Latest / Indie Film Hustle® - A Filmmaking Podcast / IFH 832: The Filmmaker Who Refused to Tap Out: The Making of Heel Kick! with Danny Mac

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IFH 832: The Filmmaker Who Refused to Tap Out: The Making of Heel Kick! with Danny Mac · Indie Film Hustle® - A Filmmaking Podcast

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Speaker 1: You are listening to the ifh podcast Network. For more
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Speaker 2: Welcome to the Indie Film Muscle Podcast, Episode number eight
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Speaker 2: thirty two. Cinema Should make You forget You're sitting in
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Speaker 2: a theater, Roman Polanski.
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Speaker 1: Broadcasting from the back alley in Hollywood. It's the Indie
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Speaker 1: Film Hustle Podcast, where we showed you how to survive
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Speaker 3: And here's your host, Alex Ferrari.
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Speaker 2: Welcome, Welcome to another episode of the Indie Film Huscle Podcast.
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Speaker 3: I am your humble.
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1:49
Speaker 2: Enjoy today's episode with guest host Dave Bullis.
1:54
Speaker 3: I have a Canadian filmmaker, actor and producer. He produced
1:58
Speaker 3: a film and actually started in as well and directed it.
2:00
Speaker 3: That it's very close to what I talk about a
2:02
Speaker 3: lot on here, and you know it's it's pro wrestling
2:06
Speaker 3: in one way or another. I know I don't talk
2:08
Speaker 3: a lot about pro wrestlings. I don't haven't watched it
2:10
Speaker 3: in years, but when I was growing up I watched
2:12
Speaker 3: it a ton, probably way too much, so we just
2:15
Speaker 3: had Nick Bondo on, who was a professional wrestler turned filmmaker.
2:20
Speaker 3: We've had a few other filmmaking projects here and there
2:22
Speaker 3: that involved pro wrestling, but this one is a unique
2:25
Speaker 3: one onto itself because it it really involves backyard wrestling.
2:29
Speaker 3: And I love the tagline for the film too, it's
2:31
Speaker 3: unprofessional wrestling, which is which is a genius tagline. So
2:36
Speaker 3: we're gonna talk all about this new film, Heel Kick,
2:39
Speaker 3: which is actually going through a little tour right now
2:42
Speaker 3: and then it'll be out later this year. We're also
2:44
Speaker 3: gonna talk about how my next guest actually made money
2:46
Speaker 3: with this first film, believe it or not, which is
2:50
Speaker 3: just crazy to think of, right making money with your
2:52
Speaker 3: first film. We're gonna talk about all that stuff, film school, networking,
2:55
Speaker 3: finding contacts, and we go with a lot of really
2:58
Speaker 3: cool producing stuff in this too, and we talked about
3:01
Speaker 3: for wrestling with guest Danny Mack.
3:06
Speaker 4: I did not go to film school, and it is
3:08
Speaker 4: something that I knew I wanted to do when I
3:10
Speaker 4: was growing up, but it just seemed too insurmountable and
3:13
Speaker 4: too difficult. You're talking to me now from Edmonton, Alberta,
3:17
Speaker 4: where I grew up. I'm just back here for my
3:20
Speaker 4: grandma's one hundredth birthday and then i'll be back to
3:23
Speaker 4: Vancouver tonight. But growing up here where there's essentially no
3:27
Speaker 4: film scene, and it does have a fairly decent theater community,
3:31
Speaker 4: but really film and television, there's not nothing, and there's
3:35
Speaker 4: no one who's doing it. So I, you know, I
3:37
Speaker 4: didn't have any inspirations surrounding me, and the prices for
3:41
Speaker 4: film school were really high, and it's something that my
3:44
Speaker 4: mom and I were looking at when I was fifteen
3:46
Speaker 4: or sixteen because clearly I had an interest in it
3:49
Speaker 4: and I needed some sort of creative outlet because I was,
3:51
Speaker 4: you know, kind of just being a little brat of
3:53
Speaker 4: a kid. But it seemed too expensive, and yeah, like
3:57
Speaker 4: I said, there was just nothing around me to indicate
3:59
Speaker 4: that it was something that that I could pull off.
4:02
Speaker 4: So so I kind of like let it. I wouldn't
4:06
Speaker 4: want to say let the dream die. But you know,
4:09
Speaker 4: I went to university and I still hadn't picked a
4:12
Speaker 4: major or a minor after like two or three years,
4:15
Speaker 4: and I was taking a lot of studies, you know,
4:19
Speaker 4: acting because I liked it. So I was training here
4:22
Speaker 4: and there, but I finally realized, you know, I could
4:25
Speaker 4: probably just make a movie myself, and so began the
4:29
Speaker 4: journey of me producing my own projects.
4:32
Speaker 3: So when you actually wanted to make your own movie, like,
4:35
Speaker 3: what were some of the first things that you did
4:37
Speaker 3: to sort of take those steps to actually make that movie.
4:41
Speaker 4: Well, we myself and my one of the co stars
4:45
Speaker 4: in Heel Kick and and my fellow producer, Cooper b Bo,
4:49
Speaker 4: we would look at scripts to get an idea of
4:53
Speaker 4: how to format them and how they were written. And
4:55
Speaker 4: then we, you know, just started to have writing sessions
4:59
Speaker 4: together and anyone who would want to work on something creative,
5:02
Speaker 4: we would. So we were writing sketches for the Fringe
5:06
Speaker 4: Film Play Theater festival that we have here in Edmonton,
5:10
Speaker 4: and anyone who wanted to do something, you know and
5:13
Speaker 4: throw it up on you too, we were contributing. But
5:16
Speaker 4: he and I were really interested in writing feature films.
5:20
Speaker 4: And then, because you know, we're actors and we're writers,
5:25
Speaker 4: but we don't really know anything about the technical aspect
5:27
Speaker 4: of filmmaking, we would seek out people who were in
5:31
Speaker 4: film school and ask them if they would want to
5:33
Speaker 4: come help us shoot something. And since we were something
5:37
Speaker 4: the only people making an independent feature film in the city.
5:40
Speaker 4: We got a lot of attention right away, and before
5:43
Speaker 4: we knew it, we had a film crew on board
5:46
Speaker 4: and they were helping us shoot our first feature film.
5:50
Speaker 4: And this was back in twenty eleven, so.
5:52
Speaker 3: When you were actually you got all that attention. Have
5:54
Speaker 3: you know, has things changed then? So, like, I mean,
5:57
Speaker 3: you know what I mean, like everybody you know who
5:59
Speaker 3: has a knife now as a filmmaker. So have you
6:02
Speaker 3: noticed have things actually changed where it's become passe or
6:06
Speaker 3: maybe it's become the point where it's like in La
6:08
Speaker 3: where it's a pain in the ass. I mean, have
6:09
Speaker 3: you noticed any difference.
6:11
Speaker 4: Just in regards to like the amount of people who
6:13
Speaker 4: are making film?
6:14
Speaker 3: You mean, yeah, exactly, and you're in your area.
6:17
Speaker 4: Well, I mean yes and no. Because Vancouver is a
6:21
Speaker 4: pretty big film city. A lot of stuff is filmed there.
6:25
Speaker 4: It's a big service city, so a lot of big
6:28
Speaker 4: productions come through there, and then you know, Vancouver actors
6:31
Speaker 4: will help round out and fill out some of the
6:34
Speaker 4: roles that are needed in the crew gets a lot
6:36
Speaker 4: of work down there there as well. But yeah, it's
6:39
Speaker 4: funny how you say everyone with an iPhone can be
6:41
Speaker 4: a filmmaker. And that's true, and I think it's so
6:43
Speaker 4: much easier for people to make films these days, but
6:46
Speaker 4: the amount of drive and determination that it takes to
6:48
Speaker 4: pull something like that off that doesn't change. It's still
6:51
Speaker 4: backbreaking and it's still a serious commitment of if not money,
6:56
Speaker 4: seriously time. So while it's easier than ever, I don't
7:00
Speaker 4: think more people than ever are actually doing it because
7:03
Speaker 4: you know what I mean, it's tough to take that
7:04
Speaker 4: plunge and you know, first of all, it's tough to
7:07
Speaker 4: sit down and write a film. It's tough to assemble
7:11
Speaker 4: a crew and a cast, and it's tough to shoot
7:13
Speaker 4: the thing and then edit it and then sell it. So,
7:16
Speaker 4: you know, as much as we have the resources available
7:18
Speaker 4: to us, I actually don't see people taking advantage of
7:21
Speaker 4: it that much because I think people do understand how
7:24
Speaker 4: much work it is and that's kind of a scary,
7:27
Speaker 4: like it's a turnoff for people.
7:30
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's true. And you know when I say everyone
7:33
Speaker 3: who thinks who has an iPhone is you know, considers
7:35
Speaker 3: themselves a filmmaker, it's just because you know, it's kind
7:38
Speaker 3: of like that idea, you know, I mean, I've done
7:40
Speaker 3: commercial work too, where commercial videography work, and you know,
7:43
Speaker 3: the guy's like, hey, my son, their daughter's got an iPhone,
7:46
Speaker 3: why should I hire you? Or you know, people who
7:48
Speaker 3: want to start throwing vlog on YouTube, or but yeah,
7:50
Speaker 3: I know it's exactly what you're saying. You know, it
7:52
Speaker 3: does still take all that time and planning an effort,
7:55
Speaker 3: which is why most movies don't get made. Right there,
7:58
Speaker 3: You know, nobody used normal who actually makes a film?
8:01
Speaker 3: Normal is sitting on your calus talking about making a movie,
8:04
Speaker 3: right Danny.
8:05
Speaker 4: Yeah, everyone on earth has done that. I got a
8:07
Speaker 4: great idea for a movie or a book or a
8:09
Speaker 4: TV show or whatever. Everyone has said that at one
8:11
Speaker 4: point in their life. It only takes the truly insane
8:14
Speaker 4: people to, you know, think that's something that should actually
8:17
Speaker 4: try to do for a living.
8:19
Speaker 3: You know, it was funny one time, I actually came
8:21
Speaker 3: home from a shoot one day and I was so tired.
8:25
Speaker 3: I just wanted to shower. Another shower I already taken
8:27
Speaker 3: on that day, but you know, it was a long
8:30
Speaker 3: ass day, and I sort of plopped down the couch
8:33
Speaker 3: and a friend of mine, you know, came over and
8:35
Speaker 3: he was like, oh, you know, what were you doing
8:37
Speaker 3: today and Bob blind and he goes, oh, man, I
8:38
Speaker 3: got this idea for a movie, and I'm like, I
8:40
Speaker 3: don't want to ever talk about movies again. I said,
8:43
Speaker 3: I am so tired right now, like I'm just aching
8:45
Speaker 3: all over. I was sunburned. I was like, I don't care.
