Latest / The Christian Reeve Podcast / A.J. Constantino | The Christian Reeve Podcast | #58

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A.J. Constantino | The Christian Reeve Podcast | #58 · The Christian Reeve Podcast

• 0:01
  Hello, and welcome to another episode of the Christian.
• 0:03
  We've podcast. Today's guest is a director,
• 0:06
  writer and occasional actor, and his name is Ajay Constantino.
• 0:11
  Welcome to the show. How's it going?
• 0:13
  Hey, thanks. Thanks for having me.
• 0:14
  How are you? No, yeah, I'm good.
• 0:16
  I'm good. I'm happy to be doing a new
• 0:19
  episode. Yeah, I don't know.
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  I prefer doing these podcasts during the middle of the day,
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  because one thing that's kind of happened throughout the course
• 0:28
  of this podcast. Is that my Guests are from all
• 0:30
  around the world and obviously that's different time zones and
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  that to me, is fine. But I always obviously prefer
• 0:37
  doing these much earlier in the day as opposed to later.
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  So yeah. Very I mean, it's 10 a.m. where
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  I'm at so it's early in the day. Yeah, thank you for this by the
• 0:46
  way. Let's let's jump straight into
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  filmmaking. How did you get into filmmaking?
• 0:53
  Yeah, basically I always like tell this story that there's
• 0:58
  three things I wanted to You throughout my entire life, you
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  know, I remember in elementary school they would ask us every
• 1:05
  year. What do you want to do?
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  And it was a zoologist, he's involved animals.
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  Then the next year, it was a Paranormal Investigator.
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  I don't know where that came from because I was scared of
• 1:16
  everything as a child, and then third, it was making movies and
• 1:21
  that from that moment on it's stuck and that's what I wanted
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  to do. Even though I really didn't know
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  what that meant. And throughout the years, you
• 1:31
  know, there was times where maybe that idea took the back
• 1:35
  burner, there was times where I'm focusing on it 100%.
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  But every year, that's what I wanted to do, and that's kind of
• 1:43
  every direction I took kinda was like, trying to leave me down
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  that path. It's pretty cool that you had
• 1:49
  like, at least some idea of which direction you wanted to
• 1:53
  kind of head as far as your career.
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  Because I must say for many years, I had no idea and And to
• 1:59
  this day, I'm still kind of figuring it out.
• 2:02
  But if I compare where I'm at, with my life right now versus
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  where I was in school and and towards University age, you know
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  it's like it can feel quite daunting especially when
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  everyone else around you is like I'm gonna be a ballet dancer.
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  I'm gonna be a singer. I'm going to be a politician or
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  a businessman or whatever and you're like I just don't know.
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  A lot of people that are like that and they're like, or They
• 2:29
  switch the people that are indecisive.
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  I want to do this this month and then now I want to be a
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  firefighter but now I'm going to go be a doctor.
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  And yeah, I mean everyone else has their own kind of path but I
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  was lost in and like I said there were periods.
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  Where like, maybe I didn't focus on it.
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  It was just like I told people, that's what I want to do and I
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  just never did anything towards it.
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  But yeah, I mean it helped that I have really had like support,
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  you know. Family was always Waiting.
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  They weren't the types to say, oh no, that's a pipe dream.
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  Don't follow it, you know, it's so hard to get in, so I think
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  that definitely helped keeping me on that path, you know, if I
• 3:11
  kept on getting people trying to talk me out of it, I don't think
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  I would have maybe stuck with it as long.
• 3:17
  Was there a particular moment or thing?
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  You know, maybe you hear a lot of the time when people were
• 3:22
  talking about, like, are there was this one moment where I just
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  saw this particular movie or saw this particular scene and in
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  that That moment, I knew that I was going to be a director.
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  Like, was there a moment like that?
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  I mean, it's hard to remember, like I can't think of a specific
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  movie, but I remember being, you know, Elementary school-age kind
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  of right around when I made that like had that idea.
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  That's what I want to do. I think we just got out of
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  seeing a movie or go. We were going to the movies.
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  I don't remember what the movie was.
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  I remember my mom explaining something like, you know, movies
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  are fit. Like these aren't real things,
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  you know, I'm like an third grade or something, you know,
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  and she's like these aren't real.
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  There's actors people make them and once I realized huh you know
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  people can just make movies because that's all I did.
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  As a kid was just watching movies and TV and I was like you
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  could do that. Oh yeah that's what I'm doing
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  and that was it like so I wasn't a specific movie but it was that
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  moment where it really got explained to me that there.
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  Yeah. Do this as a job, whether any
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  particular movies that kind of like stood out to you as far as
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  like okay this is you know how movie should be made or this is
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  the style that I want to make my movies in or it was there
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  anything in particular that stood out for you?
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  Yeah. I mean over the years and I
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  would say more recently I'm kind of diving into lot of these
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  older films. You know you hear stories of
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  other people who've The age of 12 there watching like movies
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  from the 30s and 40s and that wasn't me.
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  I Alex made it. I have a lot of blind spots, but
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  over the last few years where I'm diving into this, like,
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  these older films are foreign films, I'm like, oh, I'm
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  starting to pick and choose things that I'm like, that's
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  really cool. I've never seen that.
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  Or I've seen that in recent movies.
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  And that's where they got it from.
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  So yeah. I don't like to To exactly copy
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  his style or like attributed to one thing.
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  But I would say it's just a bucks.
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  I love watching movies and I like treated as the more movies
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  you watch. The more things are kind of just
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  gonna rub off on you like subconsciously.
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  So I like to just bring as much information in you instead, what
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  do you make of, you know, major film directors?
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  Such as you know, Martin Scorsese or Francis call Coppola
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  or you know people like that like do you because obviously
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  There's a lot of hype surrounding them and from a
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  mainstream perspective, like I'll say, now I know nothing
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  about film directing, obviously, you know, I know some stuff
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  about acting and whatnot but nothing about that.
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  So from a kind of suppose an industry perspective, I do.
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  I am a bit curious as to like, you know, your thoughts on
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  people like that. Like, are they as good as people
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  make out? Or is it kind of just, they're
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  just very well-known and successful.
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  Therefore, they get referred to as such.
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  I think it's a little bit about you know, I think all those
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  Those big names. Their big names for a reason,
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  right? They didn't get there just by
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  mistake. However what are you implying?
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  However, like I want to say like I want to say sometimes when you
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  give someone like they call it a blank check.
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  Hey, Martin Scorsese walks in Steven Spielberg a studio is
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  going to give them millions of dollars and that's it, you know,
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  they're not gonna critique what Trying to do.
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  I think sometimes when a big director does get that, They
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  kind of, they don't always hit it out of the park.
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  It's hit or miss, you know, because sometimes people telling
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  you, hey, I don't think this is the right direction.
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  Sometimes is a valid criticism. You know, you get a lot of
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  people on the internet saying, oh, the studio interfere, the
• 7:20
  studio interfered, and yeah, the studio can interfere and not
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  understand the movie and make it worse, but sometimes they know
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  what they're talking about and you get these, I don't even have
• 7:32
  an example off the top of my head, It a big-name director and
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  you're like, how did they make this?
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  You know, it just isn't working, but a lot of those top-name
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  directors that you're saying Their top name, because even
• 7:48
  when they have full creative control, they're not going out
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  of the park there. Hits their batting, average is
• 7:54
  really good. Okay.
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  Now, right, not everyone has a perfect batting average but
• 7:59
  they're pretty good. So the hype is real, then it's
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  not just, you know? Yeah, I would say so.
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  And I think sometimes their movies might only speak to kind
• 8:09
  of those big film fans. You know, who are like the
• 8:12
  movie, reviewers, I went to school to study Film criticism.
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  Because I've seen, you know, I always call it, like, kind of
• 8:20
  the average movie viewer. It's 90% of people are the
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  average movie viewer. I'll go to a movie maybe movie
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  theater, maybe once or twice a year, you know, I watch
• 8:30
  something on Netflix. I can watch a movie on like TV.
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  Watch it halfway through. I've never seen it before.
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  I don't need to watch it from the beginning.
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  I'd say that's 90%. I kind of I always kind of say
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  like what? My dad does, that's how I gaze.
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  And I've seen those people watch a Martin Scorsese movie or
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  something like considered a masterpiece and I like, this is
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  boring, what happened while I'm like, in it, like an excited.
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  So this congested you make movies that don't speak to
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  everyone. So you in a sense, you could
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  have said that those, these movies that were released or
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  more for insiders, as opposed to like the General Public, yeah,
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  and I don't think that was the intention like I'm going to make
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  a movie for insiders, but I think those people know how to
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  appreciate what the directors do and he's a kind of know the, the
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  art and the metaphors and all that and they're not just like
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  let me put this on in the background while I do dishes and
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  I missed 45 minutes what's going on and you know they kind of
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  wanted to make the movie they wanted to make and they didn't
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  care if everyone got Are not. You know, since you're in the
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  industry, I wanted to get your thoughts on the Oscars.
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  Because whenever I see the Oscars appear, you know, and
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  this is just my opinion, you know, but I look at all of the
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  entries. They get put in and I'd say,
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  like, probably like 20 or 30 percent actually deserve to be
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  there. And I've got some reasoning for
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  why, okay? We all know that there's BS and
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  there's favoritism and all of that stuff, right?
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  But Here's something as well, but people don't often talk
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  about. Have you ever noticed how
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  sometimes a movie will get nominated for an Oscar?
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  And it's not even released yet. Or if it has been, it's only
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  been, you know, for like a month.
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  But this happened about ten years ago or so I remember there
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  was a lot of George Clooney movie, where he was like, a
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  father or something like that is very non-film, right?
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  Yeah, but I remember they were going on and on about and As I
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  Hang about, I swear, this isn't even in the, in the, in the
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  theaters or it's literally just come out or something and
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  Dominating on. It's like all this is a movie of
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  the year Contender and all that, and I don't know as a general
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  viewer. Like I understand that like,
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  they won't include things like comedy films, horror films, but
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  I do Wonder, like, why shouldn't they, you know, and like,
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  sometimes, they'll make an exception, you know, if
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  something like Batman, when he Fletcher got a nomination, which
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  I don't, I don't understand how you could not give that, but
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  there are so many movies that get released every year.
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  That excellent and critically acclaimed.
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  And but again, Nothing and there seems to be all of these rules
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  in place and whatnot. So anyway that will what are
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  your thoughts on the Oscars? Okay, that that's a really good
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  question and I feel like my thoughts are really complex on
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  this right? Go for it.
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  Please. I'm agreeing with you.
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  Where you have this movie. That's not even out yet.
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  Because there are so many loopholes like they, if they can
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  just show it in like five theaters around like the u.s.
