Another Hole in the Head

... you know, like, "San Francisco needs another film festival like it needs another hole in the head."
Except in this case, San Francisco really needs this festival, because this is the only bay area film fest that celebrates horror, sci-fi, exploitation and general wackiness.

And y'all are invited to attend two weeks of mayhem from June 3 to June 16 at the Roxie Theater in the happening Mission District, S.F.

Highlights include:


- Helldriver, by Yoshihiro Nishimura (opening night)
- The Victim, Directed by and Starring Michael Biehn (who will be at the screening!)
- Absentia, by Mike Flanagan
- Red Ice, by Ralph Hyver (San Francisco Filmmaker)
- The Bleeding House, by Philip Gelatt
- Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale, by Jalmari Helander
- Apocrypha, by Michael Fredianelli (Bay Area Filmmaker)
- I am Nancy (cool doc about actress Heather Langenkamp, "Nancy" from Nightmare on Elm Street)

AND...

 Enter the Dark!  by yours truly, which will screen twice:


Thursday, June 3 at 5:20 pm (We actually open up the festival, supporting the feature film, Haunted Changi!)

Friday, June 9 at 7:20 pm 


I will be attending both screenings, along with some of my cast and crew, so if you're in the Bay Area and want to catch some cool films, drop on by.


Tickets can be purchased here:

Watch Enter the Dark for FREE

Watch Enter the Dark for FREE and help us win a spot at the FirstGlance Film Festival!

Friends, family, fans and horror freaks - now is your opportunity to watch our award-winning horror short, Enter the Dark for free in the comfort of your own home.  But be sure to hurry, this event only lasts until May 13th.

Simply bounce on over to the FirstGlance Online Competition website - http://fgff.openfilm.com , click "Join" and enter your info to create an account.

Then click on the picture for Enter the Dark, press play, click the full-screen icon, settle down and get ready for spooky fun.

Oh, and please, be sure to watch it at night…  alone… with the lights out… for full effect!

But wait… there's more!  We would really appreciate it if you would take a moment to vote for our movie and help us win prizes and a spot at the FirstGlance Film Fest in Philly (try saying that three times fast!)  Once you've watched the film to the end you will have an opportunity to vote (look for the stars above the film - wow, wouldn't FIVE RED STARS look really cool?!?!  I'm not trying to influence your vote or anything… just sayin')

Now, in order for your vote to actually count, the official rules state that you must watch THREE films in their entirety and vote on them (I guess they don't want anybody stuffing the vote or somethin'), so browse through the list of other equally entertaining nominees and pick out two others to watch and vote for. 

That's it - you're done!  You've watched some really cool short indie films AND you've helped us tremendously!

If you don't have the time to watch three short films and just want to check out Enter the Dark, that's totally fine as well.  Thanks so much for your interest, and I hope you enjoy it.

Enter the Dark - World Tour 2011

Big money baby - Big Money!!

Who says filmmaking doesn't pay off?  My first official check for Enter the Dark from DVD and streaming sales at IndieFlix is a whopper!  $21 big bucks!  Looks like I can now pay off that line item for Oreos eaten during production of my little horror flick.


... In all seriousness, any money, no matter how small, generated from this film represents a huge success!  And it's not about the money anyway - for now it's all about going through the filmmaking process, learning from it, getting my name out there and getting the film in front of as many folks as possible.

Speaking of which...

April through May will see ETD screened in theaters worldwide! I kid you not!

From Los Angeles to Scotland, to Australia the world will be abuzz with horrified viewers passing out in their seats, barely able to catch their breath from the terrifying menace that is ENTER THE DARK!!!
(well, actually just a few theaters worldwide... six to be exact... but it sounds much more impressive to say it the other way...  and folks probably won't be passing out... unless they get low blood sugar from not picking up a snack before watching hours upon hours of indie films...  or if they get up too fast from their seats after sitting too long for a while...  that can do it to me sometimes, ya know... well, not actually passing out, but kinda light-headed and seeing a couple of stars pass by...  that's gotta count for something, right?)