8:50
Speaker 4: I don't want to. Yeah, And that eventually happens, like
8:53
Speaker 4: people say, you know, what would be a great idea,
8:55
Speaker 4: and you're like, you know what, I mean, bringing my
8:58
Speaker 4: own idea to life. It's stressing me out. So please
9:02
Speaker 4: keep gray to yourself at this point because I can't
9:04
Speaker 4: help you. I'm losing my mind working on my own projects.
9:08
Speaker 4: It's sad. It's sad to say, but yeah, I definitely
9:12
Speaker 4: hear you. Yeah.
9:13
Speaker 3: It's it's that whole idea of like a friend's it's
9:16
Speaker 3: always like, hey, you know, we're a friend from high school.
9:18
Speaker 3: Do you get that? By the way, I don't. I
9:21
Speaker 3: don't have to talk about that a lot. But I
9:22
Speaker 3: have friends from high school who constantly send me messages
9:25
Speaker 3: about some script or or or an idea that they are.
9:29
Speaker 3: One wanted to shoot a zombie film in the woods
9:31
Speaker 3: and he wanted my advice, and I'm like, you've never
9:33
Speaker 3: talked to me ever unless you need something. So I'm like,
9:35
Speaker 3: why the hell would I help you?
9:37
Speaker 4: You know what I mean.
9:37
Speaker 3: It's just it's just so it's so like phony, you know.
9:40
Speaker 4: What I mean. I get a lot of that. But
9:44
Speaker 4: some people reach out and I don't think it's that
9:46
Speaker 4: they necessarily like want something from me. But at the
9:50
Speaker 4: same time they are like, I got a great idea
9:52
Speaker 4: for a thing. All you would have to do is
9:55
Speaker 4: write it and produce it and shoot shoot it and
9:58
Speaker 4: get the money together, Like.
10:01
Speaker 2: We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor
10:07
Speaker 2: and now back to the show.
10:10
Speaker 4: I'm like, are you insane? Like there's absolutely And you know,
10:14
Speaker 4: I don't have a shortage of ideas myself, you know,
10:16
Speaker 4: I'm trying to figure out what i want to do
10:17
Speaker 4: next and what I'm going to put out there. So
10:19
Speaker 4: someone with zero experience comany is saying like, I got
10:22
Speaker 4: a great idea and you haven't talked to them in
10:24
Speaker 4: a long time. Yeah, it can be frustrating. God bless
10:27
Speaker 4: them though, God bless them.
10:29
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's it's that whole idea of Look, you know
10:31
Speaker 3: what's so complicated about this. You have all the connections
10:34
Speaker 3: and i'd sit there. I go, Guys, it just doesn't
10:36
Speaker 3: work like that. And I get a lot of See,
10:39
Speaker 3: I'm glad that you understand what I'm talking about, you know,
10:41
Speaker 3: And you get that a lot because I've had girls
10:43
Speaker 3: too that I went to high school with who want
10:45
Speaker 3: to be quote unquote actresses, and they don't really want
10:48
Speaker 3: to be actresses, you know, they want to show up
10:50
Speaker 3: to set or wherever and take pictures of themselves so
10:52
Speaker 3: people can tell them how beautiful they are.
10:55
Speaker 4: Yeah, there's really and you know, there's nothing glamorous about
10:58
Speaker 4: like the job of an actor. Really, if you are
11:01
Speaker 4: an actor, there's there's so many moments where you're like,
11:04
Speaker 4: what the hell, this is not what I thought it
11:07
Speaker 4: would be. But you have to love it, and I do.
11:11
Speaker 4: But yeah, when I really explained to people, like what
11:13
Speaker 4: my day is like when I'm on set, either for
11:16
Speaker 4: a commercial or a TV show or something, it's yeah,
11:20
Speaker 4: it's really a kick in the pants, I think.
11:22
Speaker 3: So, you know, when we started in twenty eleven, when
11:25
Speaker 3: you started making your own film, your first film, you know,
11:28
Speaker 3: and you put everything together, you know, did you have
11:31
Speaker 3: any of this culture shock that we're talking about right
11:33
Speaker 3: now where you were like, oh my god, what the
11:35
Speaker 3: hell did I get myself into?
11:37
Speaker 4: Yeah? Absolutely, and pardon me, I got the date wrong.
11:39
Speaker 4: It was back in two thousand and nine. We started
11:41
Speaker 4: writing it, and we shot it in two thousand and ten,
11:44
Speaker 4: and yeah, holy crap. I could not believe how long
11:48
Speaker 4: the days were, how long it took to get shot
11:50
Speaker 4: set up, you know, I just you don't understand. And
11:53
Speaker 4: especially I'd never been to film school, so that was
11:55
Speaker 4: my film school. And I would have quit because it
12:01
Speaker 4: was just so intense and there was so much work.
12:03
Speaker 4: But Cooper and I put our life savings into the movie,
12:08
Speaker 4: and we completely funded at ourselves, so we kept working
12:11
Speaker 4: our regular jobs Monday to Friday, and then because we
12:15
Speaker 4: couldn't afford to pay anyone, we could only shoot the
12:17
Speaker 4: movie Friday night, all of Saturday, all of Sunday, and
12:20
Speaker 4: then we'd go back to work. We'd only shoot weekends.
12:22
Speaker 4: And like, I was so drained. I could not believe
12:26
Speaker 4: how tired I was, And I was almost so exhausted
12:29
Speaker 4: that quitting would have required more thought and effort than
12:33
Speaker 4: just staying the course. So we ended up finishing it.
12:37
Speaker 4: But yeah, just when I say that, like that first
12:40
Speaker 4: film was my film school. I really believe that because
12:43
Speaker 4: trial by fire is the only way that I've really
12:47
Speaker 4: stuck to things and learned in my life. I've found
12:50
Speaker 4: and yeah, it really prepares you for what the career
12:54
Speaker 4: is going to be. Like, of course, you improve the
12:56
Speaker 4: next time around. We made a ton of mistakes, but
12:59
Speaker 4: you know, learning from them and going forward, there's no
13:02
Speaker 4: better way to do it. I think.
13:04
Speaker 3: So, what was the biggest obstacle you faced when making
13:07
Speaker 3: that movie? Like, was there one day or one thing
13:10
Speaker 3: that happened where we were like, I think I'm done?
13:13
Speaker 4: Hmmm? I mean that I feel like every every day honestly,
13:18
Speaker 4: like somehow and this is crazy. And really the money
13:24
Speaker 4: was our like least, like we were always worried about
13:26
Speaker 4: the money because literally it was just his and my
13:28
Speaker 4: life savings. We both put twenty thousand dollars up to
13:31
Speaker 4: make this forty thousand dollar feature. But there was sort
13:34
Speaker 4: of nothing to worry about because we had the money,
13:36
Speaker 4: Like we didn't have to go knock on any doors
13:38
Speaker 4: for more. So, oddly enough, the money wasn't the bigges problem.
13:41
Speaker 4: But the biggest problem was was that we were producing
13:43
Speaker 4: a film and we'd never done that before. We never
13:45
Speaker 4: made a short well we had made a short film before,
13:47
Speaker 4: but like that took that took an afternoon, and like
13:50
Speaker 4: this was just so intense. So yeah, we we were
13:55
Speaker 4: just we were faced with obstacles every day, Like we
13:58
Speaker 4: didn't like transportation and getting everything to our certain locations
14:02
Speaker 4: was rough, and who was going to return all the year,
14:05
Speaker 4: and like there was just things we didn't know that
14:07
Speaker 4: were actual things that you had to do on set,
14:09
Speaker 4: and so we had we didn't delegate properly, so it
14:12
Speaker 4: just see, like day one, there's like ninety things that
14:15
Speaker 4: are undone that we need to just assign to people
14:17
Speaker 4: to start doing. And because we were the producers and
14:19
Speaker 4: we couldn't pay anyone, we had to do all those
14:22
Speaker 4: things ourselves. So while money wasn't an issue, if you're
14:25
Speaker 4: not paying anyone, you're not going to get any extra
14:28
Speaker 4: out of anyone. You know, they were just doing it
14:30
Speaker 4: for the experience. So we took on way too much
14:34
Speaker 4: and that was probably why, you know, I can't even
14:37
Speaker 4: pick a specific thing, but really the the umbrella of
14:40
Speaker 4: all the problems is that we just wore way too
14:42
Speaker 4: many hats and we juggled too many things.
14:44
Speaker 3: And you see, Danny, I think that happens to a
14:47
Speaker 3: lot of filmmakers, you see, because everything is a little
14:50
Speaker 3: more accessible quote unquote, you know, whether there would be
14:53
Speaker 3: a camera or maybe it be you know, a way
14:56
Speaker 3: to storyboard, or whether it be hey, listen, I have
14:59
Speaker 3: an idea, you know what I mean. You kind of
15:01
Speaker 3: build up this confidence to go in there and do it.
15:04
Speaker 3: But I think when you wear so many hats, you
15:08
Speaker 3: kind of it all hits you when you're trying to
15:10
Speaker 3: do two things at once. And I can tell you
15:13
Speaker 3: I remember I was I was doing one of my films,
15:15
Speaker 3: one of my student films, and I remember somebody had
15:19
Speaker 3: backed out who was supposed to be like my location
15:21
Speaker 3: manager slash like upm and everybody instead was calling me
15:25
Speaker 3: now as I'm trying to direct the scene for like directions,
15:29
Speaker 3: questions about stuff. Hey, you know what I mean. And
15:32
Speaker 3: I'm just like, guys, I'm trying to direct a freaking
15:35
Speaker 3: scene here and I'm trying to talk to the cinematographer
15:38
Speaker 3: and I'm trying to do this and people are coming
15:40
Speaker 3: up and ask me questions. People are coming up because
15:42
Speaker 3: they the people who had the location. There was like
15:45
Speaker 3: other stuff going on, so people were walking in the
15:47
Speaker 3: room going, oh, is there are you guys filming here?
15:50
Speaker 3: We're like, oh, Jesus Christ, shoot me. Now what did
15:52
Speaker 3: I do to myself?
