Heilige Scheiße! Düster in Deutschland

German horror lovers (and we know there are a LOT of you!) are preparing to feast on the indie American horror flick, Dismal. They released their own fine artwork (see above) of a body double for Jack Harrison aka Idiot carrying the severed head double of one of our female cast members (we won't say who). Very classy work, fellows! And they even changed the name of the film! BLEED! Hmm, how do we feel about that? Well, it's not much different from some of the titles we nearly used for the US release like I Bleed On Your Grave, or The Bleedened or If It Bleeds We Feeds, and my favorite Tubs of Blood. Not sure Bleed is as catchy as those titles, but who cares as long as our German horror friends enjoy the movie.

Deutsche Grausigkeit lockert Felsen auf!

3 Rules of Independent Movie Making

Here is a pretty good little article by guy named James Stern. It's about little indies competing with the big boys and what we need to do to stay in the game. What I like about his article is it's not pretentious like some many other independent cinema articles, which talk about art and message and all that bullshit. This guy says, fuck it, you wanna make cheesy horror pics or raunchy teen comedies, go do it, just know what you're getting in to before you shoot your first frame. He says there are 3 rules to filmmaking...
#1 Make Smarter Movies. Again, he's not talking about being a director with some rule-breaking vision of cinema, but rather knowing your audience and understanding the ENTIRE process of filmmaking from fiance to distribution and marketing, so you can create a solid, smart product.
#2 Respect the Money. Such a great rule to live by. For starters, if you have investors you have to treat it like a business. They want their money back, maybe even a profit. Lose sight of that and you might as well make movies while filling out fast food applications 'cause you won't last long. Also, even though you're spending someone else's money, act like it's your own. Don't spend it on frivolous shit that can be done with a little more hard work or ingenuity.
#3 Before the Camera Rolls.... Think 'Market'. This basically means knowing you have to drive people to your movie once you make it. Hey, this isn't Field of Dreams If-You-Make-It-They-Will-Come shit. Most likely if you make it no one will know unless you market the hell out of it.
This is good stuff here, guys. Even though we current apply all these rules we never really set them as "rules". But now I understand that many people do NOT apply these rules, so this article is a perfect read.

Some Things Never Change

Back in the day, before Justin Soponis was a bigshot feature film producer, he was known as "Supie". As he began his climb to super stardom, he produced a short called Pestilence. As you can see from the above photo, he gave this project the same care and attention as he does with Fearmakers' projects today.

Note: the faces of the two filmmakers in the photo have been blurred to protect their identity for future denial of any associated with Justin "Supie" Soponis.

Happy Birthday, Jules!

The Fearmakers team would like to wish partner in crime, Julie Jarrett, a happy birthday. Due to our non disclosure agreement with Julie and her company Freezer Locker Films we cannot discuss her age or else she has the legal right to pluck our eyeballs from the sockets, and that really hurts.

So Happy Birthday, Julie. May you have many, many more, and hopefully you'll still be speaking to us as each one passes. We know we're hard to deal with.

Back to Horrorfind Weekend

Fearmakers is taking its show on the road, back to a familiar stomping ground... HORRORFIND WEEKEND!!!!! Last year we premiered Dismal there to a fantastic crowd. Even though the venue has changed locations, we expect promote like hell and hope we get similar or better numbers than last year. And if you plan to go within the next 15 minutes we'll give you not one screening of the creature feature, SAVAGE, but two, TWO screenings of the film, an indoor event and an outdoor, drive-in screening special. Okay, it's really a walk in, park your ass down and watch a movie outdoors on a huge blowup screen with top of the line surround sound, but it should be a lot of fun.

We're also planning to have a Q&A after each screening and offer several seminars / round table discussions for anyone who can stand us that long. Mark your calendar now. September 25-27 in at the Hunt Valley Marriott in Hunt Valley, MD near Baltimore. Go to www.horrorfindweekend.com for more information. Hope to see you there.

Now we have to get back to post. We have a LOT of work to do to get this movie ready!

Dale vs. Jason

Tuesday marked the DVD release of Hollywood's remake of the horror classic Friday the 13th. With a budget around $19M this remake had about, oh, $18.5M than the original. But did all this extra coin make it any better? No. Did names like uber producer Michael Bay behind it make it better? Nope. In fact, I'd go so far to say this slick remake isn't any better than our own Dismal. I'm serious! Would I go so far as to come up with that snazzy little artwork above if I didn't think so? Stay with me here.

I saw a lot of Dismal in the Friday the 13th remake, kids hiding out under something while the bad guy walks by (one girl even clutching her mouth shut), one kid caught in a bear trap, the big baddie appearing from the shadows behind the unsuspecting victim, even the gratuitous sex scene where the couple think they hear something in the woods. If their movie didn't come out first I'd say those bastids stole from us! Technically we premiered our film in August 2008 about 6 months before Friday the 13th came out, but I'm pretty sure Mr. Bay wasn't in the audience.

F13 uses the traditional scare tactics and setups and wraps it up in a pretty package, and rightfully so, they had nearly $19M more to do it. I can make a REALLY pretty package for $19M. I'd just be spending a lot of time in Tahiti thinking about what that would be. But when you watch Dismal, and I hope you do, you'll realize that we did pretty much the same thing they did but for a lot less money.

SPOILER ALERT
Dale vs. Jason... Dale wins!

