudly. Later, said woman was found in the lobby covered in sperm and shame. I may have made that last part up too, depending on whether or not it can be construed as libel.

By Sunday, we’re usually ready to come home, but not this time. We were exhausted, from the drinking, the revelry and the corridor beer pong competition (combining man’s love of both beer and pong), but we weren’t ready to leave. But finally, we tore ourselves away. It took us over an hour to say our goodbyes - To Lixx Online, to Ken and Pam, to Charlie and Tim and Kate, to Carrie and Mike, to the Toe Tag folks, Art and Allana, Rob Lucas, Xploited, the Professor, Mary-Anne... A wonderful time was had by all. Or, at least, by us. And isn’t that what’s really important?

Splatter Movie: The Director's Cut - first trailer!

It took a while, but I was finally able to upload the first trailer for Splatter Movie: The Director's Cut.

Don't forget that you can check this out for yourself at Cinema Wasteland, Saturday, April 5 at 10:00 PM! Ken and Pam are screening the finished cut of the film in all its glory. We're not ready to start selling it from the site yet, as we're currently shopping it around, but we'll have a few copies available at Wasteland, while supplies last.

Feel free to grab this and imbed it on your own page!

Best Vampire Hunter of 2007... and the winner is -

Me!

Hey, I didn't know I was even nominated, which would have been an honor in and of itself! Does that mean I beat out Kate Beckensale in Underworld 2? Or did that come out in 2006? Okay, regardless, she was a vampire hunter, but still...

Anyway, you can check out the other winners of The Horror Oscars, hosted by Desert Screams Productions, HERE.

So, to you three or four people who hated me in A Feast of Flesh, I say to you "Nyah!" To the rest of you who loved me, including me, I humbly accept this award on my behalf.

* * *

It's still snowing, the mine is still drilling, my cold continues to plague me. On the plus side, I may have conquered my insomnia. At the very least, I'm attempting to sleep it off.

Tomorrow, Amy and I head to the set of George A. Romero Presents Deadtime Stories, written and produced by our friend, Jeff Monahan. I'm shooting stills and covering the production, Amy is playing a nurse in a key scene. The first part of the shoot is at Penn State, the second at Laurel Caverns. Yep, nothing like heading underground during the winter! But check out the movie HERE. It's gonna be cool!

* * *

The new issue of Sirens of Cinema is going to press this weekend. It has a beautiful cover by Daniel Horne and features interviews with Lena Headey (Sarah Connor: The Terminator Chronicles), Mary Lambert (Pet Sematery) and a special goodbye to Malia Nurmi (aka Vampira). I mention this because I want everyone who reads this to go out and buy multiple copies, subscribe twice and force complete strangers to make purchases of their own, at gunpoint if necessary.
Sales aren't down, I just want to see who will do it. I love exercising power!

Back from Chicago

Okay, I'm dying from some new, exciting cold, thanks to the multiple temperatures my body was subjected to this weekend, not to mention ongoing insomnia, so I'll make this fast.

We spent the weekend in the wonderful world of Chicago for the Fangoria Weekend of Horrors, one of our favorite shows of the year (after Cinema Wasteland, of course). As usual, we got to see the airport and the hotel, but this year, we also saw a very icy parking lot and a very clean Target (we needed supplies - sandwiches, chocolate, booze, etc.).

The folks at Creation - Adam, Stephanie, Leticia - treated us like stars. Fangoria's editor, Tony Timpone (the man, the legend), brought the layout for my Rage article for me to check out, which was awesome. And we were set up across from Kane Hodder on one side and Ari Lehman and Sid Haig on the other. And we were back-to-back with composer Harry Manfriedi! So, we had great neighbors. And because Kane actually noticed this time when I hit him back (he usually punches me hello), he swore he'd never hit me again. Now instead of taps to the chest that collapse my lungs, he gives me bear hugs that compress the rest of my organs. Not sure which I prefer, actually.

I had planned a number of projects for the slow periods of the show -- interviewing people for the upcoming Resurrection Game DVD, proof-reading the new issue of Sirens of Cinema, etc -- but oddly enough, we didn't have any slow periods. Thanks to many pounds of cookies provided by our producer and sponsor, Tim Buchholz, much of my time was spent harassing people into taking freebies (you'd think they were poisoned or something? Of course, as one fan said, "This isn't a show that engenders trust!"). The rest of the time was taken up by the stampede of people who wanted to buy copies of A Feast of Flesh, take pictures with Amy and Sofiya, and snatch up our 30 copies of Splatter Movie.

Yes, for the first time in our convention career, we sold out of a title. Completely SOLD OUT of Splatter Movie by 1pm on Sunday. Most of those copies had sold even before our screening on Saturday. And the screening itself went over pretty well. We had a pretty packed house, even though you needed two sherpas and a sled dog team to find the screening room, and the two guys who decided to "Rocky Horror" the movie stayed for the entire thing, so at least they weren't bored!