15:55
Speaker 4: I got a funny story or a very first day
15:56
Speaker 4: on set. We actually didn't have the permits to shoot
15:59
Speaker 4: in the park we were shooting in and I didn't
16:01
Speaker 4: know this. So someone like a park ranger came up
16:04
Speaker 4: to our director and was like, hey, do you have
16:07
Speaker 4: permits to shoot here? And he was just petrified and
16:11
Speaker 4: the only thing he could think to say was the
16:13
Speaker 4: name of the person he was supposed to email to
16:16
Speaker 4: get the permits that he never actually did. And let's
16:19
Speaker 4: say that person's name was Alex. So this park ranger
16:21
Speaker 4: comes up to our director our first day on set,
16:23
Speaker 4: He's like, hey, did you get the proper permits to
16:26
Speaker 4: be here? And all he says was Alex. And then
16:29
Speaker 4: the park ranger somehow accepted that and was like, okay,
16:33
Speaker 4: well have a good shoot and left us. But we
16:34
Speaker 4: could have been like shut down before we begun, So
16:40
Speaker 4: God bless him for that one. I have no idea
16:42
Speaker 4: how we weaseled our way out of that situation, but.
16:45
Speaker 3: It's like one of those movie jokes, you know, where
16:47
Speaker 3: the character kind of just like blurts out of me
16:49
Speaker 3: an answer by accident. They like their own jeopardy, and
16:53
Speaker 3: it's like, yeah, that's exactly it. That's the answer.
16:56
Speaker 4: It's yeah. Meanwhile, Oh, he's just like breathing heavily and
17:00
Speaker 4: sweating his ass off because we almost lost everything, and.
17:06
Speaker 3: You know, and see stuff like that.
17:07
Speaker 4: You know.
17:08
Speaker 3: I have a funny story happened. Didn't happen on one
17:10
Speaker 3: of my sets, but it was. I actually was was
17:14
Speaker 3: visiting the set one day and this this kind of
17:17
Speaker 3: like park ranger type of guy walks by and he
17:20
Speaker 3: looks over and he just sees all these film cameras
17:23
Speaker 3: and gear and everything else. And immediately I'm like, well,
17:26
Speaker 3: this this guy. I know, these guys who are running
17:29
Speaker 3: this film set, who's film it is. I know they
17:31
Speaker 3: don't have permits. And and I look at the park
17:34
Speaker 3: ranger and he's on a bike and he just kind
17:37
Speaker 3: of looks around and just pedaled off and never said
17:40
Speaker 3: a word. And I think, I'm thinking to myself, what
17:43
Speaker 3: made him not do this? Like what made him not
17:46
Speaker 3: want to get involved? And here's here's there's two things
17:48
Speaker 3: that I think of that didn't that made him not
17:50
Speaker 3: want to get involved as I kind of took a
17:52
Speaker 3: look around. Number one was there was probably like three
17:54
Speaker 3: hundred people there and just because it was a concert scene.
17:59
Speaker 4: And two there was a guy in an.
18:01
Speaker 3: Eight foot like monster costume just kind of rampaging around,
18:06
Speaker 3: and I think both of them, he's probably I don't
18:08
Speaker 3: even want to get involved in whatever the hell this is.
18:10
Speaker 4: Yeah, he could probably smell like the dreams that he
18:14
Speaker 4: would have crushed. Also if he just followed up on it.
18:17
Speaker 4: I think that was a big part of it too.
18:18
Speaker 4: This park ranger was like, you what, these kids look
18:21
Speaker 4: like they've got enough trouble already as it is, So
18:23
Speaker 4: I'm just gonna bike away from this situation.
18:28
Speaker 3: And we're right in Philadelphia too. We usually crushed dreams
18:30
Speaker 3: here in Philadelphia, So you know that guy.
18:33
Speaker 4: Was the that is the city motto, isn't it where
18:36
Speaker 4: dreams go to be crushed?
18:37
Speaker 3: I believe, Oh yeah, that that hitchpot thing. It survived
18:40
Speaker 3: Canada and everything else, and then as soon as it came.
18:42
Speaker 4: Here was done. That's it. So dandy?
18:48
Speaker 3: Would you if you get done making Love Hate, which
18:51
Speaker 3: was your first film, how did you go about releasing
18:54
Speaker 3: the film or even just marketing the film?
18:56
Speaker 4: That was another sort of I mean, we didn't do
18:59
Speaker 4: too much marketing, but we really got lucky on that
19:03
Speaker 4: one because we were able to sell the film to
19:05
Speaker 4: a Canadian the on demand subscription or not subscription base,
19:11
Speaker 4: but transactional video on demand channel called Superchannel. And the
19:14
Speaker 4: only thing that we had heard about it was that
19:16
Speaker 4: a guy that we knew apparently hit a short film
19:21
Speaker 4: and he sold it to them and they gave him
19:23
Speaker 4: like fourteen thousand dollars. And we never confirmed this, We
19:27
Speaker 4: never looked into it. We didn't even talk to the guy.
19:29
Speaker 4: We're like, oh, if he can do that, we can
19:30
Speaker 4: do it. So we proceeded to make this film and
19:32
Speaker 4: then their head offices happened to be in Edmonton where
19:36
Speaker 4: we shot Love Hate, and we literally just drove there
19:40
Speaker 4: one day. We google maps where their offices were. Cooper
19:42
Speaker 4: and myself just drove there in my old Honda Accord
19:46
Speaker 4: with a blu ray of our film. We were like, Hey,
19:48
Speaker 4: who can we talk to about buying our movie? They
19:51
Speaker 4: were like, I guess the acquisition's head is here. So
19:55
Speaker 4: we met with her and she passed the film off
19:58
Speaker 4: to her team.
20:00
Speaker 2: We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor
20:06
Speaker 2: and now back to the show.
20:09
Speaker 4: And we got a call like a few weeks later
20:11
Speaker 4: saying that they would they would buy the movie off
20:13
Speaker 4: of us, and we ended up breaking even on our
20:15
Speaker 4: first project just from that and a couple of theatrical
20:18
Speaker 4: screenings that we held ourselves.
20:20
Speaker 3: I mean, that is a hell Mary story, man, you know,
20:24
Speaker 3: you just you threw it up there. But see, but
20:27
Speaker 3: stories like that or a success, you know, that's what
20:29
Speaker 3: people aim for, you know. It's to do stuff like that, Hey,
20:32
Speaker 3: we sold our first movie, you know, or or we
20:35
Speaker 3: you know, we did this, or we did that.
20:37
Speaker 4: You know.
20:38
Speaker 3: It's it's funny. A guy I know actually used to
20:40
Speaker 3: work with Orn Patelli, who did Paranormal Activity, and one day,
20:45
Speaker 3: I don't know if you've ever seen the first or
20:46
Speaker 3: Paranormal Activity, but one day Oran came in and he said, guys,
20:49
Speaker 3: I just want to say it's been nice working with you.
20:52
Speaker 3: I I actually just want two weeks in And I said, oh, well,
20:55
Speaker 3: you know what, do you have another job? And he said, well,
20:57
Speaker 3: actually I just sold a movie to Steven Spielberg. And
21:01
Speaker 3: they were like, yeah, right, Like come on, what are
21:03
Speaker 3: you really doing? He goes no, he goes no, like
21:06
Speaker 3: I'm going to be on all these web series or
21:10
Speaker 3: not web series, like like web interviews and stuff like that.
21:13
Speaker 3: And he goes, and I want to be on like
21:14
Speaker 3: this channel just you know, and that's it. Well, like
21:17
Speaker 3: little by little they started, like all these interviews started
21:20
Speaker 3: popping up, and they were like, oh my god, this
21:22
Speaker 3: is amazing. But I mean it's stuff like that, you know,
21:24
Speaker 3: stories like that that that you know, it sort of
21:27
Speaker 3: keeps that indie film, indie film dream alive.
21:29
Speaker 4: You know.
21:30
Speaker 3: We were able to actually, you know, do these things,
21:32
Speaker 3: actually say hey, look we made our money back, or
21:35
Speaker 3: we made least some money, and now we can take
21:37
Speaker 3: that money and make another film exactly.
21:39
Speaker 4: And yeah, when you say it was a hail Mary,
21:41
Speaker 4: it absolutely was because we were you know, we had
21:44
Speaker 4: we were just delusional. We thought that the movie was
21:46
Speaker 4: going to explode and we'd make so much money that
21:48
Speaker 4: our next film could be like triple the budget and
21:51
Speaker 4: that it would be smooth sailing. And then you know,
21:53
Speaker 4: we were able to sell it and so we got
21:56
Speaker 4: national broadcast and we we made like a lot of
21:59
Speaker 4: money on just three threeatrical screenings that we did, and
22:02
Speaker 4: so we made our money back plus maybe like I
22:04
Speaker 4: don't know, like three grand each and this was after
22:07
Speaker 4: like three years of work, so like whoopie do right?
22:11
Speaker 4: We were like upset. We were like, man, I can't
22:14
Speaker 4: believe we only broke even, and other filmmakers like, we
22:17
Speaker 4: didn't realize how tough it was to, you know, get
22:19
Speaker 4: a broadcast deal and make your money back within like
22:22
Speaker 4: six months of releasing your film, and all these other
22:24
Speaker 4: filmmakers like, are you insane that you're complaining right now?
22:27
Speaker 4: Like you sold your first film and you made all
22:30
Speaker 4: your money back, Like what is your problem? And now
22:33
Speaker 4: is I've just like been in the industry so much longer.
22:35
Speaker 4: I was like, what a shitty little brat I was
22:37
Speaker 4: being complaining that we didn't like bring in heaps of
22:40
Speaker 4: cash from our little independent film and yeah, I'm just
22:43
Speaker 4: you know, we did everything wrong, but it turned out
22:46
Speaker 4: all right for us in the end. So I'm really
22:48
Speaker 4: proud of our little effort that we put in back then.
22:50
Speaker 3: And I'm also glad that you got my football reference too,
22:53
Speaker 3: cause I mean, I know you're you're in Canada, and
22:56
Speaker 3: I'm like, wait a minute, and will he understand the
22:58
Speaker 3: by the Yeah, I'm glad you got that right, because.
23:01
Speaker 4: Because nearly orange football here, there's nine downs before the
23:05
Speaker 4: ball change his hands.
23:07
Speaker 3: Well, I've actually been to Canada and I saw a
23:09
Speaker 3: Toronto Argonauts game one time.
23:12
Speaker 4: Oh the rgoes yeah, that's right, so yes, yeah, yeah.
23:16
Speaker 3: So it was just funny though, because I was you know,
23:19
Speaker 3: the NFL is not really popular outside of them, outside
23:21
Speaker 3: of the USA, and I'm just like, man, I always
23:25
Speaker 3: I always gott to watch my my slang. And even
23:27
Speaker 3: when I'm talking to other filmmakers from America, I gotta
23:30
Speaker 3: watch my Philly slang. They don't say something weird and
23:32
Speaker 3: they're like, oh yeah, Dave, you know.