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  I think it would probably be Right before the end of the
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  year, it like qualifies. So a lot of the times I said,
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  you know, will like Drop it even though it's going to come out in
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  February just to do it. I would say the height though.
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  Depending on the movie of course, but the height usually
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  gets built in film festivals. Know you have film festivals
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  throughout the years and a lot of those films are in festivals.
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  So a lot of people that vote on the Oscars are reviewers and
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  stuff probably saw. Like, if they went to Sundance
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  or the big ones, so they might have seen it back in March or
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  February, or January the year prior.
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  However, with picking the movies, I agree, 100%.
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  I think more comedy should be nominated more horror movies.
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  And really, the thing about the Oscars is every no one's happy.
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  Like you have to like the general film fans.
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  They're like I haven't seen any of these movies.
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  He's right. Have like, the big film fans,
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  who were like, well, this obscure movie didn't get
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  nominated. Like, I feel like when they come
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  out the nominees, very rarely do a bunch of people go.
• 12:55
  Yeah, they got it, you know, and if you look at Oscar winners for
• 13:00
  best picture, like throughout the years, you're like, what is
• 13:03
  that movie like make a movie like 20 years ago to like early
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  2000s, late 90s, you're like, Huh?
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  And then you look at other movies that came out that year
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  and you're like, we still talk about this, you know, and I
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  think it's definitely political how they go 100%.
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  Yeah, however, I like the Oscars, I get wrapped up into
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  it. It doesn't, I have all these
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  critiques of why it sucks, however, unlike when they come
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  out the nominees, I'm there, I remember there was one year I
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  threw. It was like only four of us that
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  showed up those caused by. I wanted people to dress never
• 13:44
  happen but yeah, I was like, I get wrapped up even though I can
• 13:47
  go on for hours about why it's a flawed system, why MLB's that
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  really don't stand the test of time when, however, the moment
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  those nominees go out, all my criticisms are just out the
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  window. I'm like I'm invested, I've
• 14:02
  always his a thing, I've always been confused as to why some
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  sort of a public vote Is not, you know, introduce like I know
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  obviously, that's not just an easy thing to do, like, oh,
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  we'll just do this and then no problem, but, like the fact
• 14:17
  that, you know, the nominations come from, you know, I think
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  it's like a sage Isa scream, Actors, Guild, and then like
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  other associations involved in the industry.
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  So it's basically industry people deciding on industry
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  people, which I understand to an extent like obviously the Oscars
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  has a very long history just like all the others in a baftas
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  whatever. Right.
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  But at the same time, Time. I do feel like you know it would
• 14:43
  be much more representative and I think a lot better if like the
• 14:47
  general public had a say doesn't even necessarily have to be like
• 14:50
  the final Factor but you could do it like where you know it's
• 14:53
  counted towards the votes or something and you could do it
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  throughout the course of you know however long up until the
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  next one. Like what do you think on that?
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  Like would that be a good idea? Yeah I think they need to do
• 15:07
  something right? Because Year you see articles
• 15:11
  come out like the Oscar ratings are low blah blah blah.
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  We're trying to do something to get younger people invested in
• 15:19
  the Oscars, which I don't know why we care about the ratings of
• 15:23
  an awards. Like what at like.
• 15:26
  Yeah, the awards matter but it doesn't.
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  It's not the Super Bowl like, people besides me aren't going
• 15:31
  like, I gotta watch the Oscars to be feather that the Oscars I
• 15:36
  feel like the whole show as a whole is not like really engaged
• 15:42
  like it has Moment. Like if you would release like a
• 15:44
  key highlights clip that's enough that people could watch
• 15:50
  that guilt. That's great.
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  But I recognize if you watch however long, he is one of
• 15:53
  three, four hours long, right? And you something, you look in
• 15:56
  the audience, you see the people there, they look bored shitless,
• 15:59
  because it is kind of a boring thing.
• 16:00
  Like, you basically just have someone go up.
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  They Nance other nominations. People talk for ages and then
• 16:07
  eventually you get to like the winner and whatnot.
• 16:10
  But like, there's a lot of like, wow, fin flam.
• 16:14
  Like, you know, window-dressing trying to like fill the time,
• 16:18
  basically. I love it.
• 16:20
  I love the word speculating predicting.
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  However, I agree to show is born like um and use like you said,
• 16:29
  you see the audience in your like even their board, like who
• 16:32
  is this for? We were, we doing this for and
• 16:34
  every year they Say the ratings are going down it's like well no
• 16:39
  one is really into this and I agree.
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  Like maybe if they had a private ceremony and you just release a
• 16:47
  30-minute highlight reel on TV, something like that or even an
• 16:52
  hour and it's just like here it is.
• 16:55
  I think people would like that more but kind of going back to
• 16:58
  what you said like having a people's vote.
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  I think it's really the exclusion.
• 17:06
  Like, like you said, it's industry insiders and I think
• 17:09
  they kind of treat it. Like, well, we're kind of better
• 17:13
  than just the commoners out there.
• 17:15
  We don't want their say, they don't know, they don't
• 17:18
  appreciate it, and I don't agree with that.
• 17:20
  I just think that's the yeah. Like, I know they're not coming
• 17:23
  on saying that, but you're right, that's hundred percent.
• 17:25
  They're like, you know, the mindset and the thing is, like,
• 17:30
  everyone goes out and buys. Sighs buys, the movie Juno know.
• 17:33
  Like, if the movie is bad, people will pan it and then it
• 17:39
  will just Fade Into Obscurity has happened to so many major
• 17:42
  movies that have had big budgets.
• 17:44
  Regardless of actors, you know, directors, whatever like a good
• 17:49
  movie is a good movie. So I think like your public your
• 17:52
  public opinion is essential in a more we do next.
• 17:55
  I just thought of something to even like really solidify that
• 17:59
  idea like were kind of better. Is I think it was last year or
• 18:04
  2019 something the people that run the Oscars, the academy came
• 18:11
  out and said we're going to make a category called the popular
• 18:14
  movie of the year, interesting. And that was there like way to
• 18:18
  get these other movies in. Like Marvel movies are Star Wars
• 18:25
  and there was such a backlash, that they only lasted a couple
• 18:29
  weeks, and you're like, yeah, we're not going to do it.
• 18:31
  And so my class from the Insiders yeah I don't know where
• 18:37
  the backlash came from. I think it was just a lot of
• 18:40
  confusion of what is popular. Like I'm learning good.
• 18:46
  Are you saying this movie deserves to be here?
• 18:48
  Just because people like it like it was just the way they try to
• 18:52
  introduce, it didn't work. But I mean it shows that there
• 18:55
  are people that think hey, maybe we need these other movies like
• 19:02
  When you think about it, I love these movies that do well aren't
• 19:06
  just good movies in their own right.
• 19:08
  But then like generation-defining like if you
• 19:10
  look at Fight Club that's very much, a comment on, I think it
• 19:15
  was the 90s, wasn't it? Yeah, like it's a 90's movie.
• 19:19
  So it's got everything. It's got, some of the best
• 19:22
  actors from the 90s in it. It's got a very kind of gritty
• 19:26
  story and the way it's shot is very reminiscent of many 90s
• 19:30
  movies. And Isaac and like basically my
• 19:32
  point being that, it's almost like a comment on popular
• 19:35
  culture of that time. So that right now we could
• 19:38
  arguably say like these Marvel movies that are coming out is
• 19:41
  right now. It's a big part of you know,
• 19:44
  culture because suddenly Everyone likes it and it used to
• 19:47
  be that nerdy movies were just for nerds, you know, which was
• 19:50
  good times, you know. Yeah.
• 19:53
  But now I'm all for it, you know, if nerd, if nerdiness is
• 19:55
  the new cool, great, you know, it means I can enjoy more.
• 19:58
  Ha, ha ha. Look something up.
• 20:03
  But going back to what I was saying.
• 20:04
  Like, how you brought up by Club?
• 20:06
  It's a movie. We still talk about, right?
• 20:08
  I don't know if it was even nominated for an Oscar Nom with
• 20:12
  it. This is what I mean about
• 20:13
  inclusion of certain move like a movie like that.
• 20:16
  I would wager wouldn't be included on the basis that
• 20:20
  because they seem to have this like unofficial rules, which I
• 20:25
  understand is that it's like, it has to be a certain type of
• 20:28
  movie. So, like, comedies, Horror like
• 20:32
  no chance sci-fi just I doubt it would ever happen.
• 20:37
  I mean I'm sure there's a few exceptions may be like you know,
• 20:41
  when Steven Spielberg did like was that movie AI or whatever is
• 20:46
  it something where there's a crossover.
• 20:47
  But ultimately I think it's so directors certain style and then
• 20:55
  maybe also actually if it becomes a box office hit like to
• 20:59
  a certain extent, maybe that has a fact Yeah.
• 21:02
  It's I mean, Oscar bait. Like they sometimes will make a
• 21:05
  movie knowing this will win Awards, playoffs and they don't.
• 21:09
  It's not a movie. That's good in wins Awards, it's
• 21:12
  made from the beginning. I just looked it up the year
• 21:14
  Fight Club came out. The best picture was Shakespeare
• 21:17
  in Love, never really seen that movie and that's my point.
• 21:21
  You look at the best pictures every year and you're kind of
• 21:24
  like there's a lot of movie Shakespeare in Love.
• 21:28
  Yes. Okay.
• 21:29
  That actually is a good movie, okay?
• 21:31
  Oh, it's it's literally what how it sounds?
• 21:34
  It's I do remember the movie though, but it wasn't, I
• 21:39
  wouldn't say it was like a huge, a huge dick.
• 21:41
  It was a good movie, but it wasn't like in 2020, right?
• 21:48
  Yeah, people talk about it, it's important.
• 21:54
  The things they talked about in that movie back, then are
• 21:56
  important now and you see examples of that for ever.
• 22:01
  You know, and it's just tough, you know, and it's hard to find
• 22:04
  have an award show that's going to get everyone happy because
• 22:08
  everyone should think so it's yeah, it's a good thing.
• 22:12
  The thing is you feel like they're not trying, you know
• 22:15
  it's like It really does feel like a little Club.
• 22:19
  It's like our, we have our level would show.
• 22:21
  It's a club we make the viewing open to the public.
• 22:24
  But then they almost like, they also attack the public in a way
• 22:30
  for having the opinions that we have.
• 22:33
  And it's like well it wouldn't be like that if the view the,
• 22:37
  you know. Okay.
• 22:37
  For example, you know, if they would nominate movies, that
• 22:43
  actually were popular in that year and were successful and
• 22:46
  work Like because sometimes a movie will do so well.
• 22:50
  Like here's an example and it's really old, but it's a good
• 22:52
  example, Star Wars, Revenge of the Sith was out in the cinemas,
• 22:57
  at least in the UK for like five months, something crazy like
• 23:01
  that, right? It did so unbelievably well, but
• 23:05
  there's no chance in hell that you would see that on the Oscars
• 23:07
  because of their own kind of backward mentality.