Anyway, here's the official-sounding dealio for Enter the Dark's 2011 World Tour: 

Enter the Dark is excited to be an Official Selection of the following film festivals:

 - A Night of Horror International Film Festival - Sydney Australia
Saturday, April 2, 4pm

- Famous Monsters of Filmland Imagi-Movies - Beverly Hills, CA
April 8 - 10

 - Indie Spirit Film Festival - Colorado Springs, CO
April 14 -17 

 - Bare Bones Film Festival - Muskogee, OK
April 25 - May 1

 - Dead by Dawn - Edinburgh, Scotland
May 5 - 8

 - High Desert Shorts International Film Festival - Pahrump, NV
Friday, May 27, 11:15pm



Phew, now that's a whirlwind tour!  I'd love to be able to attend all of these festivals, but alas, such is not the way for the lowly indie filmmaker.  I'm planning on going to the High Desert Shorts (tie it in with a trip to Vegas), and seeing if I can make it to Famous Monsters in LA.

So far, 2011 has blazed to action with a blistering start and I still have many festivals to hear from.  While it may seem excessive to enter into some 60 or more film fests, I find it money well-spent as it is really the only way for and indie filmmaker to have their work screened in theaters... or community centers... or casino ballrooms.  It really makes no difference to me as long as the lights are out, butts are planted in seats and all the hard work of my cast and crew is projected on a screen.  The ability to have people see our vision is priceless (well, actually on average, it's about $35/ per festival submission, plus burning the DVDs, shipping, making the postcards, etc.), but still, the marketing payoff is huge.

And speaking of marketing payoffs...

A number of months ago, I received the exciting news that I had won an award from the Maverick Movie Awards for Best Sound Design/Editing.  I had also been nominated for Best Director and Best Special Effects.  Now this was totally unexpected and very very cool news, but when I let people know, their response was tepid at best.

Now, let's face it, no one really knows what the Maverick Movie Awards are.  I hadn't even heard of them myself, until I had submitted my film for their perusal.  So, it's not like I had won an Oscar or anything, but still, any recognition is greatly appreciated.

Anyway, as with a lot of these award contests, the winners had an option of buying an actual award trophy or plaque for an additional cost.  Now, my usual reaction to this had been "Eff that!  This is all just a scam to make money off of inflated costs for stupid plastic keepsakes", so I wasn't really considering it.  But then, these guys seemed like legit folks, and they weren't really pushing the trophies - just offering it as an option since so may people had asked. "Oh, what the hell", I thought, "I need something sparkly for my office and I can write it off as a marketing expense anyway."

So I pulled the trigger and bought the dang thing:

The mighty acrylic monolith next to a DVD copy of Enter the Dark (still only $5.95 from IndieFlix)

And do you know what I discovered?  People are way more impressed with an etched piece of Acrylic-Crystal than I had imagined.  Suddenly, this makes one seem legit.  I am now an "award winning filmmaker" and I have the dang hardware to prove it.  So there.


Lesson learned.  Saying you have won an award is one thing.  Having something people can actually see, hold in their hands and reflect upon is another.  And while my natural inclination is not to toot my own horn, so to speak, I'm learning that shameless self-promotion is a necessary evil of this whole game of filmmaking.


Just a few months ago, my 8-year old was shoving his cheap, tacky plastic soccer trophies in my face, "Hey dad, how come you don't have any trophies?  And why do you keep making movies that don't make any money?"  Now I can blast him back, "Hah!!! Look at me now buddy! Feast upon the bounty that is my $21 check!! And bow down in worship to the mystical glory of my gold-tinted acrylic-crystal glittering monolithic behemoth!!"


Yeah... lesson learned...

Enter the Dark Updates

Here's what's new and exciting with my little bundle of horror goodness:

FESTIVALS

Enter the Dark will be screening at a couple of really fun festivals this week.
First off, if you happen to be in the greater Boulder City, NV. region (or ripping it up in Vegas), be sure to check out the Dam Short Film Festival. We will close out their Wednesday evening block of horror shorts from 9:15 - 10:15.

Then, hop on over to Sanford FL, and their brand new Love Your Shorts Film Festival, where you can see tons of great short movies of all genres (including the Oscar nominated God of Love).  Then stick around until Saturday night's sci fi/horror selections at 9:30 as we close out that evening's festivities as well.

We are also excited to be part of the High Desert Shorts Film Festival, May 27 - 29 in Pahrump, NV., another cool indie film short fest.  I'll let you know exact dates when I have them.