We sold a number of subscriptions to Sirens as well, four of them without having to talk them into it! They wanted them because they'd read the magazine! (See? I TOLD you people read it! They don't just buy it for the free gum!)

The only drawback came at the very end of the show. A sextet of douche-waffles decided to attempt to take advantage of our and Sofiya's good graces. But they were the instruments of their own misfortune, which turned out to be very funny in the end. Still, we should have allowed Kane to hurt them.

And while I'm sure I'll forget a few names, we just wanted to say thanks to Rob, Tammy, Amber, Codger, Chris (Phreeq), Yo Joe, Johnny, Harry (sorry we were out of #4), Debbie, Mr. Skin, Marv, Chadwick and company, Ryan and Michelle, Gabby, Betsy, Sid, Ari, Kane, Megan, Ron, Cathy, Jeremy, Jen, Monique, Saint, Monet and August. And, especially, Tim B.

And Acid and my Monkey, Kory Chupacabra (and maybe I'll explain that one later).

So let's hear it for selling out of Splatter Movie! Hear that, distributors? People LOVE US!

Right... going to bed now.

Sleepless in Waynesburg

My insomnia continues to be my best friend, though I have been a little more successful at the shut-eye thing of late. Slowly but surely I'm remastering the fine art of sleeping.

Of course, I can't just blame the stress or my natural penchant towards spaz-ism. One of our local coal companies misrepresented itself to us and our neighbors. Instead of the single line of pipe they claimed they would lay (to vent methane from one of the mines), they have begun to drill a methane capture well on our neighbor's hill. Which is directly in between two of their biggest pastures. Being sheep farmers, they need the pastures to feed their sheep. Without grazing land, sheep tend to do stupid things like starve and die. To make matters even more fun, the drilling goes on 24 hours a day, the sound travels over four miles to our land, keeping me awake even more. But, since I'm usually up anyway, the noise gives me the opportunity to be angry as well as exhausted.

When our neighbors complained to workers that this is not what was agreed upon, the workers replied, "We'll do what we want when we want."

So I'll be taking this up with the news--TV and paper. And internet. And, possibly, from my roof, shouting at God.

It's a character flaw of mine. I hate oppression. Not a big fan of corporate lying, either. Makes me testy.

With all this in mind, I've been trying to focus on getting things prepared for the Fangoria Weekend of Horrors in Chicago this weekend. It's always a great show for us, economically and funwise. And this year, we're listed as official guests. And Splatter Movie: The Director's Cut is premiering (in front of an unbiased audience, as terrifying as that may be) at 4:00 pm on Saturday. Which is a great time slot. The proof of my claims can be found HERE.

In other Fangoria news, my third-ever article for them runs in the current issue. It details my and Amy's set-visit to The Rage, where we got to hang with Robert Kurtzman and Andrew Divoff for the better part of the day, as well as get a personal tour of Precinct 13--Bob K's studio in Ohio. Seeing this piece in print gave me a special little thrill. Even though I've been writing professionally for about a decade now, I think that I've mentioned that Fangoria was always a market I'd dreamed of "cracking". And now I have, three issues in a row. So now I await Satan's collection on the contract I must have signed on one of my insomnia-enduced episodes.

Enough babbling - if you're going to be in Chicago this weekend, and, really, I see no reason why you shouldn't be, swing by the Happy Cloud table and say hi, pick up a copy of the pre-release of Splatter Movie, buy a subscription to Sirens of Cinema and say nice things about my hair.

Good night, good luck and good news tomorrow.

SPLATTER MOVIE is...

Done.

Every time I finish a movie and announce it's completion, I feel like I'm lying. It feels utterly strange to think of a movie as "finished". Even in this case. Really, Splatter Movie: The Director's Cut needs some minor sound work, and likely needs a few tweaks to the credits. And I still need to work out a deal with the special guest end credits musicians (not Lorraine 'a Malena this time sadly, but a band completely different but still awesome to be announced later). But, ostensibly, this movie is complete.

The final piece of the puzzle was provided by Alan Rowe Kelly (writer and director of the brilliant I'll Bury You Tomorrow and the delightfully-demented The Blood Shed). Alan came aboard at the last minute to provide the voice of "Devora Simmons", the off-screen documentrix who is motivating the whole shebang. And his voice gives the movie, strangely, an even deeper edge. Alan's voice has a Barbara Walters tinge to it, so the movie now feels even, dare I say it, 'legitimate'.

A consumate professional, Alan read each line in the three-page voice over script six times, giving me plenty to choose from. Which was awesome. Less awesome was treating each line with filters and room tone to make it match the existing sound while, at the same time, removing my voice as much as possible from the tracks. And, of course, while doing that, I couldn't help but tweak shot-length, fuss over color corrections, remix certain musical stings, futz with some additional effects shots... Still, all in all, the final pass on the film only took a few hours on Friday and Sunday.

And then it was done.