23:35
Speaker 4: No, I'm all over it. I got you.
23:37
Speaker 3: Wait, we know. Just to go back to about Love Hate,
23:39
Speaker 3: I mean again, you know, selling your first film, that's huge,
23:42
Speaker 3: and I mean now, I mean because you sold that
23:44
Speaker 3: in like twenty ten, twenty eleven. I mean, what do
23:47
Speaker 3: you think about the marketplace now? You know, even tying
23:51
Speaker 3: in with your new movie, he'll kick about. I mean,
23:54
Speaker 3: what do you think the market's like? Now? Do you
23:55
Speaker 3: think it's more crowded? Because I've had I've heard a
23:59
Speaker 3: lot of different opinions and perspectives of this. Some people say, yeah,
24:02
Speaker 3: it's more crowded, but but there's more avenues, and then
24:07
Speaker 3: and then the other the other sort of option is
24:09
Speaker 3: or the other perspective is the the good movies, no
24:12
Speaker 3: matter what, are always just going to rise on the top.
24:15
Speaker 4: I mean, I hope that that's the case, because you know,
24:19
Speaker 4: then that means that people will see good films and
24:21
Speaker 4: that will reward and that we'll you know, teach people
24:23
Speaker 4: to make good projects. I don't know, I think that
24:27
Speaker 4: it's really exciting the time that we're in right now,
24:30
Speaker 4: especially with all the methods of self distribution available. That
24:33
Speaker 4: is really something that gets me excited about continuing down
24:37
Speaker 4: this path as an independent filmmaker and beyond. And while
24:41
Speaker 4: I do think there is a ton of just product
24:46
Speaker 4: out there, like there's so many shows and films, I
24:49
Speaker 4: do believe that the good ones rise to the top,
24:51
Speaker 4: and I think that you have to hold on to
24:53
Speaker 4: that because I don't know what's what's the alternative thought
24:56
Speaker 4: on that that, you know, like a bad movie with
24:59
Speaker 4: great marketing will be the only thing that really matters
25:03
Speaker 4: one day. And you know, while that may be the case,
25:05
Speaker 4: I'm sure we've all heard a million things about a movie.
25:07
Speaker 4: We don't care about. In the independence scene, you have
25:11
Speaker 4: so much more leeway, I believe, and people aren't as
25:13
Speaker 4: tough on films, and you know, while you do have
25:16
Speaker 4: to have a fixed skin and everyone who's going to
25:18
Speaker 4: have critics, it's kind of a nice community. You know.
25:21
Speaker 4: People are always willing to help each other and talk
25:24
Speaker 4: about their project. And there's so many case studies. I
25:29
Speaker 4: think that's the coolest thing about it. People say, yeah,
25:31
Speaker 4: there's so many projects out there right now, it's such
25:33
Speaker 4: a cluttered marketplace. But if you're trying to produce an
25:36
Speaker 4: independent film, you can look at all of those things
25:38
Speaker 4: and you can just case study them about what they
25:41
Speaker 4: did right and what they did wrong. And I'm sure
25:43
Speaker 4: everyone has, you know, I can't even tell you how
25:46
Speaker 4: many Kickstarter film projects that I've seen that just never
25:51
Speaker 4: got to production, that never saw the light of day,
25:53
Speaker 4: and that's useful information. And then all the ones that
25:55
Speaker 4: did make it, that's useful information. So, yes, the marketplace
26:00
Speaker 4: is cluttered, but I think for indie filmmakers that's a
26:03
Speaker 4: good thing because you can sit back and you can
26:06
Speaker 4: plot your course more effectively than you ever could before.
26:09
Speaker 4: And even just in twenty eleven when we sold that film.
26:12
Speaker 4: We like, if that head of acquisitions wasn't based in
26:15
Speaker 4: our hometown, we never would have been able to drive
26:18
Speaker 4: there and use our just in person charm. If we
26:20
Speaker 4: did have it, then we certainly don't have much of
26:23
Speaker 4: it anymore. But I don't know if we could pull
26:25
Speaker 4: something like that off again. But like, there were just
26:28
Speaker 4: so many things that added up, and if one of
26:31
Speaker 4: them fell through, we wouldn't have had any idea what
26:33
Speaker 4: to do because we sold directly to the broadcaster. We
26:36
Speaker 4: did not get a distribution deal, nor did we even
26:39
Speaker 4: seek one out because we were able to go direct
26:42
Speaker 4: to the broadcasters. So now if we were in the
26:46
Speaker 4: same circumstance now, which I kind of am with this film,
26:50
Speaker 4: at least you wouldn't be completely screwed if like the
26:52
Speaker 4: one thing you know to get your film out there
26:54
Speaker 4: doesn't work. So it's exciting. There is a lot of noise,
26:57
Speaker 4: but you can learn from the noise, and that's good too.
27:00
Speaker 3: Yeah, And that's an excellent point, Danny. And you raise
27:03
Speaker 3: another excellent point too, and that is a lot of
27:05
Speaker 3: kickstarters that don't actually see production, and that happens. I mean,
27:10
Speaker 3: the most notorious of that is the video game industry,
27:14
Speaker 3: just because of all the things that happened in that industry.
27:16
Speaker 3: But you know, I've seen film projects that that have
27:20
Speaker 3: crowdfunded and gone nowhere. I mean some are some even
27:25
Speaker 3: famously have been crowdfunded. And you know, there's some pretty
27:28
Speaker 3: big people that have joined the crowdfunding spectrum. I won't
27:31
Speaker 3: name names, but they they've taken some money and not
27:34
Speaker 3: and not produced anything, you know, to me, I'm sorry, Danny.
27:39
Speaker 4: Oh, I just said, yikes. Yeah, that's that's a bad. Yeah.
27:42
Speaker 4: You don't like to hear that.
27:43
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean it's just I always wonder I always
27:46
Speaker 3: wanted to bring one of them on this show and
27:48
Speaker 3: just be like, you know, what the hell happened? I
27:51
Speaker 3: just be like, what did you really not have a plan?
27:53
Speaker 3: Did you? Guys just like throw this up and somebody
27:56
Speaker 3: donated like fifty grand, you know. I speaking of which,
27:59
Speaker 3: I had a friend of mine who's to crowdfunding campaign
28:01
Speaker 3: and in twenty twelve, he had a mysterious benefactor, dead serious,
28:06
Speaker 3: give him ten thousand dollars out of nowhere, just out
28:09
Speaker 3: of nowhere. And I mean he was like he couldn't
28:13
Speaker 3: figure out who it was.
28:14
Speaker 4: Nobody would.
28:15
Speaker 3: Yeah, it was just it was out of nowhere, and
28:17
Speaker 3: he actually was trying to figure out who the hell
28:20
Speaker 3: that was, and it just he never figured it out.
28:23
Speaker 3: And I was like, well, I guess you. You know,
28:25
Speaker 3: you have to make your movie now. And he kind
28:28
Speaker 3: of like he almost became paralyzed by trying to figure
28:32
Speaker 3: out who this was.
28:33
Speaker 4: He was like, there's your movie.
28:37
Speaker 3: He was like more adamant about He's like he's like,
28:39
Speaker 3: all right, I gotta figure out who has the resources
28:41
Speaker 3: to give me ten thousand dollars and not miss it.
28:44
Speaker 3: And I'm just like, make your movie. Who the hell
28:46
Speaker 3: cares about it?
28:47
Speaker 4: Well, like, that's a sweet ass problem to have, my friends.
28:52
Speaker 3: No, that's I mean, how how would that even sound
28:54
Speaker 3: if you said that?
28:55
Speaker 4: Oh?
28:55
Speaker 3: Man, I got this bad problem. Oh Danny, what's the problem.
28:58
Speaker 3: Oh some rain dude gave me ten grand to make
29:01
Speaker 3: a film.
29:02
Speaker 4: Oh yeah, it's keeping me up at night. I just
29:05
Speaker 4: can't figure out who's generous and loves me. It's just
29:08
Speaker 4: driving me insane. So we did crowdfunding for Heel Kick,
29:13
Speaker 4: I should probably add, and I didn't want to do it,
29:16
Speaker 4: and crowdfunding is something that like I believe in and
29:20
Speaker 4: I appreciate it, but it's just something that I personally
29:23
Speaker 4: don't want to do, and I never wanted to do it.
29:26
Speaker 4: The only reason I did a GoFundMe campaign was because
29:29
Speaker 4: I was just screwed. But the advantage that I had
29:33
Speaker 4: was that my film was already shot and I was
29:35
Speaker 4: able to release a trailer for it. So my whole
29:38
Speaker 4: GoFundMe approach was, Hey, my movie's done, so there's all
29:42
Speaker 4: one hundred percent chance that if you donate to this
29:47
Speaker 4: that it's not going to be lost in the abyss
29:49
Speaker 4: of you know, indie filmmakers asking for money. And I
29:52
Speaker 4: released a trailer and everyone could see that it was
29:54
Speaker 4: complete and that it was on its way, and I
29:56
Speaker 4: just said, hey, we need to pay like you guys
29:58
Speaker 4: want to see it, right like, we need to pay
30:00
Speaker 4: for you know, insuran.
30:03
Speaker 2: We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor.
30:09
Speaker 2: And now back to the show.
30:12
Speaker 4: We need to pay for these theatrical screenings because we're
30:15
Speaker 4: just fore walling it. And if you guys give us
30:17
Speaker 4: a little bit of money, the film can be out
30:18
Speaker 4: right away, and if not, I just don't really know
30:20
Speaker 4: what to do. So we were able. We did an
30:22
Speaker 4: aggressive three week campaign and we raised twelve thousand dollars
30:25
Speaker 4: and that finished off all the funds that we needed
30:27
Speaker 4: and we were so proud of our community and our
30:30
Speaker 4: fans for helping us with that, but that people sort
30:35
Speaker 4: of were like, Wow, I can't believe you pulled that
30:38
Speaker 4: off in just a few weeks. And I was, you know,
30:40
Speaker 4: but like I said, I was a little confused at
30:42
Speaker 4: first too. I didn't really think it would go that well.