... And now for all the rest of you horror fans, this March you will get your chance to see Enter the Dark for FREE!!!  We were fortunate to be selected as part of First Glance Film Festival's short online contest:

In 2010 we presented over 50 short films online. More than any other festival in the world and awarded over $5000.00 in prizes.
 
Over 5000 registered voters, voted over 14,000 times to create one of the most competitive online short contests for any film festival in North America.
 
We look forward to you being part of the next Short Online Contest.
 
The Short Online Contest begins in Late March 2011 and run for 6 weeks.

 Stay tuned for more info on how you can watch and vote for a bunch of great short movies!


REVIEWS

Enter the Dark continues to enjoy great reviews from some really cool bloggers.  It has been incredibly rewarding to see that the vision I had for this short film is being well received.

From Midnight, With Love:

Miro's story works like a good horror tale should, suckering us in with one hand while it's preparing to pop up and scare us with the other.  There's a command here that can't be taught, and Miro shows a natural gift for creating tension.

Dollar Bin Horror:

… this 17 minute short has no gags. It's just scary.
It's just a really damn good film.

Chuck Norris Ate My Baby:

It's quick, fun and a bit spooky and, as promised, watching Enter the Dark in the dark makes it all the more effective.

Fatally Yours:

Enter the Dark is an entertaining, scary and thought-provoking short film.
The acting is also top-notch, with actors Charles Yoakum and Rob Sandusky putting on convincing performances.

That's all for now.  In the meantime I'll continue to play the festival circuit until October or so (do a full year to hit all that I can), and work on ideas for the next short film.

The we'll do it all over again!

Bleedfest needs your help!

My good friends Elisabeth and Brenda Fies could use a little help:

HELP! We have less than 1 week to meet our financial goal. We need to meet our goal to SAVE BleedFest from folding. We're doing what we said we would by bringing you badass genre films directed, produced and written by women... in addition to honoring a badass awesome man each month. Do you need something else from us in order to assist us in our cause? Thank you in Advance for being a BleedFest HERO!

Check out all the great things Lis and Brenda are doing with their monthly indie film fest Bleedfest.

We are passionate about raising the visibility of indie genre movies by female filmmakers.

BleedFest Values: Empowerment, Partnership, Fun, Self-Expression

BleedFest fetes the women who love writing, producing, directing, and watching badass genre movies: horror, thriller, action, sci-fi, western, exploitation, B-movie, and erotica. We also screen a few male filmmakers who
have empowering and edgy female protagonists; their work screens out of competition and receives our "Partnership Award". Our mission is to spotlight these bold films and their fearless makers, and prove to the world that the derogatory term "chick flick" needs to be retired.

Sound good?  Then bounce on over to IndieGoGo and spread a little love their way to help keep the festival alive!

Many thanks!

Red State: Kevin Smith Discovers 21st Century Indie Filmmaking

As many of you may know, Kevin Smith recently completed his latest film, Red State, which he made for a reported $4 million outside of the studio system.  The film premiered at Sundance, after which Smith made a big to-do about auctioning off the distribution rights for his home-made horror flick right there - right then to the highest bidder.

If you are interested, check out the clips of Smith's often funny (and of course expletive drenched) rant from Sundance here:

and part 2 here:

Of course, the whole thing was really a big setup for Smith to proclaim a big F_You to the current distribution model and announce that he was going maintain ownership of his movie and self-distribute through a road-show style series of bookings at various venues throughout the country.  In filmmaking terminology, this is known as "four-walling" - traditionally a last-option tactic for a desperate filmmaker looking to get some exposure, or at best a way for an unsigned movie to try to find an audience.

The funniest thing to me is that Smith has basically come to the same conclusions that most indie filmmakers have today:  own your content, build your fanbase and self-distribute.  Welcome to 21st  century indie filmmaking, Kevin.

The problem is that someone like Smith has a tremendous advantage over someone just starting out in that he already is a known name brand and has a huge fan base that ironically was generated my the same marketing machine that he rails out against in his diatribe.  So, when he says things like, "We're going to distribute without any advertising costs.", he can get away with that because he already has 1.7 million rabid followers on Twitter.  And where did they come from?  From all the films he's made over the past 20 years.  And how did folks come to see those films?  From the same bloated, unimaginative marketing machine he now says is unneccessary.  And you know what?  He's right.

