Artist: Fearless Tales Genre Fest Section: Interview Importance: It's all about being different. The Plug: Check out the film festival in San Francisco in March.
This interview is the boiled down version of the hour long conversation
I had with Michael and
Jeff. Normally
I don't like to promote regional things, but I thought there might
be some of you out there
that might want to submit a
film. Plus, this film festival is all about doing something different,
and that's what I'm all about, so here's the interview.
Hey fellahs glad to have you with us. Tell us
about the film festival that
you're working on? Well the film festival title is "Fearless Tales Genre
Fest" and the theme
of the festival this year is "Filmmaking In the Age of Terror." And it's a genre based festival that incorporates ideas
and themes that would
make someone what we call "Fearless." And that is they're going out and expressing
own ideas for the sake of their own ideas not for the sake of somebody else paying
them to do it.
They're going out and they're making a film that they HAVE to make or that they WANT to make, for them and not for somebody else. These are films that are made by people that have done
everything they can to get their film made. They've sold their body to science,
they've gotten themselves into credit card debt… They're living on rice and beans to make the film. They're made by people who have sacrificed everything to make their movie. We got one film about a guy who has a very nice safe job in New York, he's
got a good wife and a good house, and accidentally kills somebody and gets addicted
to it. And that craving for murder portrays someone who has a nice safe environment
and has gone bad, and that's a fearless idea. The festival is for genre based independent films.
Horror, Sci-Fi, Fantasy, Noir. And we're going to be showing, new independent
features, and classics as well.
And what are the big classic cult horror films? People like Defranco, John
Rawlins, Bella Raz, Mario
Bava, Dario
Argento,
and all this stuff that is associated with European horror. And Redemption
[films] has found a lot of this hard to find video, weird films. Way before
video was invented actually. A lot of stuff from the late 60s early 70s. And
cult films
in general, they're not so much horror. Definitely culty though. We're also working with the Cosmic Hex Archives to bring some other classic
films. The one I really wanna show is, "I
Drink Your Blood." They've
got a 35mm
print of "I Drink Your Blood." And I'm dying to show an old Bava, Hercules film. Yeah, "Hercules
in the Haunted World."
Get me excited about the new movies you've got your hands
on from the young kids today. What's great about 'em, what can I expect to see
at the Fearless
Film Festival from the new people. Well we don't have our final selection done yet, but
we can say that all the films what've been submitted, are surprising in some
way. They're all pushing
boundaries, they're all exploring new ideas, that you're not gonna see at the
multiplex. We have some interesting stuff. So far some of the really cool films
go from cabalistic paode eating psychos in the middle of the no where, to films
about people who get addicted to murder… We've also been getting things from multiple countries.
We've got stuff from
New Zealand, Canada, Australia... We're really getting it from all over the world too which
is really exciting. That it's not just American films that we're getting, so
you get to see what
all these other countries are doing with the same kind of genre. And the theme
of our festival is "Film Making in the Age of Terror," and we're really seeing
that there's a whole change in the world culture since 9-11. Whenever you have a time where you have technology fall
into the hands of the every day person and you have a time of war you see a rise
in cult underground kind of cinema.
Other than editing are there things as a filmmaker that I
should do that maybe
I wouldn't do in a feature release because I'm trying to catch the eye of the
person who's screening for the film festival. Yes, you put an awful lot of attention, you put all of your guts and power
into making the first reel of the film as slick as you can. The second thing
you would do is make your last reel as slick as you can.
Let's say someone is excited by all of this, can you give
them a reading list some homework that they can do to sort of catch up, like
oh man if you haven't seen THIS, then what are you doing? That's a hard one. Well I'd say "Danger
Diabolic," is one of my favorites.
Dysperia Dysperia is fearless 101. Although I have to say my favorite Argento is still "The
Bird with the Crystal
Plumage." Which is probably his most Hollywood film.
What's the title again? "The
Bird with the Crystal Plumage." Really the homework is watch everything, especially
if you haven't heard of it. If you haven't seen a commercial for it, and you
haven't heard anything about it, except for the description when you go to your
little indie theater, you should see it. Cuz more than likely they're gonna be
doing something that you haven't seen… Or haven't thought of yet. Versus what some company wants
you to see and think.