30:44
Speaker 4: But it's because we had the film in the can already,
30:49
Speaker 4: and people are getting really weary of kickstarters and go
30:53
Speaker 4: fundmes and projects like this because you know, like we
30:56
Speaker 4: have just discussed, so many of them never see the
30:58
Speaker 4: light of day. And it's like, ugh, why do I
31:00
Speaker 4: have to be supportive of something that I know isn't
31:02
Speaker 4: going to happen? And you know, so I think people
31:07
Speaker 4: when they're pursuing these crowdfunding avenues, they just they really
31:10
Speaker 4: need to have their shit together because it's going to
31:12
Speaker 4: sour it for other filmmakers. You know. Imagine like knowing
31:15
Speaker 4: that you could produce something if you raise twenty grand,
31:18
Speaker 4: but people are just like, oh yeah, right, buddy, Like
31:21
Speaker 4: just like the other three I donated to, that's ruining
31:24
Speaker 4: it for everyone. So you know, it's a tool, but
31:28
Speaker 4: it's too accessible. You know. It's just like a phone
31:31
Speaker 4: with a camera, everyone can shoot a movie. That's why
31:34
Speaker 4: you got a lot of crappy movies out there. And
31:35
Speaker 4: it's like anyone can start a kickstart a campaign for
31:38
Speaker 4: their film. That's why there's so many graveyards full of
31:41
Speaker 4: dead films that never saw the light of day.
31:43
Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely, Danny. And you know, I actually knew a
31:46
Speaker 3: person who would go around from project to project actually
31:49
Speaker 3: just doing crowdfunding campaigns, and like her timeline was just
31:53
Speaker 3: nothing but pitching crowdfunding campaigns to people, and people are
31:57
Speaker 3: like tuning her out, Like all you do is prom promote, promote,
32:01
Speaker 3: and like half the time you never even hear about
32:03
Speaker 3: the movie ever after she's done promoting it. So people
32:06
Speaker 3: just started tuning her out left and right, and it's
32:08
Speaker 3: just like it's that fine sort of ebbing and flowing.
32:12
Speaker 3: It's it's kind of you know, like in marketing, you
32:14
Speaker 3: can't just keep marketing to people because they start tuning out,
32:17
Speaker 3: you know. And that's what she was doing. And that's
32:20
Speaker 3: why I think you know a lot of times when
32:23
Speaker 3: and a friend of mine who was on Twitter, and
32:24
Speaker 3: he said he followed a bunch of filmmakers and he said,
32:27
Speaker 3: literally half of my timeline is people crowdfunding projects. And
32:30
Speaker 3: he goes, it's just to the point where it's like
32:33
Speaker 3: almost unusable, and I said, you know, it's it's just
32:36
Speaker 3: the the industry and how it is sometimes personally. You know,
32:41
Speaker 3: there's different I mean, obviously there's there's a lot of
32:43
Speaker 3: different ways of crowdfund personally, you know. I mean, I
32:46
Speaker 3: was guilty that in twenty ten when I was crowdfunding
32:48
Speaker 3: as well. And I know it does get kind of
32:51
Speaker 3: I don't want to say the word murky, but I
32:54
Speaker 3: might be, but you know what I mean, Like like
32:55
Speaker 3: you were just saying, Danny, it does some people just
32:58
Speaker 3: don't want to ask people for money, or you know,
33:00
Speaker 3: because it looks like online panhandling or something like that,
33:03
Speaker 3: you know what I mean. And I've had I've had
33:04
Speaker 3: people conversations with with with producers or conversations with actors
33:08
Speaker 3: and stuff, and I said, you know, you guys have
33:10
Speaker 3: to put up the crowd fund a campaign too, or whatever.
33:13
Speaker 3: And people are out out and out and out refuse
33:15
Speaker 3: because of that. They would say, oh, this is just
33:17
Speaker 3: online panhandling or whatever else, and I'm like, this is
33:20
Speaker 3: how you get indie films made. You know, it's funded
33:23
Speaker 3: by You'd rather be funded by a crowd than funded
33:25
Speaker 3: by some producer who's going to tell you how to
33:27
Speaker 3: set up every single shot and how to have and
33:29
Speaker 3: have final edit. You know what I mean.
33:31
Speaker 4: Oh, it's so true. Yeah, it's so true. Yeah. I
33:34
Speaker 4: don't know. I don't know if it'll get better or worse,
33:37
Speaker 4: but you know, now has never been a more important
33:41
Speaker 4: time to have it together as a filmmaker and have
33:44
Speaker 4: a plan that you are able to execute and a
33:46
Speaker 4: worst case scenario that involves your films still getting made
33:49
Speaker 4: at the end of the day.
33:51
Speaker 3: So, you know, speaking of films getting mad at the
33:52
Speaker 3: end of the day, you made Heelkick, which is about
33:54
Speaker 3: two backyard wrestlers, and I mean, honestly, before we get
33:58
Speaker 3: into it, could you actually just give us a you know,
34:00
Speaker 3: brief synopsis about the film.
34:01
Speaker 4: Sure. Yeah, So, he'l Kick is about two backyard wrestlers
34:04
Speaker 4: that decide to finally go pro after ten years of
34:07
Speaker 4: procrastinating and saying that this is what they're destined to
34:10
Speaker 4: do in their life. The only problem is that they
34:12
Speaker 4: are terrible. They lack an all athletic skill required to
34:15
Speaker 4: do such a thing, and they don't really have any
34:18
Speaker 4: intelligence or the drive you would need to go after
34:20
Speaker 4: such a grand dream. So it's a mockumentary. It's a comedy,
34:24
Speaker 4: and it follows Reggie and Maurice to best friends. Is
34:27
Speaker 4: they finally go to professional wrestling training at an academy
34:33
Speaker 4: called ECCW, which is a real wrestling academy. And yeah,
34:38
Speaker 4: that's pretty much the black and white of it.
34:41
Speaker 3: So, you know, when you actually sat down to actually
34:43
Speaker 3: start writing this thing, you know what was the impetus
34:46
Speaker 3: for the idea.
34:48
Speaker 4: It came from a few different places. One, I was
34:50
Speaker 4: a huge wrestling fan between the ages of like eight
34:53
Speaker 4: and thirteen, and then I grew out of it, but
34:55
Speaker 4: I still stayed interested in the behind the scenes world
34:59
Speaker 4: of it, and I like the business side of it.
35:02
Speaker 4: It was really interesting to me. So I would read
35:04
Speaker 4: wrestler's autobiographies, even though I wasn't absorbing like the product anymore.
35:09
Speaker 4: But so I always had a great respect for it.
35:12
Speaker 4: And then all of a sudden, I, you know, I
35:13
Speaker 4: had all this knowledge about it, and they say, right, well,
35:16
Speaker 4: you know, And so that was one of the things
35:19
Speaker 4: that got me going but another was that my older
35:21
Speaker 4: cousin he also loved professional wrestling, but wanted to do
35:25
Speaker 4: it for a living. And he, you know, he's a
35:28
Speaker 4: really good looking dude, really well spoken. He's like just
35:31
Speaker 4: pure muscle, six foot three. And he went to train
35:36
Speaker 4: at the Lance Storm Academy in Calgary, Alberta, a prolific
35:41
Speaker 4: wrestling town, and that's one of the places that really
35:44
Speaker 4: ship guys off to the to the WWE or the
35:47
Speaker 4: FED as they refer to it, if they're any good.
35:50
Speaker 4: And so my cousin went there and he quit after
35:52
Speaker 4: just like a week, and I was like, man, I,
35:55
Speaker 4: you know, I couldn't believe it. This is like what
35:57
Speaker 4: he'd been talking about his whole life. And it was
35:59
Speaker 4: so interesting to hear him tell me how it was
36:01
Speaker 4: different than he thought it would be. And but even
36:03
Speaker 4: more that stuck with me is when he told me
36:05
Speaker 4: about some of the other kids in the class who
36:08
Speaker 4: just were delusional about there, you know, like about their
36:13
Speaker 4: basically their odds of making it in the business. But
36:15
Speaker 4: because you can just tell when people don't have that
36:19
Speaker 4: drive or don't have what it takes to do something.
36:21
Speaker 4: And not like he was puting any anyone down there
36:24
Speaker 4: was a lot of great talents in the class as well,
36:26
Speaker 4: But I just couldn't get that out of my mind.
36:27
Speaker 4: The idea of two people who are attempting something that
36:30
Speaker 4: you know, have no idea and via how tough it's
36:33
Speaker 4: actually going to be. And so that is sort of
36:35
Speaker 4: where the idea for heal Kit came. You know.
36:38
Speaker 3: I like that, by the way, the experience of hearing
36:41
Speaker 3: what he went, how he went there, and you know,
36:43
Speaker 3: what he found out, because I think that's a lot
36:46
Speaker 3: of times, you know, people have an idea of what
36:47
Speaker 3: something's going to be, and then when they finally get that,
36:49
Speaker 3: you know, that expectation, and when then reality finally hits,
36:52
Speaker 3: they're like, this isn't what I really wanted. You know,
36:54
Speaker 3: I didn't really want to you know, I thought training
36:58
Speaker 3: was gonna be a little different, or I thought this
36:59
Speaker 3: experience would be a little better, or you know, and
37:01
Speaker 3: and and you meet people too who who have that
37:04
Speaker 3: x you know, who have that unreal expectations of what
37:07
Speaker 3: this is going to give to them or there, you
37:09
Speaker 3: know what I mean. And and you find that in
37:11
Speaker 3: film too, where you know, somebody thinks they're gonna make
37:13
Speaker 3: a film, you know, in the living room with an
37:15
Speaker 3: iPhone and and when sun dance, you know what I mean,
37:17
Speaker 3: it's like how many times have you heard that?
37:19
Speaker 4: You know?
37:19
Speaker 3: And so it's but but it's stuff like that. I mean,
37:21
Speaker 3: that's why I really am glad you. Yeah, we got
37:25
Speaker 3: into telling this story because it adds to the to
37:28
Speaker 3: the movie itself because actually I used to do backgard wrestling,
37:31
Speaker 3: uh back here in Philadelphia, and uh, I so the
37:34
Speaker 3: movie kind of speaks to me now honestly the ending.
37:36
Speaker 3: I haven't seen the movie yet, and I'm gonna I'm
37:37
Speaker 3: gonna make a note to actually make sure I check
37:40
Speaker 3: this movie out because uh, obviously if it's right in
37:42
Speaker 3: my wheelhouse. But uh, but like you, I fell out
37:45
Speaker 3: of love with wrestling a long while ago. And uh,
37:48
Speaker 3: but again, it's so fun to you know, see movies
37:50
Speaker 3: like this about you know, backyard wrestling or or you know,
37:53
Speaker 3: movies like The Wrestler and stuff like that. You know,
37:55
Speaker 3: it's kind of cool to to see that, you know,
37:57
Speaker 3: this stuff that we used to be into, and you know,
37:59
Speaker 3: it's it's a good story with it and that you know,
38:01
Speaker 3: it's not all about that, you know what I mean,
38:03
Speaker 3: It's it's all.