For him he's right.  Or say, Eli Roth.  Or the Cohen Brothers. Or any other writer/director who already has a fan-base he/she can sell to directly.  For the rest of us poor scrubs looking to work our way up - good luck.

So, the model for any indie filmmaker trying to make it today seems to be something like this:

- Build your skills.  Write and direct a number of shorts.  Figure out what works and what doesn't on a small-scale that won't wipe out your life savings.  If you're good enough to get into some festivals and have some favorable reviews, keep going.  If not, hey you can always make videos of kittens and boobies for YouTube.

- Build your fanbase.  Utilize Facebook, blogs, twitter, YouTube, etc to find and engage folks who seem to like your work.

- Develop your brand.  This is kinda huge in the long-run.  When I hear Kevin Smith is making a new film - I already know what I'm in for.  That doesn't mean all his films are the same, but that he has a certain worldview, a certain style that shows through in all his movies.  If you are all over the map in the type of movies you make (especially in the beginning) it will be harder to grow and maintain a fanbase.  After you're established, you can branch out more.

- Take your big shot.  Now it's time to step up and make a feature.  If you can, find financial backing through traditional investors, or crowd-sourcing sites like IndieGoGo and Kickstarter. Keep production costs low by leveraging digital technology - shoot on HDSLRs, or Red. You know your craft, you've built your fanbase and established your brand - now, put everything together into a great script THAT SOMEONE CAN ACTUALLY MARKET.  This is not the time for introspective, experimental filmmaking - unless you already have a fortune and can afford to live off a trust fund.  This is a project that will make or break you, so it better be something your existing fanbase as well as others will want to see.

- Make your deal.  Here is where I disagree with Kevin.  For someone just coming up in the ranks, if you are lucky enough to have a distributor approach you and actually want to drop $20 million to promote your film - EFF YEAH, you should take that deal.  Sure, you will sign your film away and will probably never see any profits, but the trade-off is well worth it because now that bloated, unimaginative marketing machine will spread your name (and brand) far and wide in ways that you could never do yourself.

Now, what happens if no distributor ever offers you a big deal (which will be the case for most everyone)?  Well, in that case, you will need to self-distribute through IndieFlix, Netflix, etc. and scrape by, hoping that you can slowly build your brand and fanbase to a point where you can eventually make money doing this.

- Make your next film.   Hopefully, that first feature was successful and since your name brand has hit the big stage, you can now maintain ownership of your movies and their distribution.  Utilize your fanbase as evangelists to market your next film for you.  EFF the traditional marketing and distribution models.  Keep costs low, own everything and develop a one-to-one or one-to-many model to get your movies directly to your fans.  You are now Kevin Smith.  Go and buy a hockey stick.

Enter the Dark - Updates

The latest greatest happenings of my little bundle of spooky goodness known as Enter the Dark:

First, a couple of recent reviews:

Scary Film Review:  … a very surreal, scary and realistic depiction of a universal fear that all of us have... a sonic achievement of style and horror, but in a very psychological way.

Killer Reviews:  ...one of those short cool films that is efficiently produced and directed, well written and acted and a damn good use of a spare 17 minutes.

Be sure to check out these websites as they offer great insights and content on all things horror.

In other news, we were excited to find out that Enter the Dark received an Award of Merit from IndieFest!

From their website:  "Indie awards go to those filmmakers who produce fresh, standout entertainment, animation and compelling documentaries. The Indie is a showcase for cinematic gems and unique voices."

Woo Hoo!  While we're stoked to have received the recognition, I think we'll hold off on getting the actual trophy you see on the left.  You see, that little baby would set me back another $350 bucks, and while it would be nice to see it up on my mantle, I can live with the JPEG image just fine.

Also, congrats and a shout-out to my friend Elisabeth Fies for taking home an Award of Excellence at the same awards for Sound Overall Impact for The Commune.  Elisabeth and I, along with sound-recordist and mixer, Winter, spent a lot of time and effort on the sound design of that movie to really set mood, create tension, and emphasize plot points.  I learned a lot, which definitely paid off when it came time to think about sound for Enter the Dark.