• 23:10
  Like I get that like it started in what the third nineteen days
• 23:13
  or something so it's like this institution that like things.
• 23:16
  Change over time. And, you know, they don't seem
• 23:20
  to react to these things, you know, it's only a few years ago
• 23:24
  that they were getting slammed for a lack of representation of
• 23:29
  luck that people. And from what I recall, they
• 23:34
  haven't really done anything. We've had some P.
• 23:36
  I think there's one person that won an Oscar, possibly kind of
• 23:42
  behind the scenes with, like, including more people of color
• 23:46
  to vote. And stuff like that.
• 23:48
  I wasn't even allowed to vote before.
• 23:49
  Wow. They were, but it was like,
• 23:51
  okay, break that. Yeah, I don't wanna, I'm gonna
• 23:54
  say that but it was like, if you looked at the breakdown, it was
• 23:57
  like 90% of the people that vote for the Oscars are white, and I
• 24:02
  think 90% of them were also men, and they were also like above
• 24:06
  50. So because that tells you
• 24:08
  everything you need to know it. So just industry people voting.
• 24:12
  It's literally just other people Pat in there, but fucking Eggs
• 24:17
  on the back like yeah, well done.
• 24:18
  He's an award. It is political because
• 24:20
  sometimes you'll have someone like an older actor nominated
• 24:23
  for best actor. Right.
• 24:26
  He might have done a really good job.
• 24:28
  It's not his best movie, but he'll still win because they
• 24:31
  kind of go. He hasn't won before, it's his
• 24:34
  time, the younger guy who did better this year, we'll get him
• 24:38
  later. He's got more chances to win.
• 24:41
  So it's not even like who's best this year.
• 24:43
  They kind of treated us. Is it your turn to get?
• 24:46
  Oh, I remember thinking that when Leonardo DiCaprio won his
• 24:49
  Oscar because like obviously, like they didn't give it for
• 24:53
  that movie, then they should just give up.
• 24:57
  I do know me because how can you not?
• 24:58
  But, and don't get me wrong, it's a good movie did very well.
• 25:00
  But I think like, there are many other movies where he did much
• 25:05
  better. And like, I remember there was
• 25:07
  one particularly common which movie it was, but there was one
• 25:10
  particular one where it was a small most Surefire bet.
• 25:14
  That he would win and then some other random person one and it
• 25:17
  was like really that's what you're going for.
• 25:21
  Yeah, and I mean sometimes I do get it like there are a few
• 25:25
  years where the nominees come out and I'm like that's solid
• 25:28
  you know all good movies. I have no really major
• 25:31
  complaints and then other years you're like, huh should I shoot
• 25:35
  that bad? Yeah, I know we've been very
• 25:36
  critical that they do sometimes get it right where you like, you
• 25:39
  can argue with that. I could talk about being
• 25:45
  critical, but the moment those nominees come out, I'm like,
• 25:48
  okay, I'm in it. I'm on board.
• 25:50
  I'm the number one fan like I'm here.
• 25:52
  Speculating, who's gonna win? Yeah, so yeah, but the thing is,
• 25:56
  I sometimes think you are critical about things you do
• 25:59
  enjoy, or like. Yeah, I think you just have to
• 26:02
  be fair about Chris's. I like then movies.
• 26:04
  I hate it, because I don't care. You know, I'm not going to focus
• 26:08
  on the brain power towards it. Yeah.
• 26:10
  I know what you mean? It's a very solid point.
• 26:12
  I mean, you don't you You criticize things because you
• 26:15
  want it to be better. Yeah.
• 26:17
  Wanted to be better in the future.
• 26:18
  It's like Star Wars. Everyone gets critical, but it's
• 26:20
  because everyone loves Star Wars, you know, you want it to
• 26:23
  be better, you don't want it to get worse, you want it to be
• 26:25
  much better. If I hated Star Wars, I just
• 26:28
  would not talk about it, and I wouldn't think about it and it
• 26:30
  wouldn't be, I wouldn't care, but the fact that I do care when
• 26:34
  something bad comes out, that's when I'm the most vocal like,
• 26:38
  you know, hey, this could have been better.
• 26:40
  This kind of like, because I do want it to be better, because I
• 26:43
  have a, like a My heart for it. You know, I remember Game of
• 26:47
  Thrones the last season. I've been very critical but it's
• 26:51
  like I Really Love Game of Thrones.
• 26:53
  So I go to say like that I've spoken about on the podcast
• 26:57
  before. So sorry for everyone listening
• 26:59
  he's had me run before but since you brought it up II take every
• 27:03
  opportunity I can to just bury it because I'm just so
• 27:06
  disappointed. I feel like they did such a good
• 27:09
  job for like five or six seasons and then they just Do you know
• 27:13
  what I think? I think that they got
• 27:15
  creatively. Lazy is the way.
• 27:18
  Yeah, and that, that's the biggest heartbreak.
• 27:20
  It's not even because, like, the directors are be like, oh, well,
• 27:24
  you know, you know, if you don't like it, it's subjective, blah,
• 27:27
  blah, blah. And it's that, no, no.
• 27:28
  There's a difference between putting forward like a
• 27:31
  controversial ending and then getting lazy like a
• 27:35
  controversial ending would be like the How I Met Your Mother
• 27:38
  TV series ending, some people got it, some people are against
• 27:42
  it. Kind of mixed feelings about it,
• 27:44
  but at least it's not like lazy. At least it made sense.
• 27:48
  It was you know had it made a choice you know exactly amble
• 27:53
  and you can say that gamble paid off yeah.
• 27:55
  Game of Thrones those last two or three only two three seasons.
• 27:59
  You could feel like they didn't want to do it and you hear
• 28:02
  interviews with them and you're like they don't want to do it
• 28:05
  and they got an ounce to do a big Star Wars movie and they
• 28:08
  were announcing other shows. They want to do and you could
• 28:10
  tell like, I there Are in this job for 56 years, they're burnt
• 28:15
  out. They want to do other things and
• 28:18
  they should have just passed it off to someone else.
• 28:21
  They could have still been involved but they're not hands
• 28:24
  on every day. You know and someone else would
• 28:28
  have done it. But see the thing is though like
• 28:31
  they forever tarnished their legacy you know there's a design
• 28:34
  as I recall I think they lost the Star Wars still doing it
• 28:37
  right now. Yeah.
• 28:39
  And I'm not I don't blame them for taking that.
• 28:42
  From them. Because why would you trust him
• 28:45
  with a new Star Wars Trilogy? When they got lazy with the Game
• 28:47
  of Thrones and I all they had to do there's a couple of things
• 28:51
  are you they could have even probably still ended it in the
• 28:54
  way that they did. As long as they made some like
• 28:56
  logical story decisions. Like bran becoming King nowhere
• 29:01
  in the story at any point, is it implied?
• 29:05
  There's no kind of suggestion info, anything, like we know
• 29:09
  he's going to be a big deal but we have no.
• 29:12
  Idea is going to become king, you know?
• 29:14
  Yeah, it's awesome. I read the books as well.
• 29:17
  Like, that's how much of a lot of Game of Thrones and you could
• 29:20
  tell right when they got caught up to the books and they had a
• 29:22
  kind of didn't have a blueprint to follow, that's when they kind
• 29:25
  of really lost their way. And I've talked about it
• 29:28
  countless times, I think he's they were still following like a
• 29:33
  rough outline of the books. I think everyone ends up in the
• 29:38
  place they were supposed to end up in the books like I think in
• 29:42
  Books, you'll probably have brand as king.
• 29:45
  However, I think they went we need five more seasons to do
• 29:49
  this, we're going to do it in two and I think in the books
• 29:52
  it's going to be a lot more slower because I've also heard
• 29:54
  speculation that brand might be king, but it also could be him
• 29:58
  possessing someone else. And I think that's exactly like
• 30:03
  I'm not saying that it's impossible for that narrative to
• 30:07
  exist, but you have to create a logical narrative where it leads
• 30:11
  to that you Get hints for like for instance I would argue that
• 30:16
  Jon Snow becoming King was hinted at through the entirety
• 30:20
  of the, you know, this holds the whole Saga.
• 30:26
  I don't know trailer season, all of all of Game of Thrones, it
• 30:29
  was hinted at points. And so for it not to happen and
• 30:33
  then for him to just essentially go back to the Wilderness.
• 30:37
  I just thought was such a stupid narrative, like it just yeah, I
• 30:42
  think. In the book, you're going to get
• 30:44
  a reason why he doesn't become king and you're gonna be like,
• 30:47
  oh, he was so close and something like, there's going to
• 30:51
  be more explanations. I've also heard the story that
• 30:53
  maybe John is possessed by bran and technically they didn't
• 30:59
  couldn't do that in the show because they made choices that
• 31:02
  wouldn't work. And like that's why brand
• 31:05
  becomes king just because but it could be.
• 31:08
  Yeah. I don't know.
• 31:09
  There's a lot of like theories. I was kind of Fred.
• 31:12
  But the books aren't out. And now I'm upset because I'm
• 31:14
  like, I don't even know the last two books will ever come out.
• 31:18
  Yeah, I don't understand what that guy's deal is but why, why
• 31:21
  doesn't he want to finish it? What hasn't he finished?
• 31:24
  I mean, I don't know for sure. Partially you might be a little
• 31:28
  burnt out. He's also same thing with the
• 31:31
  directors. He wants to do other things.
• 31:34
  He keeps on saying I want to write the book about sci-fi.
• 31:37
  I want to do all this stuff but he's stuck.
• 31:40
  I also think I'm not If you read the books, but they're dense,
• 31:43
  there's a lot more books. Like I said, each each storyline
• 31:49
  in the books, could have been its own show.
• 31:51
  And I kind of have something like Marvel, where you follow
• 31:55
  each character and they kind of crossover and stuff like that.
• 31:59
  But I think he might have wrote himself into a corner and he
• 32:01
  doesn't know how to like, he knows I need to get from A to Z
• 32:06
  but I wrote like out. Like I don't know how to get
• 32:10
  there, you know, and I in the last book, I put my characters
• 32:14
  here, but I don't know how they're going to get to Z now
• 32:17
  and I'm stuck. Like, I think that's it because
• 32:20
  the last book came out, I think in like 2011, it was before the
• 32:24
  show started. So the show started Wait, each
• 32:29
  Seasons took a year off, finished in that a couple extra
• 32:34
  years in the next books not out. As, you know, as he released any
• 32:38
  books during that time, anything else?
• 32:40
  He really uses a few like short stories here.
• 32:44
  There but nothing really, I know he was working a little bit and
• 32:48
  then once they were catching up to where the next book need to
• 32:52
  be, he said he was going to focus on the book to get it out.