To really add to the surreal "final pass", I was also transferring some old Resurrection Game behind-the-scenes footage from VHS to DVD. So parts of our first movie played while I finished up our latest one. The ten years in between felt like a dynasty. Watching old, ancient footage of us--we were all so young!--struggle with confined spaces and war-era equipment as we strived beyond logic to finish our first ridiculous epic. There were two images in particular that struck me simultaneously.

On our snazzy i-Mac, I edited the end Splatter Movie credits and found a shot of me behind our new (-ish) XL-2 DV camera. Meanwhile, on the television, there came an ancient shot of me jerry-rigging a rented 16mm Arri-BL with duct tape and a trim of black leader to keep the film magazine and focus rings from falling off. And I'm talking about shooting the assembled movie off a flatbed linear editing machine with my own ancient VHS camcorder.

How far we've come. And yet, we still often wonder what the hell we're doing and why. Just as we did ten years ago.

Right now, we're making advanced Splatter Movie DVDs to send out to prospective distributors. At the same time, I'm readying more VHS footage (over 60 hours of the crap!) for Jeff Waltrowski as he labors over the new Resurrection Game documentary for the upcoming 10th Anniversary DVD. For this doc, I'm running down our stars for new interviews. Francis Veltri I caught the day before he and his entire family moved to Indiana. Ray Yeo is in the process of readying his own house for sale before moving his family to a new school district. Kristen Pfeifer, at last message, lives in Oregon with her new husband. Dave Shremp passed away of a brain tumor three weeks after principal photography was completed. A special memorial is also planned for the DVD in his honor.

And I was continually struck with how far we've come as artists (or "artists", whichever) in ten years. We may not be rich or world famous, but we achieved a great deal of what we set out to do. And that's enough to get me to sleep at night.

Or would be, if this damned insomia would go away... but that's another blog.

Brief notes before unconsciousness

Okay, I haven't slept for more than two hours at a time in over three weeks, so I'm taking one last shot at relearning the fine art of unconsciousness in a few minutes, but I wanted to bring a few things to everyone's attention.

First, thanks to Jeff Waltrowski, Patrick Desmond and the awesome Alan Rowe Kelly, Splatter Movie: The Director's Cut is 99% complete. Alan (The Blood Shed) stepped in to play the voice of off-camera interviewer, "Devora Simmons" and did a fantastic job. I still have a few more lines to add into the mix, but we can't thank Alan for helping us out. Now go and check out his movies, I'll Bury You Tomorrow and The Blood Shed, both available from Heretic Films.

Jeff and Patrick helped me out with a couple of really startling effects shots that occur later in the film and, again, thanks so much to them both. Jeff is, of course, Splatter Movie's director of photography and Patrick shot a terrific day of Steadicam for us as well. So you should all go and check out Jeff's Project: Valkyrie from Tempe Films (Valkyrie is the best "robots vs. nazis film" since Schindler's List). And you should check out Patrick's star-studded The Absence of Light from York Entertainment.

With Splatter Movie nearing completion, the Happy Cloud clan is turning its attention back to the movie that started it all: The Resurrection Game. Celebrating its 10-year anniversary in October (the script celebrated that anniversary in 2007). We're putting together a brand new anniversary DVD and Jeff, Amy and I are working on a brand new documentary for the disc, featuring interviews with the film's stars (including Ray Yeo and Francis Veltri), menus hosted by the one and only Necro-Phil and at least two commentaries. Plus other surprises. Jeff is currently sifting through over 120 hours of behind-the-scenes video (much of it in terrible, terrible shape, unfortunately). The likelihood of deleted scenes, however, is slim for the primary reason that we shot on film and only transferred the footage we needed to DV. I'll see what I can cull from past work-print versions, however. So this stuff won't be in the best of shape, but for you loyal 2 dozen fans out there, you're in for a treat. Or, at least, an upgrade to the dreadful VHS bootlegs you've been hanging onto all of these years.

Also, you guys should head over and show some love to JimmyO and Debbie Rochon, both of whom have some medical problems that will end happily but could use some support anyway. As everyone knows, we count these two among our very best friends, so let's send them all our best karma, prayers, positive energy and bushels of money.

Yesterday, February 6, marked a number of things and, depending on your beliefs, will either mean a lot to you, or nothing at all. First, it was a New Moon, the last of Winter, which means, according to Wicca, that it's a perfect time to start new projects. Second, it was the beginning of the Chinese New Year--either The Year of the Rat or the Year of the Mouse, depending on what menu you read; whatever, it's a rodent. And for my money, the new year has always felt "newer" on the Chinese New Year. But the better news is for people born between February 1972 and February 1973 (like me). This Year of the Rat/Mouse is YOUR year. Your birth year. It's the perfect time for new ventures, new outlooks on life and good change all around. So, stay tuned for some (hopefully) awesome news for us, since 2008 will be blessed for us.

(And we're on the cusp of a new administration, getting rid of the current band of idiots--apologies to the staff of MAD Magazine. Personally, I don't care WHO gets into office, as long as they make the current guy leave.)