No new screenings or festivals at the moment, but hopefully that will soon change as many of the festivals I have submitted to will be making their selections any day now.  Most of the recent submissions have been to short film festivals, or indie film festivals, so it will be interesting to see how the movie is received by a non horror-specific audience.  I hope it will do well, as folks who have seen it already who don't normally like horror movies (my wife included) have so far responded well to it. 

We shall see...

Enter the Dark - Updates

First off if you are in the Boston area this Wednesday, Dec. 1, it's YOUR LUCKY DAY!
Thanks to Mike Snoonian and Chris Hallock over at All Things Horror, Enter the Dark will be playing with El Monstro Del Mar! (which recently took home the award for Best Feature at the Dark Carnival Film Fest), and two other nasty little horror short gems, The Living Want Me Dead, and Get Off My Porch.
  



ALL THINGS HORROR PRESENTS
Wednesday, December 1

The Somerville Theater

55 Davis Square, Somerville MA 02143

8 pm/$5

El Monstro Del Mar! is an insanely cool exploitation monster flick from down under that has been generating some massive buzz for it's generous Russ Meyer meets Roger Corman vibe.  How can you pass that up?

Speaking of awards...

I'm super excited that my little snack 'o' dread, Enter the Dark took home the award for Best Short at the Dark Carnival Film Festival!  Wow - as a filmmaker, you don't do it for the awards, but it feels really great when you do get some recognition that all your hard work is actually having an effect on folks.  I really wish I could have attended - it looked like everyone there had a blast.

Also, I just found out that Enter the Dark was nominated in three categories by the Maverick Movie Awards:

- Best Director
- Best Sound Design/Editing
- Best Special Effects

(Drumroll please...) 

And we won for Best Sound Design/Editing!  This is really cool for me because I do think that sound is enormously important in telling a story (especially a horror story) through the language of cinema.  Although oftentimes overlooked, sound hits the audience in an immediate and subconscious way.  For an indie film director, good sound design is the most cost-effective way to creating an authentic and deeply resonant experience.  Try to imagine Eraserhead without that jarring, industrial nightmare soundtrack.

The ironic thing about winning this award is that Enter the Dark has many instances of little or no sound.  Just as composition in art is all about positive and negative space, so is sound.  What many forget is that silence is sometimes the most effective way to heighten tension - and horror movies are all about tension.


We've also been getting some great write-ups by fellow horror bloggers and websites:


The Independent Critic: Enter the Dark is an effective, psychologically thrilling chiller ... involving, slick and suspenseful.

The Man-Cave: Miro provided me with something that I crave as a horror fan. A legitimate scare.

I Like Horror Movies: Fans of PARANORMAL ACTIVITY will be happy to discover this spooky short!

All Things Horror: ...effectively creepy with an atmosphere that kept me looking over my shoulder constantly.

Cinema Crazed: …a nail biting bonanza of moments that will definitely keep audiences watching in anticipation the entire time…

Zombies DON'T Run: …a short movie that's shot very well, creepy as all hell, and has a twist that may just catch you off guard…

 
For all you aspiring filmmakers out there, just be aware that none of this comes without work.  Since I completed post-production on this movie, I have easily spent 20 hours a week making all this happen.  From burning DVDs, contacting possible reviewers, submitting to festivals, mailing out DVDs, creating postcards, updating the website, Facebook and Twitter - all this is a non-stop marketing blitz.  And I've really only done a small amount.  If this were a feature film I really would want a professional publicist and marketing team, with the end result hopefully that ever-elusive distribution deal.


But for now I'll keep humming along - probably until next summer when I will have completed a full festival circuit.  Then I'll start on the next project - probably another short that may hopefully help to sell a feature idea.


If I'm lucky...

Enter the Dark - updates

First off I'm excited to report that Enter the Dark is now available via IndieFlix!

- $1.95 for 30-day stream

- $5.95 for a DVD that you can keep forever and use to scare your friends.

For anyone who has been under a rock for the last six months, Enter the Dark is a short horror movie that I wrote and directed (and edited and produced, yadaa yadaa...).  It tells the story of two buddies who are led on an adventure of paranormal encounters: cold spots, an eerie talking children's book, unexplained apparitions and a final mystery that leads to an unforgettably disturbing ending.

Or something like that.