• 32:56
  and then, they released like a A book about like the world.
• 33:02
  I haven't read it but he didn't write it by himself.
• 33:05
  He kind of helped someone else, write it and gave him a lot of
• 33:07
  like characters. It's kind of like an
• 33:10
  encyclopedia the world. Didn't write every word but he
• 33:14
  was there like approving everything.
• 33:16
  So that was about it, you know, I mean, unless he's done
• 33:20
  something I don't know about but I know he does interviews and
• 33:23
  people always try to reach out to him and he he he's famous now
• 33:27
  and I feel like he wants to kind of enjoy.
• 33:29
  And every time you go somewhere they go, when's the next book
• 33:33
  and that would drive me crazy. I couldn't, I couldn't deal with
• 33:37
  that. I'd rather just get it done.
• 33:38
  Get out the way people like it. People hate it, whatever.
• 33:40
  But at least, I don't have to hear that bloody.
• 33:42
  And I also think it's probably the pressure to because, yeah, I
• 33:47
  only read the books after I watched the first season of the
• 33:50
  show, and I think a lot of people are like that.
• 33:52
  Like, the book started in the 90s.
• 33:55
  Mmm, they were probably popular, but they weren't like the
• 33:58
  biggest there weren't Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings and
• 34:01
  now they are. And I think now the pressure is
• 34:04
  like, oh, I can't mess this up. And now you see the last two
• 34:07
  seasons people hated it and now he's like, oh no, I can't.
• 34:12
  Like you start to feel that pressure.
• 34:14
  I guess like it, but he could he could Salvage it by.
• 34:16
  Do it Ryan something different. What is he doesn't have to do
• 34:19
  what they did in the movie in the TV show?
• 34:22
  I also think maybe it's just in his head, like I already set
• 34:27
  things in motion to end that way.
• 34:29
  I can't change it. I think the if you look at each
• 34:35
  individual ending, John, goes to the wall, brand becomes king
• 34:38
  like all that, it could work if it's done, right?
• 34:43
  Like if you like I said, they did three more seasons.
• 34:47
  I think they could have done it right, you know.
• 34:49
  Yeah, it's the one thing as well, as HBO said, they would
• 34:53
  give them the money. So it's not even a case of like,
• 34:54
  oh we didn't have any don't want to do it.
• 34:57
  And I think they were too. To stand down and like have
• 35:01
  someone else with but yeah no yeah I think I think they could
• 35:07
  have done it right if they just had took the time and also the
• 35:10
  show is so different than the books that like I know for a
• 35:15
  fact you're not going to have all the characters in one place
• 35:18
  like the last season and all the like the meeting old.
• 35:22
  I think they just did that for the show to make it easier.
• 35:25
  I don't think the characters you might have some people crossed
• 35:28
  paths but it's not going to be Okay.
• 35:30
  All these characters are in Winterfell, having a good time
• 35:33
  from all these different stories and backgrounds.
• 35:36
  No, it's gonna be spread out. Things are going to happen
• 35:40
  slower you know? And yeah, I'm excited.
• 35:43
  So I'm excited for the book If I ever get to read it.
• 35:46
  What do you make of this? This pretty cool TV show coming
• 35:50
  up. I like it.
• 35:53
  Oh, watch it. I'm not super excited and I
• 35:56
  don't know why, you know, probably because I have the
• 36:00
  fucking TV show. I did.
• 36:03
  It's like I think it's just like maybe once I see a trailer maybe
• 36:09
  once I know more what what it's going to be about, I'll get more
• 36:13
  excited but right now I'm like, okay there I hope they're just
• 36:16
  not milking it. I hope they had an idea and it's
• 36:19
  going to be good. But Yeah.
• 36:22
  I mean, if they're sensible, they'll treat it like, what
• 36:25
  Marvel's doing and create something where they can extend
• 36:29
  off of it and do other things. And maybe, I mean, for example,
• 36:32
  I think a lot of people were quite intrigued by IR stocks
• 36:36
  potential storyline, and I think that would be pretty sick.
• 36:40
  Actually, is to see some sort of show After Game of Thrones.
• 36:44
  I think that'd be a lot of intrigue.
• 36:47
  And in that story. Yeah, I would like them to
• 36:51
  extend. Send the world out more, you
• 36:53
  know, I think that would be really awesome, it just really
• 36:57
  depends on. Like, you said what they're
• 36:59
  doing, if they do Arya Stark, and it's just really cool story.
• 37:01
  Yeah, I'm in. But if you just kind of milk it
• 37:06
  in or you didn't have a good idea, I said from the beginning,
• 37:09
  I'd love a Robert's Rebellion, the prequel you see Ned you see
• 37:14
  all these different things, all characters, you know, even if it
• 37:17
  was just a miniseries, I think you could do it.
• 37:20
  And I've been saying that I like from Season one is, I don't know
• 37:23
  why you hear all these stories of this war and it's the thing
• 37:28
  that led everything to happen in the show.
• 37:30
  I'm like I'm surprised they didn't do it or have flashbacks
• 37:34
  because even in the books you don't see it.
• 37:37
  But you get a lot of stories where you can piece the events
• 37:40
  together and you're like it was really important.
• 37:43
  Like all these characters ended up in the places, they're at the
• 37:47
  beginning of Game of Thrones because of this war it like
• 37:50
  really was like World War Two. To it changed everything, and
• 37:54
  I'd love to see that if they announce that prequel, I meant
• 37:58
  like, it doesn't matter. 30 min sources of inspiration, in
• 38:03
  filmmaking, that is a good one. I mean, I would say the people I
• 38:10
  kind of always gravitate towards and we're going back to like,
• 38:13
  going like with the big names you have Scorsese.
• 38:17
  He's one of my favorites Tarantino.
• 38:20
  That's kind of like, everyone's Top Choice, David Fincher.
• 38:24
  And those are all more recent directors.
• 38:27
  Like I said, as I start going back, To the classics.
• 38:32
  Cursed Sawa, who was as big Japanese director Samurai films.
• 38:36
  He's amazing. Everything I've seen from him in
• 38:39
  the last like five years I've loved and I guess Spielberg to
• 38:44
  like, Spielberg is probably like the most well-known and I feel
• 38:48
  like a lot of his movies, nowadays, kind of our Hit or
• 38:52
  Miss. But if you go back to his early
• 38:54
  stuff, Jurassic Park, Jaws, ET, those are all classics, like he
• 38:58
  knocked it, out of the Every single time I know, I asked you
• 39:03
  a similar question at the beginning of this.
• 39:05
  But are there particular things you look out for in movies when
• 39:09
  you're watching them? Now, that kind of make you
• 39:10
  decide like this is a good movie or this is a porn movie or you
• 39:14
  know what? The things that you look out
• 39:15
  for? Because obviously me being a
• 39:17
  fan, I look, I look well because I'm an aspiring actor.
• 39:22
  I look at the acting that's for me is the believability of the
• 39:25
  characters and to some extent. The way it's shot.
• 39:28
  If there's anything interesting in And not.
• 39:30
  But what do you look for? I mean, ultimately, I feel like
• 39:34
  I'm very optimistic when I see movies, I like tend to like more
• 39:38
  movies than I hate. You know, even if it's a movie
• 39:40
  people don't like I feel okay about it.
• 39:43
  I don't really have too many movies I hate so the things kind
• 39:48
  of like when a movies on that edge of just being okay like if
• 39:52
  the story's really good it'll keep me and if it's just kind of
• 39:56
  boring I think it's really good acting kind of like you said
• 40:01
  that might save it for me but really I kind of just go in
• 40:05
  open-minded and if just if I'm into it I'm into it and I
• 40:10
  there's a couple different aspects that might save it for
• 40:13
  me and I might still give it like a good review if It was a
• 40:18
  little, like, not great. It's like I said, the acting is
• 40:21
  good, the cinematography, and it just looks really nice.
• 40:24
  That could save it for me. And like I said, most of the
• 40:26
  times a movie hits one of those, check marks where I end up
• 40:31
  liking it. Like, I think most movies I
• 40:33
  like, Talking about what do you make of film critics?
• 40:41
  It's tough because I so I made a movie like we directed it like
• 40:46
  last year. So it's black forest.
• 40:49
  Yeah, correct. Yes, it's not out yet, we're
• 40:52
  putting in the film festival. So I haven't had a lot of
• 40:56
  first-hand experiences with criticism so I can't say me
• 41:00
  personally looking out just in general, I think you can film
• 41:06
  criticisms good in the sense of you can see what a critics.
• 41:11
  And get an idea. If it might be something worth
• 41:15
  seeing, however, I don't think that should be your only choice,
• 41:19
  you know, I think it's a good tool to like maybe find a movie
• 41:22
  that you wouldn't have seen before, but you should really
• 41:26
  see it for yourself. Don't take someone else's word
• 41:28
  on it, unless it's a person, you know, personally, like in that
• 41:32
  sense, but hate reading the newspaper or see you video.
• 41:39
  You can use that as a suggestion, but if they bash it,
• 41:42
  I would at least give it your own chance.
• 41:44
  But when I say film critics are, I mean more like the
• 41:46
  professional ones because obviously it's one thing, if you
• 41:49
  got some guy on YouTube, or someone in the paper, I mean,
• 41:51
  especially if they're known for having controversial opinions.
• 41:54
  But you know, often the case may be is particularly for like real
• 41:58
  fans of Cinema. You look at like the critic
• 42:01
  ratings that you get on websites, like rotten tomatoes
• 42:04
  or like official ratings based websites.
• 42:09
  And obviously, the industry reviews in general and sometimes
• 42:12
  they could, they like, I've seen it, they've completely destroy a
• 42:14
  movie and then it'll come out and it's excellent.
• 42:17
  Yeah. Then other times it's the flip
• 42:18
  reverse. You know, they say it's amazing
• 42:21
  in the film's terrible. So, like, what's your take on
• 42:24
  those? Just go and be something like
• 42:27
  pure, like professionals. Not even YouTubers who even if
• 42:30
  it's you too, but I just wouldn't consider them
• 42:32
  professional job. That's be harsh.
• 42:33
  But like, I know, I'm in the newspaper.
• 42:37
  I'm on TV. Like that, right?
• 42:40
  I don't pay attention. I really don't care.
• 42:42
  Hi, Mike tomatoes. And if it's a high score, I'll
• 42:46
  put that into my like, Rango know this might be worth
• 42:50
  checking out if it's highly rated.
• 42:52
  However, if it's a low score, there's plenty of low sward
• 42:55
  movies on that website that I'm like, I go into it going, oh,
• 42:58
  this is going to suck and I end up liking it.
• 43:01
  So yeah, I kind of will use that like, the average score, but I
• 43:07
  rarely read individual. Reviews, the most I do.