Finally, and more importantly, yesterday saw Amy and my 14th anniversary together. Yes, fourteen years ago yesterday, we decided to take our relationship to the next level and have been happy and healthy together ever since. We've known each other, however, for almost twenty years, now, which is pretty frightening when you think about it. So here's to US, the Nick and Nora of the indie industry (or something like that). Love you, Amy!

Right... I'm going to bed.

Stuff we did on our last weekend off...

Had a very unproductive weekend. Primarily, we laid around and did as little as possible. I had utterly no motivation to do anything and was unsuccessful at fighting it. Aside from some cursory Sirens work, all I really accomplished was watching a few movies. To wit:

Cloverfield: Okay, so we had to go out to see this one. At a packed theater in the South Side (and, yeah, Jordan, like I said - I ignored you because you don't call someone in a movie theater! Especially if you're in the same theater. It's an unwritten rule that should be friggin' written!) sitting three rows from the screen. I was pre-disposed to liking this because of the pretentious dick on NPR who disdained it's shaky camera and that it "didn't bring anything new to the giant monster genre". And true to my disposition, I liked it. A lot. Having spent the last decade watching backyard, no-budget movies, I barely noticed the shaky cam and thought, from a stylistic and thematic point of view, that the movie was a real success. To no surprise, the movie grossed a bushel of money, guaranteeing sequels galore, which I'm fine with. But since it's J.J. Abrams, I'm sure midway through the second installment, it'll all fall apart but we'll have too much invested to stop watching.

Transformers. Big, dumb, noisy. And ridiculously long. I missed it in the theater but, ironically, don't feel like I missed anything at all.

War. Jet Li vs. Jason Statham. And this is the best they could come up with? Lackluster story, uninspired action (Corey Yuen, what the hell happened to you?). Ridiculous, tacked-on ending. Bleah.

Hairspray. I was actually doing a bit of work while this was on but enjoyed it anyway. It didn't change my life, but the original didn't either. Fun. Not enough Christopher Walken. And someone should teach John Travolta the difference between a Baltimore accent and a Pittsburgh accent. It did make me miss Divine.

Brokeback Zombies. Jeff and Pam Fugate run Hell's Orphans, which I'm sure you've seen at countless conventions. They're two of my favorite people and they seem to be raising their child correctly (he'll be cannibalizing the mailman in no time). Their latest is a marked improvement over their first movies--and that isn't meant to be a back-handed compliment. I love watching filmmakers evolve. This is a fun romp with the undead but doesn't contain the man/male zombie love that the title implies, sadly. And Jeff gives the best performance in the movie. (There's a little testimonial by Lloyd Kaufman included. We spent a few minutes trying to figure out which con it was shot at. Twisted Nightmare? Monster Mania? No - finally, I figured it out: fucking Genghis Con II!)

Teen Ape Goes to Camp. Every time we run into Chris Seaver and the Low Budget Pictures gang, we end up with nine or ten of their latest movies, three of which were shot and edited prior to lunch. This was one of them. I'm not a Teen Ape fan, but this installment made me one. And it contained two of my favorite jokes: "Camp Idonwanna" and "Dude, Where's Mein Kampf?" I plan to use these both in casual conversation from now on.

Film Crew. Enjoying TAGtC as much as we did, we decided to make it a double feature (especially since something called Foot Ball pre-empted The Simpsons). Film Crew features some of my favorite LBP actors - Meredith Host Von Bonage, Jason McCall and Noel Neill - and one of my least favorite, Josh Suire, who has, on several occassions, made my flesh crawl clean off my bones. Josh, however, in both Film Crew and TAGtC, is hysterical. Granted, there was a level of safety involved - Josh was inside my TV where he couldn't hurt me. But, damn, he was funny as the demented Caspian. Although I suspect that Seaver based that character on Josh himself but couldn't find anyone else to play him that day.

All in all, it was a weekend well-spent. Except I couldn't figure out why, after a day of inactivity, I was so tired. Then I realized: I was relazed. It was a weird, alien feeling. Fortunately, it resulted in another bout of insomnia, so everything was back to normal.

The only announcement I have from the weekend is to tell everyone to run out and buy the new issue of Fangoria 270. I have another article in there, about the new 40th Anniversary documentary of Night of the Living Dead. AND there's an unprecidented (for us, anyway) 3-star/disc review of A Feast of Flesh, which made us feel all warm and fuzzy (like a lollipop left under the sofa). Run out and get it while you can - don't let there be a hole in your precious Mike Watt collection. Someday, there will be a museum. Sooner, rather than later, if I have any say in it.

Oh, and I'm turning old this coming Saturday. Send me gifts. Or, at least, condolences, but gifts are preferable. Go here and be generous.

Finally, Andy Copp's new blog is priceless. I've seen it before, but it bears repeating.

EDIT: New article posted on Film Threat about "the greatest western since Unforgiven". Read it HERE.