38:04
Speaker 4: Good, absolutely, and this is kind of the wrestling movie
38:07
Speaker 4: that I wished was around when I was really really
38:10
Speaker 4: into wrestling. And it's been cool to screen the film
38:12
Speaker 4: around North America and have like real hardcore wrestling fans
38:15
Speaker 4: tell me that as well. It means a lot. And
38:18
Speaker 4: wrestling is such an amazing subculture and you can go
38:23
Speaker 4: deep down the rabbit hole of learning about it and
38:26
Speaker 4: exploring what that world is like. And it was just
38:28
Speaker 4: so fun to get back into it. Not to mention
38:31
Speaker 4: the fact that I literally had to train because I
38:34
Speaker 4: play one of the backyard wrestlers in the movies.
38:37
Speaker 3: So did you like train by getting hit with like
38:40
Speaker 3: light tubes and going through tables days?
38:44
Speaker 4: Well, we actually, I mean the film starts with these
38:46
Speaker 4: guys are more like fans than anything. You know, they're
38:49
Speaker 4: just classic procrastinators that they pretty much just goof off
38:53
Speaker 4: all day. And then they're one of the guy who
38:56
Speaker 4: plays my brother, Matthew Graham. He he challenges us. He says,
38:59
Speaker 4: all for your wrestling school, but you have to go
39:02
Speaker 4: to class every day and you have to improve. And
39:05
Speaker 4: if you if you can't do it, if you can't
39:06
Speaker 4: show that your fund you got what it takes, then
39:08
Speaker 4: you've got to, you know, give up on this wrestling
39:10
Speaker 4: dream forever and just get a real job and move
39:13
Speaker 4: on with your life. So that's when they start going
39:17
Speaker 4: to wrestling school. And so I wanted to show real progression,
39:20
Speaker 4: so I placed myself and Chris Wilcox, who plays Maurice,
39:23
Speaker 4: the other backyard wrestler. I placed us in an actual
39:26
Speaker 4: training program with a real wrestling academy called ECCW based
39:31
Speaker 4: in Vancouver, and they operate all over the Pacific Northwest.
39:35
Speaker 4: And some really talent comes out of there. I don't
39:37
Speaker 4: know if you know, you know Kyle O'Reilly who's just
39:41
Speaker 4: joined up in NXT the other day and he's big
39:44
Speaker 4: on an indie scene, and you know, just tons of
39:48
Speaker 4: great talent go through there and still go through there.
39:50
Speaker 4: But we were actually training for six months to prepare
39:54
Speaker 4: for what we do in the film. So yeah, we
39:58
Speaker 4: didn't tell anyone.
40:00
Speaker 2: We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor.
40:06
Speaker 2: And now back to the show.
40:09
Speaker 4: That we were doing it for a movie. Only very
40:11
Speaker 4: few people knew because we didn't want to get treated
40:13
Speaker 4: any differently. So eventually they found out you do form
40:17
Speaker 4: you know, serious bonds with these with the people in
40:19
Speaker 4: class and the people that are training you after a
40:22
Speaker 4: few months, which you should when you're like dropping each
40:26
Speaker 4: other on your spine forty times a day, you should
40:28
Speaker 4: probably get close to those people and make sure they're
40:31
Speaker 4: on your good side. But yeah, so I actually had
40:34
Speaker 4: to train to become a professional wrestler for it, and
40:36
Speaker 4: it was, you know, talk about things being different than
40:39
Speaker 4: you thought they would be. Oh, ma'am.
40:44
Speaker 3: So, you know, with your experience on Love and Hate,
40:47
Speaker 3: what were some of the things that you took in
40:49
Speaker 3: the heel kick? Like, was it about, you know, not
40:51
Speaker 3: wearing too many hats?
40:53
Speaker 4: You know?
40:53
Speaker 3: Was it maybe doing things a little bit differently in
40:56
Speaker 3: terms of like planning or even marketing.
41:00
Speaker 4: Marketing? Definitely, because the whole world of film marketing changed
41:03
Speaker 4: from twenty ten to now. So that was just something
41:07
Speaker 4: that I never had to worry about before. But I
41:09
Speaker 4: tried to educate myself on that as best as possible.
41:12
Speaker 4: And our co producer on the film is Greg Miller,
41:15
Speaker 4: and he's a really big name in the entertainment world,
41:18
Speaker 4: and he's a YouTube star and really big big in
41:21
Speaker 4: the video game world, and he just has a huge
41:23
Speaker 4: love for professional wrestling, and he and I became friends
41:25
Speaker 4: a few years ago, and so he's been spreading the
41:27
Speaker 4: word about the film as the co producer, getting it
41:30
Speaker 4: out there. So he's been you know, he's sort of
41:32
Speaker 4: our human megaphone. I like to refer to him that way,
41:35
Speaker 4: and he's really helped us get butts in the seeds
41:38
Speaker 4: of these screenings and have people find out about the film.
41:40
Speaker 4: And we're arts to wearing a lot of hats. I
41:43
Speaker 4: still did that. I was still the writer, the lead,
41:46
Speaker 4: the co director and the producer on this project, and
41:49
Speaker 4: I was in the editing room for every frame of
41:51
Speaker 4: the film. And not to mention the fact that I was,
41:54
Speaker 4: you know, working out and training at a professional wrestling
41:57
Speaker 4: academy for six months as well. But I think the
41:59
Speaker 4: difference was just getting a little bit more money together
42:02
Speaker 4: so you can pay people enough that make that your
42:05
Speaker 4: film is their main priority. Because that was the big
42:09
Speaker 4: biggest takeaway from Love Hate was that when everyone's got
42:13
Speaker 4: their other job and when you can't afford to pay anyone,
42:16
Speaker 4: you know, everyone's still committed and they want and they
42:17
Speaker 4: want to help you out. But when it's their job,
42:20
Speaker 4: it's a whole it's it's a different story, right, Like
42:22
Speaker 4: everyone's going to be there and nothing can take them
42:25
Speaker 4: away from that place. And you also aren't working on
42:27
Speaker 4: people's free time. Their free time is when they're off
42:30
Speaker 4: of your set. And you know, it seems simple, but
42:33
Speaker 4: that was really the biggest takeaway. If someone was going
42:35
Speaker 4: to be there more than a couple of days for
42:38
Speaker 4: the shoot, it was they were going to get paid
42:40
Speaker 4: for it, and it was going to be their job.
42:42
Speaker 4: And so with that said, I could wear all those hats,
42:48
Speaker 4: and you know, there's something to be said for stepping
42:51
Speaker 4: back and and sharing the responsibility. But and I certainly
42:54
Speaker 4: did that, even though it sounds like I wore all
42:56
Speaker 4: these hats. But you know, if you have a vision
42:58
Speaker 4: for something, you might as well. I'll wear as many
43:02
Speaker 4: hats as you possibly can, because you know, you don't
43:04
Speaker 4: want to delegate something off to someone who's not as
43:06
Speaker 4: passionate about the project as you are, because it's going
43:08
Speaker 4: to lose its voice. So people are like, man, you
43:11
Speaker 4: did a lot in this movie, and I was like, yeah, well,
43:13
Speaker 4: you know, I had a very certain way that I
43:15
Speaker 4: wanted to say things, so it was just kind of
43:17
Speaker 4: a no brainer for me, really.
43:20
Speaker 3: Yeah, And see, so what I wanted to ask is,
43:22
Speaker 3: how did you go about getting George as a producer.
43:25
Speaker 3: And also, like when you talk about, you know, having
43:28
Speaker 3: money to pay people, did you actually you know, go
43:31
Speaker 3: out and put together like a pitch packet to find
43:33
Speaker 3: different people and and sort of say like, you know,
43:35
Speaker 3: this is what we did with Love Hate, and you know,
43:38
Speaker 3: this is what we could do with this movie if
43:39
Speaker 3: we had just a little bit more money.
43:41
Speaker 4: Exactly. Yeah. Basically, I put together a little plan and
43:46
Speaker 4: I sent it to pretty much everyone I knew who
43:48
Speaker 4: I figured could spare like a couple thousand dollars and
43:51
Speaker 4: they wouldn't, you know, if they never made their money back,
43:53
Speaker 4: they wouldn't hate me, or they wouldn't have to sell
43:55
Speaker 4: their home or something like that. So I put together
43:57
Speaker 4: a package. I told everyone, you know what I did
43:59
Speaker 4: with Love Hate with extremely little resources, and how I
44:04
Speaker 4: could capitalize on another film today with much greater success.
44:09
Speaker 4: And we never you know, we never even sold DVDs
44:11
Speaker 4: of our first film. We didn't do anything else with
44:13
Speaker 4: it after that because it just became so much work
44:15
Speaker 4: and we wanted to move on to other projects. So
44:17
Speaker 4: it was pretty easy to convince people to come on
44:20
Speaker 4: board with this one, especially after they read the script
44:22
Speaker 4: and they thought it was really funny and really touching
44:25
Speaker 4: and they liked it, and that was pretty much it
44:28
Speaker 4: for that. And then in regards to getting Greg Miller
44:32
Speaker 4: on board, we Cooper and I threw a charity Mario
44:37
Speaker 4: Kart tournament at this pub in Vancouver where we live,
44:41
Speaker 4: and we flew celebrities from the gaming world out. So
44:43
Speaker 4: we had cos players come out, we had game developers,
44:46
Speaker 4: and we got in touch with Greg Miller, who was
44:50
Speaker 4: just leaving his job at IGN at the time. I
44:52
Speaker 4: think he was the senior PlayStation editor, and we had
44:55
Speaker 4: him come out and we formed a friendship and we
45:01
Speaker 4: just stayed in touch ever since. And then the closer
45:03
Speaker 4: we got, the more I realized how he'l kick was
45:05
Speaker 4: something that would be like right up his alley, and
45:09
Speaker 4: I asked if he wanted to come on as a
45:10
Speaker 4: co producer and help spread the word about the film,
45:13
Speaker 4: and he said yes, And so that's how we've been
45:15
Speaker 4: getting the word out ever since.
45:18
Speaker 3: And now I see that that that's absolutely fantastic. By
45:20
Speaker 3: the way, I actually called him George instead of Greg.
45:22
Speaker 3: I don't know why. I don't know what if we
45:23
Speaker 3: got George from Sorry about that, but uh good, But
45:27
Speaker 3: but see that that that stuff like that. You see.