Ladies, Let the Mourning Begin

Today is the day that Mr. Christopher Cook is taken from the bachelor world and thrown feet first into the mucky muck of marriage. For those of us who have been married a little while let us pass along some wisdom to a successful marriage (Justin, you just got married so you can't comment).
* Her friends are now your friends and your friends are people you used to know
* Being right is not an option so don't even try
* Keep the couch clean. You never know when you might be sleeping on it
* If you are asked a question and you answer honestly, you are a fool
* Statistics show that marriage is the #1 cause for divorceSeriously, you have a great woman there. We are very happy for you and wish you both the best of luck. And let us know when you're allowed to make a movie with us again. We will miss you.

To Premiere Or Not To Premiere?

That's not really the question. The question is where to premiere. We've been invited back to Horrorfind Weekend by our friends there. It's a great place and a lot of supporters will be there again this year. The problem is they changed venues and the screening room is much smaller now. Last year we premiered Dismal there to a crowd between 4 and 5 hundred screaming, obnoxious, filthy, wonderful horror fans, and we still had room for more. This year the screening room holds less than 150. They offer an outdoor screening as well, but we'll be up against the Horrorfind favorite costume contest and Mother Nature. Both will probably whip our ass.

As you can see, immediately after last year's screening we were slammed with fans asking actors for their autographs. It was a good moment in Fearmakers history. Our goal is to repeat that performance with Savage.

We are looking in to other options as well. Other venues, bringing in some of the celebrity cast members from Savage, anything to pump up the fan interest and hopefully draw a few away from the costume contest, should we go back to Horrorfind. The gang is great there. They treat us right and Margot Kidder will be a celebrity guest as well. Don't act like you don't remember her from her big break in Death4Told. I'm sure she'll be THRILLED to see us show up and shove D4T DVDs in her face all weekend. Meez have a feeling security will be issuing a 500 ft. rule against us that weekend.

We will keep you posted as soon as we make our selection. Feel free to offer suggestions.

"Savage" Post Production moving right along

We have picture lock!! After several months of editing and tweaking as well as a day of additional shooting, we have "locked" the picture. For those of you out there not familiar with the industry lingo, "picture lock" is achieved when the video of the film is locked into place, meaning that every single frame of video is set and cannot change from here on out. The picture must be locked so that the Audio, CG, color correction, and score can all be manufactured in accordance with the picture lock. A small caveat- since we haven't completed the title sequence the movie isn't really technically "picture locked", but for Heaven's sake stop nitpicking!!! 

About to Unveil Some New Stuff

Very soon we'll be rolling out some new stuff here at Fearmakers. A new logo, website and, more importantly, a new movie. We're very excited. It's been nearly 10 years since we got our first website, and we were due for a facelift. It's been 5 years since Death4Told was released. I can't give any sneak peaks just yet, but I can say the website, logo and movie are vastly different from their predecessors. We think you'll like them all.

From the 'Where Are They Now?' File

Back in the day, 2002 to be exact, a couple actors appeared in a segment called 'Folklore', one of a four part anthology in Fearmakers first film, Death4Told. In that segment, Rich Sommer (left) played Donnie, a tough guy jock with a sensitive side and Nar Williams (right) played Travis, a jokester with a penchant for ghost stories. Well not to ruin the ending for all those on their way out the door to find this little unwonted gem of a movie, but both guys die.

Thankfully, their careers didn't die with their characters. Rich moved to NYC, did some commercial work (you might have seen him in a Verizon 'dropped call' ad), had a part in The Devil Wears Prada and appearances on a couple TV shows and then hit the jackpot with a supporting role on AMC's Emmy winning series Mad Men. Rich plays Harry Crank, a bow tie wearing ad exec. He shares a SAG award with the rest of the cast for Best Ensemble, and I'm sure he'd tell you life is much better now than getting shot in the ass with a BB gun.

Nar went to Texas, 'cause you know everything's bigger in Texas, including the movies. He got a small part as a pizza delivery guy in Man of the House starring Tommy Lee Jones. Then, like so many actors before him, he made his way to LA. The self proclaimed uber nerd is now the host of the Science Channel series Science of the Movies, a very cool show if you're in to nerds or movies. Nar also hosts a web show called Head's Up on www.craveonline.com where he reviews all things geek. The show is well made and very funny.

One of the cool things about low budget movies, especially horror, is the chance to work with someone at the beginning of their careers. Sometimes you also work with people at the end of their careers but that's a different story. But actors like Tom Hanks, George Clooney, Jennifer Aniston, Johnny Depp, the list goes on and on, all got their break in a low budget, shitty horror movies. We hope that when Rich and Nar are super famous like Leonardo DiCaprio and Kevin Bacon, they can look back on their careers and see that black smudge that is Death4Told and embrace it knowing that movies like that only kill MOST actors' careers. Seriously guys, call us sometime. Please.

Check our Nar hosting Science of the Movies on the Science Channel Tuesdays at 9pm. And see Rich in Mad Men which begins its 3rd season in August on AMC. Congrats gentlemen, you deserve it!

Another One Bites the Dust

On May 22, Fearmaker Justin Soponis tied the knot with longtime companion Duke Ferris. Wait, that's not right. Justin married longtime girlfriend Lauren Creamer at a cozy riverside ceremony in Wilmington, NC. In just two weeks, our last bachelor hope, Christopher Cook, is getting hitched to a woman who wishes to remain nameless (imagine that). Of course I lost the battle against matrimony a long time ago.

So, in two weeks, all you desperate, toothless women looking to hook up with some hunky, Hollywood celebs like ourselves are S.O.L. I'm am just astonished that there are three women in the world patient enough to put up with our nonsense on a daily basis.

Stay tuned! I have a feeling future posts will involved parenting and social services.

-- Bo Buckely