Yeah, I know it sounds a lot like Paranormal Activity, but trust me... it's a lot different.  In a good way.

It has been getting some great buzz and positive reviews as it has made its way through the film festival circuit.

Speaking of which...

Enter the Dark will be playing at the Dark Carnival Film Festival, Saturday November 20th at 4:00 in lovely Bloomington, Indiana.  It looks like a cool festival with none other than Joe Bob Briggs hosting this year's festivities.  Joe Bob says check it out!

At that same festival, we have just been nominated for three awards:

- Best Short

- Best Editing

- Best Supporting Actor (my buddy, Rob Sandusky)

See, I told you we've been getting good buzz.  Fingers crossed - hopefully we can bring home some hardware.

In other news, the team from Enter the Dark recently had a great time attending the screening at the Sacramento Horror Film Festival.

 

(L-R) Actor, Charles Yoakum, Writer/Director(and blogger)Todd Miró, Sound Recordist Ben Weiner & 2nd Unit DP/Assistant Cameraman Eduardo Silva outside the Sacramento Horror Film Festival

 

The festival was very well organized and we screened in a block of very good shorts, including the very funny, award-winning, The Familiar.  Charles and I were able to do a little Q&A session with emcee, and filmmaker, Blake Reigle who had a tremendous knowledge of the horror genre and asked intelligent, and interesting questions.

Although I was nervous at first, Blake put me right at ease.

Charles has 'em cracking up as usual...

I was able to speak with some other attending filmmakers including James Tuverson (Zombies Take the School Yard), Matthew Roth (The Man Who Collected Food), and Producer Ethan Cushing (Devil's Creek).  Needless to say the atmosphere and experience was much better than what happened to us in Chicago.

That's all for now from the indieworld!

Disobedience is Good - Two thoughts to live by

When I was growing up, I was taught to pay attention to rules; to ask before you do something; to try your best at what you do before you finish it; and these simple rules helped me to succeed in school, and I assumed they would lead to success in life.

Boy, was I ever wrong.

In the dog-eat-dog reality of the grown-up world, those who succeed are rarely those who wait for permission, or who do the most thorough job.  The winners are more often those who seize the moment, take action and get things done.

In the last couple of years, as I've tried to make a course correction in my own life and strive to make a name for myself as a filmmaker, I've had to fight against some of my ingrained tendencies in order to succeed.  Through this process I discovered two thoughts to live by that have helped me immeasurably:


1) Ask for forgiveness, not permission.

 As children, we are constantly reminded to follow the rules, ask before you do something - look to those in power for confirmation.  We look to our parents, teachers, coaches and later, our bosses asking them, "Is it okay if I do this?"  While this is good behavior as a child, it is not useful as an adult.

As an adult, this puts you at the whim of incompetent bosses, and arcane rules.  Yes, obviously you shouldn't break the law, but short of that, everything else is up for negotiation.  If you wait around and ask for permission to do something, the stock answer is almost always NO.  You will need to get around many NOs to succeed in what you want to do, whether that's make a movie, start a business, or plan a vacation.  Why place more phantom NOs in your way? You're a grown-up now - make a reasoned decision and take action.  If someone doesn't like it, ask for forgiveness after the fact.  More often, however you won't even have to ask for forgiveness as your actions will have proved that you were right.


2) Ready, Fire, Aim!

This was a huge one for me to overcome.  I am a natural perfectionist, which is what makes me a good editor.  I am paid to notice an edit that's 2 frames off, or a logo that should be eight pixels to the left.  However, as someone who is now trying to get my own projects done, this tendency can be crippling.

My natural tendency is to want everything to be perfect before I can accept it and send it out into the world - whether that's a movie, a business idea, or even a blog-post.  The problem with this however, is that those who get things done are rewarded more than those who do it better, but who take too long. The lesson for me is that good enough is good enough!

I spent many years coming up with ideas for movies, web sites and products and never finished a single one of them.  I would always be crushed under the weight of my own expectations - if it wasn't perfect, it wasn't worth doing.  I never wanted to hand in B- work, when I knew I could do an A.  But, you know what I realized?  The world gets by on B- work.  Heck, most people can barely do C level work, anything more than that looks like friggin genius level!