45:30
Speaker 3: I always have a saying, you know, your net worth
45:32
Speaker 3: is your network and being able just to go up
45:35
Speaker 3: to people and and you know, it's kind of like
45:37
Speaker 3: what Sam Raimi did, honestly, Danny with with The First
45:40
Speaker 3: Evil Dead. He went to different people and they each
45:43
Speaker 3: kicked in a little bit of money and that's how
45:44
Speaker 3: he made the film, you know, rather than having one
45:47
Speaker 3: investor who gives It's kind of like that idea, you know,
45:49
Speaker 3: do you want one investor to give you a million
45:52
Speaker 3: dollars or do you want a million investors to give
45:55
Speaker 3: you one dollar?
45:56
Speaker 4: Mm hmm, yeah, exactly.
45:58
Speaker 3: So it's kind of like, you know, there's pros and
46:00
Speaker 3: to each and obviously you know, and honestly, with doing
46:03
Speaker 3: this podcast, I've heard both and everything in between. But
46:06
Speaker 3: using that, you know, and using your network and then
46:08
Speaker 3: able to get somebody like Greg and and as forming
46:12
Speaker 3: a relationship with him, and you know, just for everyone
46:15
Speaker 3: listening to Danny, let me I just want to pick
46:17
Speaker 3: your brain about this really quickly. For somebody who was
46:21
Speaker 3: thinking about maybe pitching a YouTube star or pitching somebody else,
46:24
Speaker 3: what are some of the tips you have for them?
46:27
Speaker 3: I mean, because we've all seen that mistake where it's
46:29
Speaker 3: like they meet somebody that they want to work with
46:31
Speaker 3: and the first thing they do is like, you have
46:33
Speaker 3: to help me, please God. Do you have any like
46:37
Speaker 3: tips or anything on like networking or even pitching that
46:39
Speaker 3: you you know, you could just give to the listeners.
46:42
Speaker 4: I would say, And I think the people who are
46:44
Speaker 4: the best at this would tell you the same thing,
46:47
Speaker 4: and that it's that don't pester people right out of
46:49
Speaker 4: the gate. You need to form honest to God relationships
46:52
Speaker 4: and bonds with people and have things that you that
46:55
Speaker 4: you both like and share interest in, and then if
46:59
Speaker 4: something is a good fit, then I think you should
47:01
Speaker 4: have approached them. Otherwise, you know, just don't go ringing
47:06
Speaker 4: every doorbell that you can find asking for favors. Like
47:08
Speaker 4: Greg and I, you know, like we flew him down
47:11
Speaker 4: to Vancouver for that thing, and that was just a
47:12
Speaker 4: party and we raised like seven thousand dollars for the
47:16
Speaker 4: BC Children's Hospital. It was just a good time and
47:18
Speaker 4: we stayed in touch after that, and you know, I
47:21
Speaker 4: just presented him the movie and he would keep telling me,
47:24
Speaker 4: like anything you need for help on this thing, like
47:27
Speaker 4: let me know, and you know, so it wasn't so
47:30
Speaker 4: much me asking him as him offering, and then I said,
47:32
Speaker 4: you know what, let's make it official. Let's make you
47:34
Speaker 4: a part of the team. So I think, just like,
47:36
Speaker 4: look for the signs, like some people will be interested
47:39
Speaker 4: in jumping on projects with you and others won't. But
47:42
Speaker 4: in regards to like a YouTube celebrity specifically, that is
47:46
Speaker 4: a thing that we're seeing a lot more of in
47:49
Speaker 4: the indie film world. Oh I'm not sure if you've
47:51
Speaker 4: noticed it, but when I was at the AFM in
47:53
Speaker 4: Santa Monica two years ago, a lot of people's pitches
47:57
Speaker 4: like weren't with movie stars anymore. It was with YouTube
48:00
Speaker 4: stars in the roles and that they were coming on
48:02
Speaker 4: as producers and stuff like that. And I was like, wow,
48:06
Speaker 4: I just talked to like six filmmakers and I didn't
48:09
Speaker 4: know half the names they were talking about because they're
48:12
Speaker 4: not actors there, they're online celebrities. And I think that's
48:16
Speaker 4: a trend that's going to be going up. So I
48:18
Speaker 4: would just say for that, remember, at the end of
48:20
Speaker 4: the day, your film has to be well acted. And
48:23
Speaker 4: it's seems like funny to say that, but you know
48:26
Speaker 4: a lot of people forget that they just try and
48:27
Speaker 4: cram as many recognizable names into a project as possible.
48:30
Speaker 4: But like, just think of all the amazing talent that
48:34
Speaker 4: have been in a bad movie before. Like, you're not
48:35
Speaker 4: going to watch a bad movie with your favorite actor
48:38
Speaker 4: in it. And you know, I'm not saying that they
48:40
Speaker 4: would be giving a bad performance, but just things don't
48:43
Speaker 4: always come together and that performance has to be there
48:45
Speaker 4: on screen. So I really like the idea of Greg
48:48
Speaker 4: coming on as a co producer because what these people
48:52
Speaker 4: do best is build communities and build awareness about things
48:57
Speaker 4: that they think are cool. And so I think that
49:01
Speaker 4: the capacity in which Greg has come on is a
49:03
Speaker 4: great way to involve some of these YouTube celebrities because
49:07
Speaker 4: they're interested in production and film and stuff like that,
49:10
Speaker 4: you don't necessarily have to, you know, make them the
49:13
Speaker 4: star of your movie if that's something that you're not
49:16
Speaker 4: comfortable doing. And I'm not saying that, you know, internet
49:18
Speaker 4: celebrities aren't great performers, a lot of them are, but
49:22
Speaker 4: there's more than one way to include someone in your
49:25
Speaker 4: film to benefit to benefit its longevity.
49:28
Speaker 3: Yeah, you know. I actually we had Jason Brubaker on
49:31
Speaker 3: the podcast and he actually was at the forefront of
49:34
Speaker 3: doing this. What he did was he got a bunch
49:36
Speaker 3: of YouTuber stars together and he made Camp Dakota for
49:39
Speaker 3: Netflix and they they it was a full YouTube stars. Well,
49:44
Speaker 3: I have friends who were you know, you know, they're
49:47
Speaker 3: probably like ten, fifteen, twenty years older than I am,
49:49
Speaker 3: and they all have kids and stuff like that, and
49:52
Speaker 3: the kids were like, oh my god, Camp Dakota's conet, like,
49:55
Speaker 3: what the hell is Camp Dakota? Who the hell are
49:57
Speaker 3: these people? Why is everyone caring about this movie?
50:01
Speaker 2: We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor,
50:07
Speaker 2: and now back to the show.
50:09
Speaker 3: And it's like because it's full YouTube stars and and
50:12
Speaker 3: that they just packed it full of them and it
50:14
Speaker 3: was like number one on Netflix when it came out.
50:16
Speaker 3: But I agree with you completely, by the way, you
50:19
Speaker 3: have to make sure that they can cause you know,
50:21
Speaker 3: if you do like a maybe a five or ten
50:23
Speaker 3: second video, hey, you know, that's that's really cool, But
50:26
Speaker 3: you know, imagine stretching that out to an hour and
50:28
Speaker 3: a half. You know, is that sustainable? Is this person sustainable?
50:31
Speaker 3: Because you know, like like we were just saying at
50:33
Speaker 3: the beginning of this interview, if they're not in you know,
50:37
Speaker 3: if they're not around film or know how this all works.
50:40
Speaker 3: I mean, you end up saying to them, hey, listen,
50:42
Speaker 3: you used to spend an hour a day making a
50:44
Speaker 3: video that got a million hits. Well now you're gonna
50:47
Speaker 3: spend sixteen hours on set and we're gonna be lucky
50:51
Speaker 3: to break even with this film.
50:53
Speaker 4: M hmm. Yeah, it's just a completely different world, You're right. Yeah.
50:56
Speaker 4: And Bwbaker, Jason Brewbaker is such a smart guy too.
50:59
Speaker 4: And you see a lot of other people try to
51:03
Speaker 4: capitalize on that idea and it doesn't always work out.
51:06
Speaker 4: But I do think that's gonna be a serious trend
51:09
Speaker 4: in the film industry and that's not going away anytime soon.
51:12
Speaker 4: So if you're gonna, if if that's what you're gonna do,
51:14
Speaker 4: if you're gonna include people from another industry that isn't
51:17
Speaker 4: the film industry and bring them into your film project,
51:20
Speaker 4: just make sure that you're doing it in the in
51:22
Speaker 4: the best way possible to service the film.
51:26
Speaker 3: Yeah. Absolutely, And uh, you know, and we've both seen
51:29
Speaker 3: movies that that sort of fall into that whole like
51:32
Speaker 3: celebrity sort of trap. I mean, for instance, I had
51:35
Speaker 3: a friend of mine he cast this girl specifically because
51:38
Speaker 3: of her social media following. And here's the kicker, she
51:42
Speaker 3: refused to promote the movie to her social media following.
51:45
Speaker 3: So's yeah, and it was like and and finally, begrudgingly
51:51
Speaker 3: she finally did and and it got nothing. Like they
51:54
Speaker 3: had no analytics from it because nobody really followed her
51:58
Speaker 3: to hear about some movie she was going to be in.
51:59
Speaker 3: They wanted to see photos of her, you know, in
52:02
Speaker 3: like a bikini and stuff like that. She wasn't a
52:04
Speaker 3: YouTube star. I should have I should have predicated everything
52:06
Speaker 3: with that. But she was like, you know, like a
52:08
Speaker 3: model and the heat. And he was like, oh my god,
52:12
Speaker 3: this if we get her in there, this is going
52:14
Speaker 3: to be awesome. And you know, it just all filtered away.
52:17
Speaker 3: It just it didn't really do much of anything. And
52:20
Speaker 3: people with lower numbers had much more engage fans. We're like,
52:24
Speaker 3: we want to see this person as an actor, you know,
52:26
Speaker 3: we want to see this person in an actual film.
52:28
Speaker 3: And you know, hey, I said, you know, it does
52:31
Speaker 3: make sense though, if you think about it. You know,
52:33
Speaker 3: if if you follow, if if some guy follows a
52:35
Speaker 3: model online, does he does he necessarily would he pay
52:38
Speaker 3: to see her in a movie and when he can
52:40
Speaker 3: get a photo of her for free.
52:41
Speaker 4: You know, yeah, it doesn't translate, it really doesn't, and
52:45
Speaker 4: hopefully people will figure out the best way to do it.
52:47
Speaker 4: I really love my relationship with Greg, like, well, we
52:50
Speaker 4: are friends as well, but I think this is a
52:51
Speaker 4: cool project and the way that and the way that
52:54
Speaker 4: he's helping spread the word about it is great. And
52:56
Speaker 4: you know, his community is into this kind of stuff,
52:58
Speaker 4: Like there's a lot of pro wrestling that follow him
53:01
Speaker 4: in the kind of funny groups. So it was just
53:03
Speaker 4: a good fit. Yeah. So if if it wasn't, he
53:05
Speaker 4: wouldn't be involved, but you know who knows.