• 43:12
  There's this app letterbox, and it's like, social media feel
• 43:15
  like film fans, right? You can review movies, you log.
• 43:18
  What you watch? This isn't, this isn't an ad,
• 43:21
  but, but I'll read other people's reviews, but those are
• 43:24
  just regular people. I trust those reviews more than
• 43:28
  just, someone who is in the newspaper and I'm not even knock
• 43:32
  them, you know. I might read it as a suggestion,
• 43:35
  like I said, but I really don't pay too much attention.
• 43:38
  I go into a movie. Because I want to see it, not
• 43:41
  because some guy who went to college for eight years to get a
• 43:45
  PhD in film told me. It's good, you know.
• 43:50
  So you mentioned in that you have this movie Black Forest,
• 43:55
  it's I believe your first feature film.
• 43:57
  So let's talk a little bit about it.
• 43:59
  Tell us what it's about and discuss the process of filming
• 44:03
  it. What you learned from the
• 44:05
  experiences and how you think the film will do?
• 44:10
  Okay, well I'll start with the last one question.
• 44:13
  I hope it does good. Okay, but I can only hope right
• 44:17
  now, it's still in the final stages of kind of being finished
• 44:21
  and it should be really 100% done in the next month or two.
• 44:26
  And then we want to put in film festivals and stuff like that.
• 44:29
  But the movie itself is it's about, you know, found footage,
• 44:34
  movies, Blair, Witch, Paranormal Activity, they were a big deal
• 44:38
  in the mid-2000s early. Yes.
• 44:40
  And my idea was kind of well who finds that footage, it's called
• 44:45
  found footage, so it's about a couple walking through the woods
• 44:50
  and they find a camera. And as he, the guy goes home and
• 44:54
  starts looking at it and watching this story unfold, the
• 44:57
  things that were happening in that story, start bleeding out
• 45:01
  to him and it's a, what's kind of how much is happening, how
• 45:06
  much is to be treated on face value, but it's That idea of who
• 45:11
  finds the footage and so is it like a horror movie or a frill?
• 45:16
  Oh yeah, so the best genre to put it in would probably be
• 45:21
  horror. I don't think it's just fully
• 45:23
  whore. I think it's a horror Thriller
• 45:26
  but yeah we made it over the course of the summer and the
• 45:29
  middle of a pandemic. I mean we did it cheap.
• 45:33
  You know, we did it with just a few of us and got it done.
• 45:36
  Yeah. That's actually a very
• 45:37
  interesting point. I saw this in nice, you did.
• 45:40
  This on a budget of five thousand dollars.
• 45:43
  How the hell did you pull that off?
• 45:46
  Because I thought I saw the Steals and it looks very
• 45:48
  impressive. So, yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 45:51
  It was tough. I'll say that D'Angelo, who
• 45:57
  produced the movie with me? He was the Director of
• 45:59
  Photography and Shout out if you're listening to this him.
• 46:04
  And I really had to on a Marvel movie, A Star Wars movie, when
• 46:09
  you see the credits, it It's an army and every job is so
• 46:13
  specialized in like specific and on our movie there was days
• 46:18
  where it was just me and the Angela behind the camera.
• 46:21
  And we had to try to juggle as many jobs as possible and it was
• 46:24
  just keeping it small when I was writing the script and him and I
• 46:29
  were kind of coming up with the story, we kept it small, it
• 46:33
  really takes place in an apartment and in the woods for
• 46:36
  the two storylines and it's like very rarely do we go?
• 46:40
  Any other place. So keeping the location smell,
• 46:44
  there's only like five actors in the movie, you know, me being
• 46:48
  one of them. Actually, there's like seven or
• 46:50
  eight of us but, you know, keeping the castle.
• 46:53
  And I was just keeping everything small, but also
• 46:55
  making the story good. You know, don't sacrifice the
• 46:59
  story because of the budget sacrifice.
• 47:01
  You know, there's not going to be a scene where there's a
• 47:03
  hundred extras, We're not gonna have a big car chase, you know,
• 47:06
  do what we can do and make the most of every single dollar.
• 47:11
  So how did you decide decide on location?
• 47:15
  Because from what I've read over the years about how that's
• 47:18
  decided for movies, like when you see, I can move a movie is
• 47:22
  in pre-production. Obviously a lot of that is
• 47:25
  things like yeah, locations searching and stuff like that.
• 47:29
  So like talk a little bit about the process of you know, for
• 47:32
  instance, finding the right Forest finding the right
• 47:35
  apartment. Now what were you looking for?
• 47:37
  So we had like some scene. In mind with the apartment,
• 47:42
  right? And ultimately you couldn't be
• 47:45
  too choosy because like we're not renting an apartment.
• 47:47
  We don't have that money. Originally we were going to try
• 47:50
  to get an Airbnb. I'm not sure if they have that
• 47:53
  over there but yep we got it. We were going to rent one of
• 47:57
  those and just keep it for a week and film and try to either
• 48:02
  ask the owner if we could do it or just hopefully they didn't
• 48:06
  notice. And then when you kind of Like
• 48:10
  you said, like with the money you have to really think of we
• 48:13
  were paying everything out of pocket.
• 48:15
  So You could save money by doing it at someone's apartment that
• 48:21
  we know or do it Adam an Airbnb and try to find that perfect
• 48:26
  looking place and we had to make the decision, we did it at them
• 48:29
  lead actresses apartment, she offered early on we took it up
• 48:33
  and it ended up on face value. When we saw the apartment, the
• 48:37
  layout wasn't how I pictured it, and I know the Angela thought
• 48:40
  the same thing, we're so is this going to work, you know, their
• 48:44
  scenes where you need to be in different rooms.
• 48:47
  Like it just didn't feel right and then as we filmed we just
• 48:50
  made it work and I feel like he always says we used every inch
• 48:54
  of that apartment. Like I think every room, every
• 48:56
  angle and we had to make it work and it actually ended up being
• 48:59
  better that way. Did you do any sort of creative
• 49:02
  sort of film work? Well, you know, sometimes like
• 49:04
  you can kind of manipulate it to make it seem like things are
• 49:07
  bigger and stuff that you do stuff like that.
• 49:09
  It was a few instances where, like a certain shot we did to
• 49:13
  like maybe make them feel further away, but for the most
• 49:16
  part, Like we made that the apartment work as is, you know,
• 49:20
  we didn't have to, you know, do too much change and besides
• 49:25
  maybe taking pictures off the walls and stuff like that,
• 49:29
  didn't fit, but yeah, it ended up working better than we could
• 49:33
  have imagined. I think that's like a big thing
• 49:35
  is just adapting, you know. They kind of say like the more
• 49:38
  money you have, the more creative control you have.
• 49:42
  So like if we had a bigger budget, we could have built a
• 49:45
  set to be the exact. Aspects of that apartment and
• 49:48
  make it look, however. But you have to be, you have to
• 49:51
  work with the cards. You're dealt, you know, and then
• 49:54
  with the the woods, the forest, we have like a trailer that we
• 50:00
  kind of refurbished and we made it into like a little office
• 50:03
  Studio space where we did our podcast when we were doing it.
• 50:09
  And there's a bunch of woods right behind it.
• 50:12
  And we would walk back there. And honestly, when we were
• 50:15
  coming up with the story, we would walk and be like, oh, this
• 50:18
  is a creepy-looking tree. Write that into the script.
• 50:23
  Well, we write the script and we have the actors.
• 50:28
  This is last August. Well, I guess to August 2019
• 50:32
  when like the script was done when we were going to film it
• 50:35
  and we went back there to just do a little test, right?
• 50:38
  It just a few of us we've been in those woods.
• 50:40
  A million times and a TV pulled up.
• 50:43
  And it was this big guy, his wife and had a baby strapped on
• 50:48
  like the chest and he goes, what are you doing back here?
• 50:52
  And we just played it off. We didn't want to say we're
• 50:54
  filming a movie, which oh, we're just taking pictures.
• 50:57
  Sorry, we live, right? There are properties are
• 51:00
  conjoined. We didn't know anyone own this
• 51:02
  Woods of shit and you're not allowed here.
• 51:05
  You gotta go. Yeah, so we laughed.
• 51:09
  We can we try to figure out ways maybe to talk to them to ask
• 51:12
  permission and that was the biggest, like, demoralizing day,
• 51:17
  we had and really, we were ready to film that August 20, 19.
• 51:22
  And because life got in the way after that, we just kept on
• 51:26
  pushing it, pushing it. Pushing it until the pandemic it
• 51:29
  and we are like, we got time, we're out of work.
• 51:32
  But like, how did you overcome knife if someone owned that
• 51:35
  portion of the woods? Do you want to film in like?
• 51:37
  Did you just do it? Now we had to find new spots in
• 51:41
  that was the tough part because we always felt like, oh our that
• 51:46
  was perfect. We wrote the script based off
• 51:49
  that place, that creepy tree. That was written in the script
• 51:53
  for that and I think that was a big hurdle because we were
• 51:56
  always afraid to even look at other places because we're like
• 51:59
  it's not going to be as good and when we finally decided Now's
• 52:03
  the Time to do it and we started looking at different areas, it
• 52:07
  ended up being better. EP tree that I keep on
• 52:09
  referencing looks creepier than the tree.
• 52:12
  We had originally had like the way we filmed it because we had
• 52:16
  to get creative and like film it right by our trailer on our
• 52:20
  property and make it look like it was Deep Woods works better
• 52:23
  because it feels bigger, you know that area we originally
• 52:26
  were going to film, it's kind of tiny.
• 52:28
  So if you watch the movie, it would have just looked like,
• 52:32
  yeah, they're in the same, like ten by ten will area, you know.
• 52:37
  Now we were able to go to different places.
• 52:38
  Says and piece it together to make it feel bigger and I think
• 52:42
  it actually worked and sometimes those accidents are those big
• 52:47
  blows where you're like, how are we going to overcome this end
• 52:50
  up? Making it better because you
• 52:51
  have to you have to either. Absolutely.
• 52:54
  Yeah, that with what you were talking about earlier about, you
• 52:57
  know, making that budget work. I think it's a very good point
• 53:00
  that many of us creatives. Can kind of, how do I put this?
• 53:08
  It's something we can all. Relate to, you know what I mean?
• 53:10
  Like, I remember when I first started this podcast and first
• 53:12
  at my YouTube stuff, like it's my audience knows that.
• 53:16
  I just don't have the money for the equipment that I won.
• 53:19
  So, I always work around. Like, oh, how can I best make
• 53:22
  kind of use of my situation? What things can I do?
• 53:25
  What can I do? And I think if anything it was
• 53:28
  in the context of a movie or something like that, it forces
• 53:31
  you to be more creative which ultimately is going to be more,
• 53:34
  beneficial to the project that you're working on and I feel
• 53:37
  like just having a big budget. Isn't always necessarily the
• 53:40
  best thing for your movie. The best thing is the story.