What Ready Fire, Aim! taught me is to do a good-enough job, get it done, get it out there, and make course corrections on the fly.  This is how the world really works.  Ever wonder why it seems you're always Beta testing software that you have bought?  That's because you ARE!  The software developer is fine-tuning their product with your help - yup, Ready, Fire, Aim!

When I made Enter the Dark, my main priority was to actually finally finish something.  I had to let go of a lot of things in order to do that.  One of them was my fear of rejection and putting something out there that wasn't perfect.  What I learned however, is that the process of completing this project, of making the movie, submitting to festivals, getting reviews, making connections, is WAY more important than having a finished perfect movie.  Enter the Dark is not perfect - far from it.  If I were to grade it, I'd probably give it a B.  But you know what, it's done, it's out there and I learned tons from the experience.  And people seem to like it.

Warts and all.

(p.s. - I'm going to post this blogpost without spell-checking it... so there!)

Enter the Dark - Reality Check

First the good news - my short horror movie, Enter the Dark will be playing at the Sacramento Horror Film Festival, Friday, Oct 22nd as part of their shorts program that starts at 5:00.  Myself, my wife and a number of folks who worked on the movie will be caravanning up to Sac to enjoy the evening.  If you are in the area, please stop on by!

I know there has been a lot of Enter the Dark news of late and I never intended for this blog to become just a marketing machine for my indie movies, but that's what my brain has been wrapped around for the last few months.  My intent was always to present my honest opinion of things that interest me, and right now that's been writing, shooting, editing, and now screening my horror movie.  I've tried to give you a little insight into that process, and into the indie scene in general.

Enter the Dark has been fortunate to have been selected by three film festivals and has had a number of positive reviews so far, but as with everything in life, that is not the whole story. I give you now the complete unadulterated truth that most filmmakers will try to hide.



First, the festivals.  Everyone loves to put those laurels on their movie poster and webpage, but what most filmmakers won't tell you is how many festivals they did not get into.  Here's the deal:

Of the ten festivals that I've entered and have made their selections so far, seven of those have said no to us.  That means that 70% of the festivals that saw our movie, for whatever reason did not have a place for it in their lineup.  Was our movie poorly made, misunderstood, or did it just not fit into that festival's focus this year?  We'll never know - no one ever says.  As a filmmaker you just have to keep plugging along and be happy that any festival has selected it - that someone has given it a home.

I have yet to hear from six other festivals that I've entered, and I'll probably enter in at least 15 more within the next year.  My total expenses for entering into festivals will run over $1,200 (entry fees, postage, DVDs) and if I'm lucky enough to get selected and decide to attend any of those festivals I will incur further expenses - travel, hotel, printing of posters, t-shirts, post cards, business cards, and making Blu Ray discs or HDCAM masters for the screening.

We've had seven reviews of the movie from horror blogs so far and none of them has hated the movie.  This is a good thing.  I've been able to pull impressive quotes from almost all of the reviews that make the movie seem like the best thing since Citizen Kane.  This, of course is not the whole truth. I artfully omit all the less-than glowing parts of the reviews and focus on the one or two lines that will help to sell the movie.  Everyone does this.  The more ellipses you see in a blurb (you know, those magic three dots), like "...the best...thing...since... sliced... bread!", the more the marketing team has had to struggle to carve a semi-positive remark from a scathing review.

However, in the indie scene there is a kind of unwritten rule that most reviewers rarely will write a really bad review for an indie filmmaker.  Most of the times if they hate it, they just won't post a review at all.  That way, the filmmaker won't have a permanent Google trail of someone completely bashing their home-made little movie.  If your movie is lucky enough to get onto Netflix or Amazon or iTunes however, watch out - the kid gloves come off.  Now, it's the reverse - if someone likes your movie, they probably won't take the time to post a review, but if for whatever reason they hate it, they will take extra glee in savaging it in the most hateful way possible.  And now that putrid pile of regurgitated hate is there for all to see. Forever.

I approached 22 horror sites and blogs to see if they would be interested in reviewing Enter the Dark.  Of those, 10 asked to see a screener, and of those, 7 posted reviews.  So, 3 reviewers looked at the movie and never posted anything.  Did they forget to watch it?  Did they hate it?  Did they forget to post a review?  I'll never know.  I do think getting 10 out of 22 to even respond to me is pretty good, and is mostly due to the fact that I had a track record, having edited and produced The Commune, which many of them had previously reviewed.