First blog of 2008 is shameless shilling

So... the first official blog of 2008 is little more than a shill. It's been a wild 12 days so far, what with Tara and Dave's wedding, grinding away on the new issue of Sirens of Cinema, and... well, work and more work.

Splatter Movie: The Director's Cut is 99% complete. We're just waiting on voice over from - wait for it - Alan Rowe Kelly! Alan, writer and director of I'll Bury You Tomorrow and The Blood Shed, is lending his vocal talents to the movie as "Devora Simmons", the documentarian who is filming the insantiy of the making of Amy Lee Parker's Tesseract. Once Alan's v.o. is in, Splatter Movie will be ready for the selling. We have a short list of a half-dozen distributors we want to send it to - many of whom actually requested it, which is a nice change from just foisting our work on the unsuspecting.

While we're on the subject of Splatter Movie, if you haven't already done so, you should head on over to the official Splatter Movie Myspace page and check out the fourth and final Amy Lee Parker video blog, which ties directly into the film. (You have to be a friend of the page to view the video - no hacking, downloading or cracking, if you please!)

If this gets you sutably intrigued, you should also head over to Sirens of Cinema, plunk down $20 and receive not only four fantastic issues of the greatest magazine ever created but also the Splatter Movie Companion, a special DVD we created specificially for Sirens that ties in with our newest opus, providing more insight into this bizarre, gory and wonderful movie.

If that's not enough, we're going to soon announce places where you can catch Splatter Movie: The Director's Cut - screenings, film festivals, drive-by projections onto brick walls...

If you aren't suitably excited by now, check your pulse. You might have passed away just after clicking on this message (and using your final breath to check out my latest blog just brings a tear to my eye - thanks, friend!).

Other shills... uh, news: I feel it's my duty to remind you that Fangoria 269, currently on the stands, features a big article on Happy Cloud Pictures, so if you haven't picked that up yet, the terrorists truly have won.

Oh, and I've been added to the official guest line-up for April's Cinema Wasteland, the greatest show on Earth. I'm usually there, but the site makes me an official Important Guest. So there.

More news soon. Please find constructive ways to fill your time until then.

Goodbye 2007!

While there were a few setbacks that came with 2007, it was infinitely better than 2006, and I feel fondness towards this dying year. 2007, for the most part, was good to us, though it kicked the asses of a lot of our friends and family. Because, of course, that's what years do. We've forced our lunar cycle into this arbitrary box of time-telling--our year ends tonight, China's ends later in Febrary, and the Aztecs STILL thumb their noses at us--so the year acts appropriately as it trudges along through the 365. It slaps us with tidings good and bad and never in equal amounts. (Good luck, after all, arrives at the door alone, with a small gift and threadbare clothes; bad luck comes with overfilling sacks and has brought all his drunken relatives.)

What 2007 is leaving me with, however, is a sense of calm and inexplicable optimism towards 2008. I can't explain it--no more than I could explain the optimism I felt at the close 2006 (though perhaps that was more desperation than anything else)--but I have high hopes for 2008. And I wish everyone the very best of all possible fortune for the coming year.

So tonight, let us all eat, drink and be merry (or be Carl, what do I care?). Or rest, or cower or hold your breath until the damned ball drops. In other words: Happy New Year!

Sirens of Cinema and a free gift!

Let's see, I've pimped the new Fangoria appearance and our blatantly-positive Feast of Flesh reviews, what's next?

Oh, yes: Sirens of Cinema 10! With our swanky wrap-around cover by Holly Golightly (School Bites) celebrating 30 years of Star Wars! Also boasting interviews with Angela Bettis (May) and Kristen Kerr (Flight of the Living Dead), Julie and Lizzy Strain (Black Dahlia Movie), Debbie Rochon on The Colour from the Dark - and oodles more! Plus, the word "oodles"!

AND, we have a special treat for new subscribers: for a VERY limited time, if you pick up a subscription to Sirens of Cinema (for a ridiculously low price, click HERE) you'll receive a free DVD copy of The Splatter Movie Companion. This special DVD was created by Amy and I strictly for Sirens readers and boasts footage that cannot be seen anywhere else. (When the official DVD of Splatter Movie is finally released, this Companion featurette will NOT be included - this is the only way you'll get to see some of this footage, which ties directly into the Splatter Movie mythology.) Plus, a sneak-peek at one of the stories from the upcoming Brinke's Tales of Horror created by the late Joe D. Casey.

All this-- all the Leia goodness, the reviews, the articles--come for the nouns, stay for the verbs! Buy the consonants and the vowels come free (including "Y" for a limited time!)

Keep Sirens alive and subscribe. That way, you won't feel all sad and rejected when you go to Barnes and Noble only to discover that the issue is sold out! (And if it isn't sold out, do us a solid, willya, and move it down in front of lesser magazines like People or Time. Corporate bastards...) You'll get a year's worth of cool issues and eye-popping, suitable-for-framing covers (seriously... Joe Jusko? Mike Lilly?? How DO we do it?). And seriously, what else were you planning on doing with your money? Buying food? Didn't you eat yesterday?