• 53:43
  You've got to focus on, how does this affect the story?
• 53:47
  And that's what we really have. Like I said, we had a stay on
• 53:50
  that, you know, like I said, if we had the money to build an
• 53:53
  apartment, you know, build a set, or find any apartment in
• 53:56
  the world to fill them in. We would have spent so much time
• 53:59
  on that project. It doesn't matter too much, it
• 54:03
  could add a little flavor to the character because you see where
• 54:06
  they're living, you can maybe make it creepy or when it needs
• 54:09
  to be creepy and things like that.
• 54:11
  But ultimately, it's like, no, the story in our movie is about
• 54:14
  these two characters in an apartment, the apartment overall
• 54:18
  is unrelated, you know, you can make it feel like those
• 54:22
  characters live there. But if the characters are
• 54:26
  boring, you don't care, what's going on, you're not going to
• 54:29
  care that the apartment looks great, you know?
• 54:32
  And the apartment was great but it just wasn't like, originally
• 54:35
  our idea. You know, I kind of wanted
• 54:38
  something a lot more bigger, a lot more Grandeur like and
• 54:41
  different rooms so you can make these different rooms.
• 54:44
  It just feels bigger instead of it feeling like wearing one
• 54:48
  one-bedroom apartment you mentioned that you would doing a
• 54:52
  podcast whilst filming this. Now, I don't actually have that
• 54:56
  in my notes. That's something that I haven't
• 54:58
  seen that you promote. So please tell us about that
• 55:01
  life. Like I can gather what it
• 55:03
  probably was. But, yeah, it's a mess.
• 55:05
  Well, actually what it was and why you doing?
• 55:07
  Wow, we were filming. We were coming a year or two
• 55:11
  before and then we took a pandemic Hiatus, that we're
• 55:16
  technically still on, but it was called the squad goals podcast.
• 55:20
  We were talking a little bit before and it was just me
• 55:23
  DeAngelo, who produced the movie, Devon who is also a big
• 55:26
  part behind the scenes and he's in the movie as well.
• 55:30
  You know, we're all good friends and we were just Chit chat and
• 55:33
  hang out sometimes it would be serious topics.
• 55:35
  You know, we're talking about life and then other times we're
• 55:38
  just joking around or playing a dumb game.
• 55:41
  Like the idea kind of was your you hanging out with your
• 55:45
  friends in the dumb conversations you have would
• 55:49
  have you recorded them you know when you're kind of sitting
• 55:51
  around having beers in originally well we started in my
• 55:56
  apartment then we start filming it at a bar where you would go
• 55:59
  to a lot. We ask you So we would, you
• 56:03
  know, it was more authentic. And then when like, I briefly
• 56:05
  talked about that trailer, we renovated we'd made a set there
• 56:09
  and then we were doing it for a while, but yeah, we did stop
• 56:13
  that in March. It's something I still want to
• 56:16
  go back to, but we have to do a few things behind the scenes,
• 56:19
  but, you know, we were doing it very good time.
• 56:21
  It was fun, it was just entertaining.
• 56:23
  That's what's the name again? Didn't quite catch it, Waddles
• 56:26
  podcast squiggles. Yeah, Squad goals, Squad goals.
• 56:32
  Those podcast. Okay, right.
• 56:34
  So maybe it's just my hearing and that cool man.
• 56:38
  Yeah, I hope you I hope you do do it sounds like a lot of fun.
• 56:42
  I've had similar Concepts before but I've never heard good idea
• 56:46
  by any stretch of the imagination.
• 56:48
  But it was just fun because I even said, like, at the
• 56:52
  beginning I was like, you have people don't listen to it.
• 56:55
  The worst case is you're sitting down with your friends and
• 56:58
  talking for a little bit of time, you know?
• 57:01
  And that's it. That's what do we have to lose?
• 57:04
  Like, we had the equipment because we did other film
• 57:07
  things, so it's like, we just have to hang out with our
• 57:10
  friends. Well, that's, you know, it's not
• 57:13
  a torture, just bringing it back to the movie.
• 57:17
  It's one. Final.
• 57:18
  Question on that. Is there likely to be a sequel?
• 57:22
  Do you think course or continuation of the story?
• 57:25
  And some perspective? Okay, so I'm going to be a
• 57:28
  little quiet about it. I'm going to say, yes, yes.
• 57:32
  And no, there's no linking div plan right now, right?
• 57:38
  And in all honesty, D'Angelo, who I keep referencing has come
• 57:44
  up with an idea, right? It might not be a direct sequel
• 57:49
  or prequel, but it would kind of live in that world and that
• 57:53
  right now might be my favorite idea.
• 57:55
  However, I think that would be more him taking the ball on that
• 58:00
  if that was something he really had a Develop that idea because,
• 58:05
  you know, he came up with it. I think it's a really solid idea
• 58:08
  and it's different. It's not just a direct sequel or
• 58:12
  copycat of the original. It takes elements of like the
• 58:17
  world, we created and made something new and that's my
• 58:20
  favorite. Like, if I was to really ever do
• 58:22
  a sequel for a movie, I made, I don't want to just continue the
• 58:26
  characters and the same thing before.
• 58:28
  I kind of want, I'd like I would love more movies to make see
• 58:32
  Sequels. And you have like, a minor
• 58:34
  character from the first become the lead character in the
• 58:36
  second, like unrelated. But I'm watching the show the
• 58:41
  why there right now it's an older.
• 58:42
  So but every season totally different, it has the same
• 58:46
  characters. It's about the city of Baltimore
• 58:50
  but every single season focuses on something new and that's the
• 58:54
  thing. I love that they're doing is you
• 58:56
  might have a character who only popped in three episodes and
• 58:59
  season one will now season 2's about him.
• 59:02
  See his side of things and the new aspect and then a season of
• 59:07
  character that has a little role in season two, is the big part
• 59:10
  of season 3, or we go back to a character from season one.
• 59:13
  It's the shows about Baltimore, not the characters.
• 59:16
  And I think the idea D'Angelo hit really strikes that nerve
• 59:22
  where it's about some of the characters in our movie, but
• 59:25
  it's not just a direct continuation, or a copycat, you
• 59:28
  know, it's not. Oh, someone else find a camera
• 59:31
  in the the woods, you know it's we're going past it, but It's
• 59:37
  just talk right now. So nothing's been concrete.
• 59:41
  What did you study filmmaking? And what did you actually take
• 59:44
  from that experience? So, yeah, I went to there's a
• 59:48
  school in Orlando, Full Sail and wonderful.
• 59:51
  So that's what they do. NXT sorry.
• 59:53
  I originally, I was going into the film program and it's a
• 1:00:00
  great program, amazing amazing, amazing.
• 1:00:03
  But at the time there was Isn't it just wasn't going to work you
• 1:00:09
  know, they need 100% commitment and all in and at the time I had
• 1:00:16
  I just got a new apartment. I just got a new car.
• 1:00:18
  I had a lot of financial obligations that I couldn't
• 1:00:20
  just, I had to work like a full-time job.
• 1:00:23
  I couldn't just drop it and I had to change my major to
• 1:00:28
  entertainment business. So I learned the business side
• 1:00:31
  of things at Full Sail. And then the filmmaking, the
• 1:00:35
  Even stuff I had to learn on my own or you watch YouTube and
• 1:00:40
  stuff like that, you know, because I'm like, the technical
• 1:00:43
  stuff. You have to learn the creative
• 1:00:46
  stuff that's on you. Ultimately, it's really hard to
• 1:00:49
  teach someone how to be creative, you know?
• 1:00:53
  So I felt confident that I have the creative side already.
• 1:00:58
  Figured out, I learned the business side which taught me a
• 1:01:00
  lot of things that I wouldn't have known.
• 1:01:03
  And then the actual like technical film, Making stuff, I
• 1:01:06
  had to teach myself, you know, and I know that's how D'Angelo
• 1:01:10
  was to he really when we first started talking like, oh, we
• 1:01:14
  could do movie things together, he liked movies, he was a big
• 1:01:18
  movie fan, but I don't think he really knew much of what went
• 1:01:21
  into it and he really buckle down.
• 1:01:25
  He watched YouTube videos, read books, did everything, and now
• 1:01:29
  he knows more than me at the technical stuff, lighting and
• 1:01:32
  cameras and all that, you know? And he only started learning
• 1:01:37
  like recently, it's like five years ago, six years ago now.
• 1:01:41
  So it's really if you want to do it, you don't need the formal
• 1:01:45
  education, the formal education for film, and stuff, will help
• 1:01:49
  you so much and it's Hands-On, and it's great.
• 1:01:53
  However, if you didn't have the money or the funds, and the
• 1:01:55
  time, there's really no excuse, you couldn't do it on your own,
• 1:02:00
  you know, you have a 4k camera in your pocket, now, you don't
• 1:02:04
  even need equipment. Just make things and that's what
• 1:02:07
  everyone says and it's cliche. But it's true, just make things.
• 1:02:11
  Yeah, I couldn't agree more. I mean, you know, I've said that
• 1:02:13
  about podcast I've heard people say, oh I can't do podcast
• 1:02:17
  because I don't have the equipment.
• 1:02:19
  You know. I started with a cheap ass Mike
• 1:02:21
  and my webcam originally and then you know, after some time
• 1:02:27
  you gradually improve, your yeah, your equipment But
• 1:02:31
  ultimately the content is always the most important thing, you
• 1:02:34
  know, like And your audience will.
• 1:02:39
  Kind of allow for that as well. You know, I also think at least
• 1:02:44
  with podcasting and stuff like that.
• 1:02:46
  It's hard to get the content right off the bat, you know, but
• 1:02:51
  like if you go back to our first episode, it's terrible.
• 1:02:55
  We had no experience podcasting. We recorded it because there's a
• 1:02:58
  video component to we recorded, it just in my living room at the
• 1:03:02
  time, and if you watch every episode, you see it getting
• 1:03:06
  better. The Mike's get better because me
• 1:03:08
  Guarded by a new mics are learning how to actually make
• 1:03:12
  the mic sound better, the lighting got better, the camera
• 1:03:16
  got better than we moved to a new set.
• 1:03:19
  So it looks nice. And it just was an evolution
• 1:03:21
  over the period of like a year and a half.
• 1:03:24
  But we just jumped in. It was just an idea.
• 1:03:26
  I think me and the Angela, both had it and we're just like,
• 1:03:29
  let's just do it. You know, we wanted to do things
• 1:03:32
  on YouTube. We've always wanted to do film
• 1:03:34
  for like it's just a fun creative thing, you know, I'm
• 1:03:37
  always about. doing something creative doing something new and
• 1:03:41
  like building this new creative Endeavor, you know, I totally
• 1:03:45
  get where you're coming, from them prior to your first feature
• 1:03:49
  film. What projects have you worked
• 1:03:52
  on? Really not much.