This brings me to my recent trip to Chicago, to attend the world premiere (I know, that sounds so impressive) of Enter the Dark with my good friend and co-star of the movie, Charles Yoakum.  Originally, I had no intention of going to Chicago to see the premiere - it just was not within my budget, and I hoped our film would at some point play closer to home where all of us who had worked on it could attend.  This is where the amazing interconnectedness of today's social networking stepped in. 

A person I had met only once, maybe ten years ago, who was a friend of a friend, saw my posting of the Chicago premiere on my friend's Facebook page and insisted that I had to go.  She was so inspired by my little movie actually making it to a festival that she offered to donate her airline miles so that I could make the trip from the west coast.  Wow.  I was overwhelmed - how could I say no to her amazingly generous offer.  So I asked Charles if he wanted to go and he said "Heck Yeah!", or something like that, and before I knew it, we had landed in Chicago.

 (yup - that's Chicago...)

To be entirely honest, some of my reluctance in going to Chicago in the first place, was that I just had a weird feeling about the festival.  The website looked good, the lineup of movies looked good, but there didn't seem to be a lot of attention to the filmmakers.  I had emailed them when I found out that we would be flying out, and asked them about recommendations on where to stay or eat in the area and got no response.  Some festivals are clearly set up as a vehicle for the filmmakers to meet their audience, talk about their film, meet other filmmakers and network with distributors, while other festivals are clearly set up as fun events for the audience - the films just a part of an overall atmosphere that also includes horror-themed contests and other activities.  This festival was feeling like latter.

I kinda knew we were in trouble when at dinner, a couple of blocks away from the theater where our movie was going to premiere that evening, our waiter noticed Charles and I wearing our Enter the Dark t-shirts and asked what was up.  When we mentioned that we had a short film in the nearby festival, he had no idea what festival we were talking about.  Not good.  He did however make our night as he kept asking more and more questions about our movie, and then when he realized we had flew out all the way from the west coast he remarked, "Wow - you guys are living the dream - congratulations!"  It's small moments like these that sometimes make everything worth it.

As we approached the Portage theater on a Sunday evening just before 8:00, I was aware of a notable lack of people buzzing around.  I wanted to arrive a couple of hours before our movie screened to watch a number of the other films in the fest and check everything out.  However, when we entered the newly renovated theater, my stomach dropped.  In an old venue that holds almost 2,000, I would say there were 30 or so folks scattered around, politely listening to an ongoing auction of horror-themed items.  The sound was echoing off the walls of the almost-empty theater.  Gulp.

There was nothing for us to do but settle in and hope some more folks arrived by the time our movie screened.  The auction ended and they rolled into a feature-length movie and I realized the fest was running late - maybe 40 minutes late.  After that movie ended, about ten people in front of us got up and left - I realized they were there just to see that film - probably the filmmakers and their friends.  The emcee of the event got up on stage to announce that he really wasn't sure what was coming up next... did anyone in the audience have a schedule handy?  Then someone in the audience shouted out the name of the movie that was to screen after ours and the emcee mentioned that since they were running late - maybe that was up next.

That was when I almost lost it.  I could handle the lack of marketing, the lack of organization, the lack of an audience, but not this. We had come all this way across the country to see our movie premiere up on the big screen and you're telling me you're going to skip over it to save some time??  NO FRIGGING WAY!  I got up and started walking back to talk to someone in charge (if there was any), when they started rolling the movie just before ours.  Ok, I realized, our movie should be next.  I settled back down next to Charles trying to remain calm.

(Enter the Dark up on the ol' big screen.)

I'm here to say that yes, our film did eventually roll up on the big screen, and the 30 or so folks that saw it actually seemed to enjoy it.  They laughed at the right moments, got quiet at the right moments, and two folks audibly jumped at the climatic ending or our movie - it worked.  Once that happened, everything else was quickly forgotten.  I had no control over the festival - no control over how many people were there - I only had control over my little movie, and in front of a real live audience, my little vision was working.  It was all worth it.

So that's the hard truth.  Things are never as clear-cut as they may seem, but sometimes in the end, they work out just fine.

(Charles and Todd after the event - geez, what's the deal with the dress-code?)