So CLICK HERE and get your subscription and your free copy of The Splatter Movie Companion. This is a limited offer so strike while the fire is hot, or whatever that saying is. Or don't come crying to us when all of your friends have theirs and won't let you see them (seriously, guys - don't let them see it! It'll be our secret and we can giggle and text each other behind their backs!).

Only after you receive your subscription will you ever truly be happy...

Feast of Flesh reviews for fun!

The reviews for A Feast of Flesh are still coming in. The majority of them have been positive, and the negative ones have been truly negative. I've only seen one so far that was just "eh, it's okay". So what we have here, folks, is a "love it or hate it" movie. Which is fine by me.

I thought I'd post links to some of the positive ones, here, just to keep the momentum going. I'd post links to the negative ones, too, but we're contractually not allowed. I don't particularly care - the joke's on the guys who hated it, ya know? They're the ones who requested the screeners and had to sit through it! - and I enjoy a good insult as much as anyone, even if I'm the recipient. But there's this mode of thinking that negative press doesn't help sales. So... okay, I'll remain eyes fixed upon the financial prize and keep the negative reviews sequestered to Google searches.

Anyway, my most recent favorite comes from Tim "Tex Massacre" Anderson over at Bloody Disgusting, who wrote that I come off like a "leprechaun with a Tommy gun".

Another favorite comes from Movies Made Me Do It, who wrote "A Feast of Flesh is a great vampire film, and this is coming from someone who normally skips over any DVD that even references another vampire flick." He seems to like all of our movies, so he holds a special place in my heart.

Speaking of people I love, Doug Waltz gave us a glowing review on Cult Cuts, but the site seems to have vanished. I'll try and get Doug to send me a transcription and post it here, because he always makes Amy and I seem like geniuses. Doug makes us happy.

Another of my favorite people, Michael Den Boer, says that, with AFOF, "Director Mike Watt avoids the sophomore curse" and goes on to say other nice things about the movie over at his wonderful site 10,000 Bullets.

David Carter at Film Fanaddict liked Amy a whole lot: "Amy Lynn Best does a commendable job as the film’s lead and displays a broader range of emotions that one typically sees in a low budget horror film."

Eros-LA gave A Feast of Flesh "Six chainsaws, five vibrators, and a high-five."

Oddly enough, the ones who seemed to enjoy it the most were the kind fellows at Mr. Skin. I don't have an account so I'm not sure how the rest of the review plays out, but it starts off enouraging HERE.

AND... in other news, Fangoria #269 just hit the stands and I finally got to hold a copy in my hands... and I've been leaving the other copies on the shelves open to our page. I'm thrilled beyond words. If you haven't bought your copy yet, you really don't love me, do you?

The Horrible Allegation

After battling the cold and spending over three grand on a new furnace, Amy and I received a very disturbing email on Saturday. The message was sent by a former acquaintance who is not a friend of ours any longer (in fact, the email stated "We're not friends and I don't wish to be, however I can't allow this to happen to anyone I know"). The Good Samaritan told us to check out our Feast of Flesh page on the IMDb and told us that we should "do something about it".

I was sitting with my back to the door and a cyber terrorist came up behind me and shot me in the back of the head. Someone had taken it upon themselves to steal the review from CHUD.com—which is a legitimately negative (and scathing) review—and add a single line, hidden several paragraphs down, accusing me of being a "true life" criminal, guilty, it alleges of a particularly heinous crime. It was all of six words, but it was the most damaging accusation I've ever received and it was—I hope it goes without saying—completely untrue.

I've been accused of being a lot of things, many of them justifiable and fairly accurate. I'm belligerent, egotistical, sarcastic, insulting, unnecessarily cruel to family and friends—I'm not proud of (most of) these things. But I can't deny they're true. But I'm not a criminal of any sort and I'm not a danger to anyone. And I didn't appreciate being accused of such. At all.

(This blog is going to be vague for a variety of necessary reasons. For one thing, I don't want to come right out and state the accusation because one of the things we killed ourselves to achieve over the past few days was getting that accusation expunged from the IMDb in the first place. I'd rather not have this allegation anywhere on the web. So let your imagination roam—what could possibly be the one accusation that would send me over the edge? Secondly, I'm not going to name names here, either. The party responsible would like to have the attention, even the negative attention, and I'm not going to give him the satisfaction.)