• 1:03:57
  Sorry for the boring answer. I mean we did a lot of we would
• 1:04:03
  film weddings and stuff like that side money.
• 1:04:08
  We would do some little shorts on YouTube just being a things
• 1:04:12
  and I know our end goal was always to make films or like a
• 1:04:16
  web series or something like that.
• 1:04:18
  And there was a few other projects, we dabbled in but we
• 1:04:23
  really Ever got them off the ground for whatever reason.
• 1:04:26
  And this is really the first big thing.
• 1:04:29
  I would say, I worked on. I know a lot of other people in
• 1:04:32
  the cast and crew worked on as well.
• 1:04:35
  So right now, this is the first is the beginning, you know, do
• 1:04:40
  you think you'll do of a similar projects that you've done in the
• 1:04:44
  past on platforms like YouTube or whatever it was that kind of
• 1:04:47
  in the past now and you're focusing fully on sort of more
• 1:04:51
  professional film project so to speak.
• 1:04:53
  I'm going to say a little bit of both.
• 1:04:56
  I really liked doing the the YouTube stuff because like I
• 1:04:59
  said it was me hanging out with my friends for the podcast or we
• 1:05:05
  would do like little commentary reaction videos these and it was
• 1:05:09
  just hanging Out with your friends watching a movie.
• 1:05:12
  So I would love to do that and I still think we will do that.
• 1:05:17
  However, now that we kind of passed the threshold, it's hard
• 1:05:22
  to like, not commit, you know, a lot of doors start opening when
• 1:05:27
  you kind of say, hey, here's a movie.
• 1:05:30
  It's in this festival. And I think if I was able to do
• 1:05:34
  both, that's the perfect world. You know, you can do this.
• 1:05:37
  YouTube thing have this following and that is Important,
• 1:05:40
  if you walk into a meaning for a professional film, and you say,
• 1:05:43
  hey, I have a blank amount of subscribers that would follow me
• 1:05:47
  and watch this movie. It helps, it helps.
• 1:05:50
  Do you reckon? It is truly taken.
• 1:05:52
  Seriously. Now as a medium it would like
• 1:05:55
  there's a lot of people in the past that would have sort of
• 1:05:57
  shunned YouTube and be like what's not proper filmmaking but
• 1:06:01
  hands on the person to you know, you have some YouTubers who
• 1:06:06
  really the say. I can't even think of names but
• 1:06:09
  a YouTuber has 50 million subscribers, they've never done
• 1:06:13
  anything film-related if they walk into a room fifty thousand
• 1:06:17
  or fifty million subscribers is tempting.
• 1:06:19
  But if they don't know what they're doing it's not really
• 1:06:22
  worth it. You know really didn't think
• 1:06:24
  they would see and go. Maybe there's a bit of money to
• 1:06:27
  be made here and you do you do get some of those YouTube movies
• 1:06:31
  but they're usually low budget and stuff like that.
• 1:06:34
  Okay. Okay, let's let's just think
• 1:06:35
  this make the distinction now. So not YouTube.
• 1:06:37
  Movies. Like someone trying to do a
• 1:06:39
  serious thing. Because yeah, I don't think
• 1:06:41
  there's ever been a good YouTube movie.
• 1:06:43
  Yesterday of someone walking into a room with a bunch of,
• 1:06:49
  like, Milling try to make a movie.
• 1:06:52
  But the thing is, I think that's what they want to do.
• 1:06:55
  I don't think that you to, that YouTuber wants to make a movie,
• 1:06:59
  that is like their YouTube videos with the same humor and
• 1:07:02
  stuff like that. I don't, I don't know personally
• 1:07:06
  of a big-name YouTuber who's like, I want to make a Is drama
• 1:07:11
  or something, where I'm not in the movie.
• 1:07:13
  I'm behind the camera and I, I personally don't know too much.
• 1:07:17
  Maybe they do, try and they get turned down, but it always helps
• 1:07:21
  to have some kind of following, and that's unfortunate part of
• 1:07:25
  it. But so, yeah, I would do YouTube
• 1:07:28
  and movies. You know why not?
• 1:07:31
  Putting them. I think it's good to just try
• 1:07:33
  lots of different things, you know, and see what works.
• 1:07:36
  And I think that increasingly YouTube is becoming just more
• 1:07:40
  and more revered as a platform that, you know, you should be
• 1:07:45
  taken seriously and, you know, certainly content creators.
• 1:07:49
  I think for the most part again, taking a bit more seriously by
• 1:07:51
  the mainstream now. So who knows where it could go
• 1:07:54
  in the future. What do you love most about
• 1:07:58
  filmmaking? I really just love that story.
• 1:08:04
  You know making telling a story and also it's you kind of go
• 1:08:09
  through hell like what making the movie?
• 1:08:11
  It's a lot of work. It's tiring and you know there's
• 1:08:15
  things that go wrong and I can name a million reasons of why
• 1:08:20
  it's a tough and hard and not easy, but then when you start
• 1:08:25
  seeing the Pieces come together and you're watching, and you see
• 1:08:28
  that Dean and you're like, oh this is coming out good all of a
• 1:08:33
  sudden, all those bad things that aggravation goes out the
• 1:08:36
  window and you're like yeah let's do this again and I think
• 1:08:40
  just working with a team and building something and then you
• 1:08:44
  have an end result that you guys are all happy with.
• 1:08:47
  Is really hard to compare to anything else that I know of The
• 1:08:53
  foreman. And what would you say?
• 1:08:54
  The biggest challenges of being a filmmaker?
• 1:08:58
  I think the biggest hurdle right now, like, before we made this
• 1:09:02
  was just doing it, you know? We like I said, we had other
• 1:09:08
  projects, we wanted to do whether like web series or maybe
• 1:09:11
  short films and stuff like that, and you kind of just have to do
• 1:09:17
  it. I mean, ultimately if the story
• 1:09:20
  is not good and sometimes that was some of the reason, but Your
• 1:09:23
  time is never going to make itself for you, you know, if
• 1:09:29
  you're working a full-time job, you're not all set.
• 1:09:32
  I'm going to be your boss isn't going to just come out of
• 1:09:33
  nowhere and say, hey, here's three months off, you know?
• 1:09:36
  And now you're both of them and that was our problem.
• 1:09:40
  We lost that. Well we lost that location and
• 1:09:46
  we got into the pattern of man were depressed.
• 1:09:49
  We don't like, we want to do the movie so but we don't know how
• 1:09:52
  and You got caught up working working working, kind of just
• 1:09:56
  hoping that hoping something would happen.
• 1:10:01
  And, I mean, we had a global pandemic that came out of
• 1:10:05
  nowhere where we didn't work, that's never going to happen
• 1:10:08
  again, knock on wood. But so, we were in that, like,
• 1:10:13
  point zero, zero, zero zero, one percent.
• 1:10:15
  We're awesome. Time opened up.
• 1:10:17
  And now, we have the time to do this and going forward.
• 1:10:21
  My attitude is That's never going to happen again.
• 1:10:24
  So if you want to do something, you just have to do it and don't
• 1:10:27
  worry about the equipment, do it with what you got.
• 1:10:30
  And then like you kind of said with the podcast and things like
• 1:10:33
  that the next movie you make or the next short film, you just
• 1:10:36
  make it better and build on it. You're you know, if you sit back
• 1:10:41
  trying to buy the most expensive camera, the most expensive
• 1:10:45
  lighting, you're never going to be happy because something new
• 1:10:48
  is going to come out that you want.
• 1:10:49
  Just make something with what you got and then just get stuff
• 1:10:52
  for the Next time and build on it.
• 1:10:55
  Absolutely took us with the role of director.
• 1:10:59
  What are your key responsibilities on set during
• 1:11:03
  both pre-production and post-production and then the
• 1:11:05
  eventual release? So, yeah, director, like, I feel
• 1:11:09
  like a lot of people know what a direct like knows that awning
• 1:11:13
  films have but a lot of people don't know what they do, the way
• 1:11:19
  I kind of like, think about it is A making a movies like a
• 1:11:24
  business, right? Italy.
• 1:11:25
  The film sets a company, a big company and the directors kind
• 1:11:29
  of the CEO in the sense of they make decisions that these other
• 1:11:35
  departments in that company kind of do.
• 1:11:38
  And you it's collaborative like depending on the director, you
• 1:11:41
  might have a director who's like, no, it's my way you do it
• 1:11:43
  my way. I like to be more open where
• 1:11:47
  let's say, you know, the Director of Photography is in
• 1:11:49
  charge of the camera and lighting department, if they
• 1:11:51
  have a cool Idea, I'm going to listen, we didn't have all these
• 1:11:55
  other departments, but you have the person towards your charger
• 1:11:58
  wardrobe, you know, who it's just collaborative, and they're
• 1:12:02
  kind of overseeing all these little departments that make the
• 1:12:05
  movie run and make that decision.
• 1:12:08
  And the most direct job they have is working with the actors
• 1:12:13
  that's like their most Hands-On thing they do, is they work with
• 1:12:16
  the actors and that's kind of their department.
• 1:12:19
  And then besides that, they oversee these other departments
• 1:12:23
  on set and then going into post-production you kinda Take
• 1:12:29
  those next steps when editing the movie, you could have three
• 1:12:33
  different editors, take our footage from our movie, and they
• 1:12:36
  would probably make a different movie each time I edited the
• 1:12:41
  movie myself. And so I kind of had control
• 1:12:44
  over that but in a regular movie Set, they would work with the
• 1:12:48
  editor Hands-On and kind of get that Vision that they had in
• 1:12:52
  their head done, you know. And they work with the other
• 1:12:55
  collaborate and excetera and right.
• 1:12:58
  Now we have someone working on the sound, so it got sent off to
• 1:13:01
  them, they send us back Clips like with what they're doing,
• 1:13:05
  the tweaking the mixing and mastering and stuff like that.
• 1:13:10
  Make sure that to construe the the process for writing scripts
• 1:13:15
  like what's your individual process?
• 1:13:17
  Okay. Yeah.
• 1:13:18
  So everyone's going to do things different.
• 1:13:21
  I We'll sit on an idea. Personally and I constantly have
• 1:13:28
  movie ideas or seen ideas or character ideas pop into my
• 1:13:32
  head, like, oh, that's a really cool scene and then sometimes
• 1:13:35
  they just disappear and those few ideas that kind of pop back
• 1:13:39
  into my head. You know, it might be a concept
• 1:13:42
  for a movie or might be a character and I go the ones that
• 1:13:46
  keep on coming back when they leave.
• 1:13:48
  I go. Let's think more about this.
• 1:13:50
  So I could have a brief idea before I even sit down like I
• 1:13:57
  kind of call it. Like I do a lot of wedding in my
• 1:13:59
  head before I really commit to I'm going to write this and then
• 1:14:03
  I just sit down and write I kind of go in blind during like that
• 1:14:07
  brief outline. I might have a few checkpoints
• 1:14:09
  of the story like I need to hit this.
• 1:14:11
  This this but I really don't want blind.
• 1:14:14
  And I write a rough draft, just with nothing.
• 1:14:17
  I don't outline it out. I know some people really have
• 1:14:21
  the movie planned out beforehand before even writing a sentence.
• 1:14:25
  I just had a few major plot points normally and I just write
• 1:14:30
  and kind of let the story take me places and sometimes that's
• 1:14:34
  good, and sometimes that's bad. But then I couldn't you kind of
• 1:14:39
  right from beginning to end then because Had a lot of filmmakers
• 1:14:42
  tend to do it the other way around where they sort of start.
• 1:14:45
  They okay, I've written the ending.
• 1:14:47
  I work my way backwards. So like when I say like, I have
• 1:14:53
  those pop point, it might be the ending, you know, and it's just
• 1:14:57
  a brief idea. But like, even with black
• 1:15:00
  forest, there's the ending kind of came as I was writing it.
• 1:15:05
  And I remember talking with D'Angelo, like, hey, I have this
• 1:15:08
  idea for an ending. I'm 30 pages into this script
• 1:15:13
  and he was like, oh no, that's really good.
• 1:15:14
  And it was like that wasn't the plan when I went in.
• 1:15:17
  Then I on like the second, were you right now?
• 1:15:20
  I can kind of make things make Sense in my now that I have the
• 1:15:24
  whole like that. Rough draft is I'm getting the
• 1:15:26
  story and now I can maybe oh let me add a scene in so this scene
• 1:15:31
  that I came up with doesn't feel like it just came out of
• 1:15:34
  nowhere. You know, and I kind of add
• 1:15:36
  things in or I might add a line in to kind of make things
• 1:15:39
  connect better, but I really kind of go in blind and I know
• 1:15:42
  I'm in the minority there. I know a lot of people really
• 1:15:46
  have everything planned out. She's think you'll always have a
• 1:15:50
  co-writer with you just sent you.
• 1:15:52
  So break off and just right for yourself and future.
• 1:15:55
  I mean I like collaborating, for example, I do like with black
• 1:16:02
  forest, the three of us kind of came up with a story or ideas
• 1:16:07
  and then I wrote it actual script myself.
• 1:16:10
  But I do like that like sending it to someone, you know, and
• 1:16:14
  trust and getting their input and building on that because I
• 1:16:19
  also think it's very easy to be Find and think this is amazing.
• 1:16:25
  And it's not or something's not working and you just can't see
• 1:16:28
  it. So even if I'm writing, like I'm
• 1:16:31
  working on a new project that I'm writing.
• 1:16:34
  Kind of just start as fun but I sent it over to D'angelo he
• 1:16:38
  liked it and I need it. Like I always kind of need that
• 1:16:41
  the criticism I need NOS from someone else.
• 1:16:44
  I don't really Trust myself to be like this is perfect.
• 1:16:48
  I like to have other eyes on everything you know, constantly.
• 1:16:55
  Sometimes you're an actor, I said at the beginning, you're
• 1:16:58
  like an occasional actor. Is this something?
• 1:17:02
  What is it? I wasn't really sure how to put
• 1:17:04
  this Jimmy because you put it at the end of your bio and I kind
• 1:17:06
  of figured like maybe and this is me presuming.
• 1:17:10
  It's not something you like you know, it's not like with
• 1:17:14
  filmmaking you're serious. This is what you want.
• 1:17:16
  This is what you want to do acting.
• 1:17:18
  Maybe it's like a little thing. I mean, it's not uncommon for
• 1:17:20
  directors to appear in their own movies.
• 1:17:23
  Some do it really really well let you know Tarantino others.
• 1:17:26
  Just have that little cameos but are you actively pursuing acting
• 1:17:30
  or is it just more kind of just filling in sports just
• 1:17:33
  occasional cameos and stuff? So I mean I think you kind of
• 1:17:36
  hit it the first time. It's definitely not my main
• 1:17:40
  focus. It's not my main passion, like
• 1:17:41
  the writing and directing definitely is and I kind of have
• 1:17:46
  it in my head that like a Tarantino dive.
• 1:17:48
  If I direct a movie, I'm putting myself in a part Even if it's
• 1:17:52
  just a cameo but I'm giving myself a part.
• 1:17:56
  I really do enjoy acting. I don't think I'm the greatest
• 1:17:59
  actor but it is something I like doing it.
• 1:18:02
  I do want to get better at it. Okay?
• 1:18:04
  And I can see myself trying to pursue it but it wouldn't be
• 1:18:08
  like my primary focus, you know, I think if I can get acting
• 1:18:12
  roles awesome, but it's also something that I'm kind of not
• 1:18:17
  necessarily pursuing at the moment.
• 1:18:19
  Like, let me get my foot in the door with what I Do and then
• 1:18:22
  maybe when my foots in the door I can Branch off and be like, oh
• 1:18:25
  let me get a part in this or like audition for this and like
• 1:18:29
  doors open kind of wounds you're in.
• 1:18:31
  And yeah, I do love the art of acting, but it's just not my
• 1:18:38
  number one, like love like at that fair enough.
• 1:18:44
  What are your goals and aspirations within the field of
• 1:18:47
  filmmaking? I mean I would say like my main
• 1:18:51
  goal would just be making things, you know, directing
• 1:18:56
  different things or even just working in different
• 1:18:58
  departments. Like as I said before it's a
• 1:19:01
  bunch of department just really being in the film world but like
• 1:19:06
  if I had To say whatever. I like pick whatever I wanted.
• 1:19:10
  Yeah I would be directing things especially directing like maybe
• 1:19:13
  ideas. I came up with because sometimes
• 1:19:15
  a director might Get hired in their scripts already made and
• 1:19:19
  they don't get too much control over the story and stuff like
• 1:19:23
  that. If I could be one of those
• 1:19:24
  directors that writes and directs my own stuff.
• 1:19:27
  Awesome. You know, that would be the
• 1:19:29
  dream come true but I would also be happy doing anything in the
• 1:19:32
  field. And what do you do goes for 20
• 1:19:36
  21? 20:21 right now.
• 1:19:41
  Get the movie 100% done, you know, it's like 90% there right
• 1:19:46
  now and really just start putting it in festivals.
• 1:19:49
  And hopefully getting into a couple that would be kind of the
• 1:19:54
  main goal. And then the other goal, like I
• 1:19:58
  said, I was writing a new project, and it's a bigger idea,
• 1:20:02
  it's something we could interact.
• 1:20:04
  Like, I couldn't direct right now.
• 1:20:06
  You need money and that's Something where I'm like, you
• 1:20:08
  know what, let me try to see if I could sell it or do something
• 1:20:12
  like that, you know, and I feel like that's a new challenge.
• 1:20:15
  I haven't really done that yet. So I would say get that get the
• 1:20:19
  movie done Film Festival, finish my script and see if I can sell
• 1:20:23
  it or get interest or maybe make a connection where they say.
• 1:20:27
  I don't like that script but I like your writing.
• 1:20:29
  Right. That's, you know, it certainly
• 1:20:31
  sounds like from your background, you'll prepared to
• 1:20:34
  sort of do that as well. And like obviously there's a lot
• 1:20:36
  of opportunities. The filmmakers and just writes
• 1:20:41
  his in general with, you know, companies like Disney, plas
• 1:20:45
  Netflix, you know, list goes on HBO, do you think you'll be sort
• 1:20:50
  of trying to reach out to those sort of companies?
• 1:20:52
  Or I wish your kind of strategy at the moment.
• 1:20:54
  Right now, I'm going to want it done and I feel like happy with
• 1:20:59
  the finished product. I'm doing a couple of drafts
• 1:21:02
  right now, maybe try to get a manager, an agent either lot of
• 1:21:07
  they'll be the The ones to get you those meetings.
• 1:21:09
  Okay. You know, if I call up a
• 1:21:12
  Netflix, who am I right now? I'm nobody.
• 1:21:15
  So it's, it's tough to get in that door, but if you have a
• 1:21:19
  manager or an agent who has connections and they go out for
• 1:21:23
  you, they can get you in. So right now that would be like
• 1:21:26
  my first process. Maybe if the Black Forest isn't
• 1:21:30
  festivals, that's good. Enough to get your name in the
• 1:21:33
  door because people might start a knockout, you know.
• 1:21:35
  So it really depends. On there's a million different
• 1:21:40
  ways to get into like film and TV and right now I'm like at
• 1:21:44
  that threshold where like could take me different directions
• 1:21:49
  down certain paths and I don't know, you kind of just have to
• 1:21:52
  go with it. I'm sure it'll work out but I
• 1:21:55
  wish you the best of luck with crossed as we draw things to a
• 1:21:59
  close for today. Do you have any final thoughts
• 1:22:02
  or maybe some upcoming projects that you'd like to share with
• 1:22:05
  us? Yeah.
• 1:22:06
  I mean Workforce would be right now.
• 1:22:10
  We don't have like a social media for it.
• 1:22:12
  So, I would say you could go to, I have Instagram, Twitter,
• 1:22:16
  really? I use the same username.
• 1:22:17
  It's a j Co NS T right now. Like, if that kind of like the
• 1:22:22
  idea, follow me, there will start getting trailers once
• 1:22:26
  movie, maybe make a social media paid for the movie.
• 1:22:28
  You'll know. You'll learn their first and
• 1:22:31
  move and follow that. And yeah, that's right now the
• 1:22:34
  biggest Act on the table to follow.
• 1:22:38
  Excellent, excellent. Yeah like I said before wish you
• 1:22:41
  the best of luck with that I'm excited to see the film and yeah
• 1:22:46
  thank you very much for agreeing to be on the show.
• 1:22:48
  It's been a pleasure to talk to you or is it was a good time.
• 1:22:52
  And yeah, as always, thank you very much for watching the
• 1:22:55
  question we've podcast, whether it's on Spotify, Apple podcasts,
• 1:22:59
  Google podcasts YouTube. As I always say, please make
• 1:23:03
  sure to get in touch with me. If there is a particular guessed
• 1:23:05
  that you would like to see on an upcoming episode, or if there's
• 1:23:09
  particular topics that you'd like us to discuss on the
• 1:23:11
  podcast, just let me know, please.
• 1:23:14
  I always want to hear your thoughts.
• 1:23:15
  Thank you very much for listening and until next time.
• 1:23:18
  Peace out. One love.
• 1:23:19
  I'll see you in the next one.