The post was signed with the title of a movie I recognized. So as to not cause the producers of this film undue harm, I'm going to make up a title, let's say Hellnukkah (don't steal it—that one's ours!). I was familiar with the project and knew a couple of folks involved with the film, including one who I'd never met but had caused a lot of problems for a very good friend of ours. We'll call this problematic person "Asshole 1". Because of recent horror stories about "Asshole 1" and our good friend (we'll call her "Gloria" for no particular reason), I was convinced very quickly that "Asshole 1" was the one who plagiarized the CHUD review and added the Horrible Allegation. I know a little bit about psychology and came to the conclusion that "Asshole 1" did this to a) prove to "Gloria" that she couldn't get away with leaving him and hurt her obliquely; b) attack me for being a friend of "Gloria"'s. The fact that he buried the Horrible Allegation in the body of the review proved that he wasn't very confrontational and the only people who would see it would be people searching for it (like, say, the FBI). Using a previously-published negative review, he was hoping I'd go after the author. Since I was familiar with the review in its original form, and since it didn't originally have the Horrible Allegation, I contacted CHUD and told them about the plagiarism, while, at the same time, sent half a dozen complaints to the IMDb to have them remove the comment.

Now, I actually had no problem with the review being on the page. I don't mind negative reviews at all, even scathing ones. There are a couple of funny lines in the piece, it's well thought-out and he backs up his opinions, rather than just spewing insults. He didn't like the movie; that's his right and it's fine. I just wanted the Horrible Allegation removed.

I was sinking deeper and deeper into a rage, however, and wanted to enact vengeance on Asshole 1. Violent vengeance. But I couldn't prove, yet, that Asshole 1 was indeed the author of the post. The breadcrumbs were leading to him though. Particularly signing the post with the "Hellnukkah" screen name. I attributed that mis-step to ego. Like the Zodiac Killer taunting the police and the newspapers.

When you work in any community or industry for a long enough period of time, you make enemies. Not as many as you do friends, provided you're not a complete wretch of a human being. So we have them. I have more than Amy does because, frankly… well, see above. I can be a bit of a bastard. I have people who dislike me in the publishing industry, people who dislike me because of reviews I'd written or general dealings I'd had in the past. Or they don't like me because their friends don't like me or… pick a reason. But the most "dangerous one", the ones who have been the most outspoken of my enemies, make up a very small group.

We went through the short list of people who would be most likely to pull something like this and came up with… bagel. None of the current persona-non-gratas of the Happy Cloud Clan would stoop that low. Not all of my enemies are classy, but the bulk of them would prefer to vilify me and vindicate themselves at the same time. The majority would be more apt to post "This is what he did and this is how it affected me!" And very few of them—again, as near to zero as I can calculate—would ever be this oblique. They'd want me to know what they said about me and how they felt. Because the fact of the matter is, most of my enemies used to be my friends. We're no longer friends because of a disagreement or falling out and there are more hurt feelings than there are thoughts of vengeance or ruining my life. And the same goes for how I feel about them. There are rifts that can't be mended. I'll draw your attention to the person who alerted us to this situation in the first place, the Good Samaritan. We're not friends any more and there's very little chance we ever will be. I can't think of anyone who hates me more than he does.

But even he had my back when it came to something like this.

Amy took the reins from there. She called Pop Cinema to see if anything could be done on their end. Paige Davis logged on and found a name associated with the account. A guy named Steve. A guy we know named Steve. A guy we know named Steve who lives in Pittsburgh and has been to our shows, we've been to dinner with him, we've worked with friends of his and, indeed, are friends with his friends. So my theory—my assurance—that it was "Asshole 1" went completely down the drain. And so did my rage.

Depression quickly replaced my fury. Instead of having an enemy out to destroy my life, I was now faced with the prospect of having a jokester plaguing me. The Horrible Allegation was, suddenly, a very unfunny joke at my expense. We called friends of Steve and told them that he should contact us immediately, or I was going to have his ass thrown in jail.

Again, the Horrible Allegation, particularly in this political climate, is something that could have gotten me arrested "for my own good and the good of the community" pending an investigation. Which, possibly, could mean my being thrown into general population of any number of judicial facilities until such a time as an investigation could be set underway. In which case, my good friends would be called upon to 25^th Hour my ass so I didn't wind up a subplot on the OZ reunion movie.

I was expecting Steve to email us or call us with denials, and he did. And in my paranoid state, I was ready to judge any denial as a lie or a CYA, but then, midway through the email, he dropped a name that I recognized. We'll call this person "Asshole 3" because he's just not cool enough to be the next asshole on the list. Actually, I think we'll bump him down to "Asshole 11" because that's what kind of nobody he is.

"Asshole 11" is one of those people who wants attention and wants to be noticed by people he admires. But he fixates on these people early and comes out on the offensive even before he introduces himself. It's an insecurity, a social dysfunction. He wants so much to be the badass in the room, the guy who knows everything and knows how to do it better than everyone else and wants everyone to look up to him for his badassedness. The problem is, he's not much of a badass and is more of a jerk than anything else. After a very annoying first encounter with him—through the internet, never in person—I started to ignore him. There was no sense in responding to him because I'd always be met with more abuse, more insults. He didn't weigh very heavily on my thoughts as I find flame wars to be very boring, so I stopped giving in. And, after a while, I stopped hearing from him. Everyone has one of these dipshits in their lives. They don't go by their real names on the web, you only have a vague idea of who they are, and you suffer them until they find someone else to annoy.

Message boards are filled with these people.

Apparently, Steve ran afoul of "Asshole 11" on a couple of boards and the guy started using Steve's name to flame other people. For fun. To discredit any opinion Steve would have. To make trouble, etc. Because of one particular board they both frequented, one from which "Asshole 11" was banned, I found the connection between him, Steve and the Hellnukkah people. "Asshole 11" had no idea that we had any connection with "Asshole 1"; the Hellnukkah thing was just to make them look even worse. As it turns out, he'd been using Hellnukkah in addition to Steve's name to flame other people. The Hellnukkah people even posted that on their official site—that the flames were not coming from them.

The vengeance returned, but not in the religious sense. I was suddenly very tired. I called a lawyer friend of mine and asked about my options. Most people recommended that I nail the motherfucker to the legal wall. My lawyer friend replied that there isn't a lot to be gained from it, that I'd spend more on legal fees than I'd get from suing him. Libel isn't a crime in PA, it's a civil matter, and the statutes might be different in the state that "Asshole 11" calls home. My lawyer friend asked me, point blank, "What do you want to get from all of this? Revenge, or the Horrible Allegation removed?" If it's the latter, then taking "Asshole 11" to court would just shine the light back on the Horrible Allegation, and then it would never go away. The Horrible Allegation and my name would be forever linked. And that's what would ruin my life. My own actions.

At this point, holes in the ground were starting to look really comfortable. As enraged as Amy was herself, however, she helped me try and get through all of this.

I don't insult easily. I'm not quick to get offended. But this Horrible Allegation fucking hurt. And when "Asshole 11" was revealed, I wondered what the hell I'd ever done to him to deserve it. The answer was: I'd ignored him. You don't ignore a psychopath—have horror movies taught me nothing?

But here I was again, with the only course of action available to me: ignoring it.

At this point, other people started coming to my aid. JimmyO, my parents, Pop Cinema, multiple other friends and family—thank you to everyone who helped out and sent in emails and phone calls of support! Seriously, thank you one and all!—all contacted the IMDb to report the libelous Horrible Allegation. Other people too including, again, someone who does not consider me a friend any longer, someone with whom I'd had a horrible falling out where terrible things were said on both sides. They went to the IMDb and demanded that the Horrible Allegation be removed because it was Just Not True. My enemies, people I'd hurt or had hurt me, had my back.

By Six O'Clock yesterday evening, the IMDb gave in to the countless complaints and took down the entire post. The plagiarized review was gone, the Horrible Allegation was gone, even my former colleague went back and deleted the Horrible Allegation from her quoted demand so that it could be expunged from all records. The Hellnukkah account had been deleted, along with any connection to Steve—whether by the IMDb or by "Asshole 11", I have no idea.

The only thing not gone at this point is the depression and the rage. I don't know how to box shadows. There's nothing saying that "Asshole 11" won't resurface again. Or that Assholes 12 through Infinity won't come with him or follow his lead. The Internet is an endless root knot of computers and there are Assholes all over the world, hiding behind their screen names and Second Life identities. They delight in being the bullies in the digital world because they're powerless in their analog life. There is truly nothing that can be done. I have to remain diligent, alert, and rely on my friends to keep me safe. And marvel that the people I deemed against me really aren't.

There are a lot of Assholes out there. But I have to remember what I learned through all of this: that there are a lot of Really Good People, too. Even if we don't like each other.

And to all a good night.

Freezing cold and good FANGO news

Our furnace gave out over the weekend, just in time for PA's first cold snap. We're currently bundled up inside the house surrounded by space heaters (thanks to my co-worker, Jessica, for donating her office one for our current cause). No idea how much a replacement will cost or, really, how the fuck we'll pay for it, but, what the hell, right? That's what makes life fun! Anyway, one bit of news before my nethers snap off: pick up a copy of Fangoria 269 in stores now.

Why? Happy Cloud Pictures is featured in the "Notes from the Underground" section. Mr. Gingold and Mr. Timpone invited me to chronicle our ten years a few months back and now here it is in all its glory (with photos by Mike Haushalter, Carolyn Oliver, Bill Homan and Jeff Lewis). Sneak preview of the cover HERE, with a lovely caption summing up the article about midway down the page. The article covers not only our recently-released-through-Bloody-Earth DVD A Feast of Flesh, but talks about our beginnings with the rarely-seen The Resurrection Game and our upcoming Splatter Movie: The Director's Cut. It's like a history lesson and a scoop all at the same time!

I have to confess that this is an abject honor for us. I know it's fashionable among the indie elite to kick Fangoria, but I've been a reader of the mag since I was a little kid—like so many others among us. My dreams have always been to both write for the publication and have one of my movies featured within. With this issue, both dreams have come true and I couldn't be happier!

If only inner warmth could translate to outer warmth…