53:08
Speaker 3: Yeah, and you know, just to going back to to
53:10
Speaker 3: backyard wrestling in your movie, He'll kick you know, it
53:13
Speaker 3: is there is a that that wrestling industry that the
53:16
Speaker 3: fans are very loyal, especially that you know, there's all
53:18
Speaker 3: the hardcore fans who go to the indie shows every weekend,
53:21
Speaker 3: you know, just by again, I haven't seen the movie yet,
53:24
Speaker 3: you know, And I'll be honest, I haven't seen the
53:25
Speaker 3: movie yet, So I don't I don't want to be
53:27
Speaker 3: one of those guys Danny who tries to like you know,
53:29
Speaker 3: fake it through, like you ever see those interviews where
53:32
Speaker 3: the guy clearly hasn't seen the movie, so I ask
53:35
Speaker 3: questions like, well, how did you do that thing? And
53:36
Speaker 3: it's like what it's like, you know, But but I
53:39
Speaker 3: I can you know, I can imagine this is a
53:41
Speaker 3: movie for them, because this again is a movie I
53:43
Speaker 3: would have wanted to see in a way because you know,
53:48
Speaker 3: again I used to be big into wrestling and do
53:50
Speaker 3: backyard wrestling stuff and do all that crazy nonsense that
53:53
Speaker 3: you look back on now like, oh my god, how
53:54
Speaker 3: am I not dead? But uh, you know, it's just
53:57
Speaker 3: that idea of too, of going to these independent shows.
53:59
Speaker 3: And that's imagine the two guys, the two leads are
54:02
Speaker 3: are two guys you know, aiming to you know, uh
54:05
Speaker 3: get to the biggest you know, the league in the land.
54:08
Speaker 3: But they have to you know, train at the local
54:10
Speaker 3: you know, uh wrestling school. They have to you know,
54:12
Speaker 3: go into the and and wrestle and some of these
54:14
Speaker 3: indie promotions that and again it's probably not what they
54:18
Speaker 3: think it's going to be, you know. And and uh,
54:19
Speaker 3: because it's just like real life, you.
54:21
Speaker 4: Know, very true. Yeah, I wanted to make a really
54:24
Speaker 4: realistic like you know, I don't want to make a
54:26
Speaker 4: movie where two guys decide to be wrestlers and then
54:28
Speaker 4: boom they're fighting like Stone Cold Steve Boston and the
54:30
Speaker 4: Roth at the final scene, or I want to you
54:32
Speaker 4: know what happens when two guys want to be pro
54:34
Speaker 4: wrestler as well. First you research local wrestling academies and
54:38
Speaker 4: then you see if they'll take you on, and then
54:39
Speaker 4: you pay your gym figes and then if you're good enough,
54:42
Speaker 4: you get put into the show, and then you can
54:45
Speaker 4: start traveling around and doing it with other promotions. You know,
54:48
Speaker 4: Like I just wanted to really show off what it's
54:51
Speaker 4: actually like, and you know, and people have told us,
54:55
Speaker 4: and a lot of people in the indie rerestling scene
54:57
Speaker 4: as well have told us that it's it's really true
55:00
Speaker 4: to form, but it's also you know, it's got to
55:02
Speaker 4: be funny too, So there's there's a few liberties, but
55:04
Speaker 4: really not too much at all. And I would leave
55:06
Speaker 4: out the training sections from the script until I had
55:09
Speaker 4: trained more myself in real life because I wanted my
55:13
Speaker 4: actual training to be reflected in the film. So I
55:16
Speaker 4: was like, I wonder how this works when you're teaching
55:18
Speaker 4: someone how to do this, and then when you know
55:20
Speaker 4: when the when the wrestlers would teach me how to
55:22
Speaker 4: do that, then I would put it into the movie.
55:25
Speaker 3: Yeah, and that's really cool. And imagine too, when you
55:27
Speaker 3: were talking about to the actors, you know, you probably
55:29
Speaker 3: were like, hey, guys, you know, you'll probably you know,
55:32
Speaker 3: to go through there take a few bumps, and they
55:34
Speaker 3: have to be cool with it, you know what I mean. Like,
55:36
Speaker 3: so it goes into sort of the whole idea of
55:40
Speaker 3: paying your dues for your craft, if you know.
55:41
Speaker 4: What I mean. Yeah, definitely. I mean, the only people
55:44
Speaker 4: that really took bumps were besides the actual professional wrestlers
55:48
Speaker 4: that are in the film are myself and Chris will Wilcox,
55:52
Speaker 4: who plays the other wrestler. And I was I don't
55:53
Speaker 4: even think I could have cast this movie if I
55:55
Speaker 4: had the money to, because I don't know who would
55:57
Speaker 4: have done this. Like when you see the film, you'll
55:59
Speaker 4: see there's a few moments in it you're like, oh
56:02
Speaker 4: my god, that was pretty harsh. And the reason that
56:06
Speaker 4: you know it's it's just extra intense for an audience
56:09
Speaker 4: watching it is because you're comfortable watching a movie for
56:12
Speaker 4: the first act and and you're into the performers and
56:15
Speaker 4: then all of a sudden, they're doing things that you
56:16
Speaker 4: would see a stuntman do, and that was sort of
56:18
Speaker 4: where a production value would be I figured, is that
56:24
Speaker 4: we would be doing all these things ourselves. And we
56:26
Speaker 4: shot the film for only forty thousand dollars Canadian, which
56:29
Speaker 4: is another thing that I wanted to bring up because
56:31
Speaker 4: when people ask me, like, how did you get all
56:32
Speaker 4: the money together to shoot a heel kick? And I
56:34
Speaker 4: was like, well, we you know, it's easy to get
56:36
Speaker 4: the money together when you're not asking for half a
56:38
Speaker 4: million dollars or three million dollars, or if you're not
56:42
Speaker 4: making like a big epic sci fi film. You know, like,
56:45
Speaker 4: I don't want to write something that I know I
56:47
Speaker 4: could never afford to get made. But anyway back to
56:50
Speaker 4: my point, Yeah, as a director, you probably shouldn't ask
56:53
Speaker 4: any actor to do anything you're not willing to do yourself.
56:56
Speaker 4: So I've made sure to do all the worse things
57:00
Speaker 4: myself and share them, of course with my costar credit.
57:04
Speaker 3: Yeah, and you know that's a good point too, because
57:06
Speaker 3: you know, people write things that really you know, sometimes
57:09
Speaker 3: they think they can shoot like a sci fi movie,
57:11
Speaker 3: one hundred paid sci fi movie for like ten thousand dollars.
57:14
Speaker 3: And it's just like or there was a person I
57:17
Speaker 3: knew who was trying to shoot a time traveling period
57:19
Speaker 3: piece for like five grand, and I said, you're going
57:22
Speaker 3: to spend five thousand dollars in in in close alone, unless,
57:26
Speaker 3: of course, yeah, unless of course you travel back in
57:28
Speaker 3: time and you shoot it in a state park and
57:33
Speaker 3: you also have one character dressed up in like in
57:36
Speaker 3: historical times, you know, regalia, and then it's even pushing
57:40
Speaker 3: it like so it has to be like a very
57:43
Speaker 3: quickly done and shot very very carefully. So because if
57:47
Speaker 3: you you know, if you have something in the background
57:49
Speaker 3: like a skyscraper or you know it's supposed to be
57:53
Speaker 3: a war going on, there's no you know, there's no
57:56
Speaker 3: army or something, it looks it immediately just destroys the
57:59
Speaker 3: whole idea what you're trying to do.
58:01
Speaker 4: Yeah, you gotta be careful about what you're planning on shooting.
58:05
Speaker 3: Yeah. So yeah, it's just that's why again, you know,
58:08
Speaker 3: we always have to have you know, always aim high,
58:11
Speaker 3: but then always you know, realize what you have access to,
58:14
Speaker 3: you know, make those lists of resources and stuff like that,
58:18
Speaker 3: you know, and so Denny, I wanted to ask you
58:19
Speaker 3: where do people check out He'll Kick Movie.
58:22
Speaker 4: So currently it's just we're four walling a little theatrical
58:25
Speaker 4: tour around North America. So upcoming screenings are going to
58:30
Speaker 4: be there's gonna be one in Saskatoon, there's going to
58:32
Speaker 4: be one in Portland, and most likely one in Seattle,
58:37
Speaker 4: and those are going to be over the next six
58:39
Speaker 4: or seven weeks, and then we are finally going to
58:41
Speaker 4: call it a day with our theatrical tour and we're
58:45
Speaker 4: going to get the film out there onto iTunes. We're
58:47
Speaker 4: going to self distribute it, so we're using destribber, speaking
58:50
Speaker 4: of Jason Rubaker, So that is going to be what
58:53
Speaker 4: we're rolling out in the next little while here in
58:55
Speaker 4: the meantime, Yeah, people can follow it at Heel Kick
58:59
Speaker 4: Movie on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.
59:02
Speaker 3: Yeah, and very cool that you're touring with it. And yeah,
59:05
Speaker 3: Jason Brewbreaker, awesome guy, I'm so glad that you're using
59:08
Speaker 3: the stribber. I'm telling you, I always tell people if
59:11
Speaker 3: you really are confused about how to distribute your movie,
59:14
Speaker 3: go talk to Jason. Like Jason's so up, like just
59:17
Speaker 3: straightforward with it too. He goes, look, maybe you can
59:20
Speaker 3: just put a buy now button on a website, you
59:22
Speaker 3: know what I mean. And it's just he's not even
59:25
Speaker 3: though he does work for Destribber, he's not always like,
59:27
Speaker 3: oh you got to go to the stubber or else,
59:29
Speaker 3: blah blah blah. He is like one of the straightest
59:32
Speaker 3: and most honest guys, and he's so knowledgeable, like you said,
59:35
Speaker 3: and he's a good guy to know.
59:37
Speaker 4: Yeah, he's a straight shooter and he's a really good guy.
59:39
Speaker 4: I would I would recommend indie filmmakers think about using
59:43
Speaker 4: that platform or other ones like it early, like while
59:47
Speaker 4: you're writing, because it's it's just gonna make things so
59:50
Speaker 4: much easier if you know where what your filming should
59:53
Speaker 4: wind up and what avenues you're gonna take it down
59:55
Speaker 4: before you even start shooting.
59:58
Speaker 2: We'll be right back after word from our sponsor, and
1:00:04
Speaker 2: now back to the show.
1:00:07
Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely, So, you know, Danny, we've been talking for
1:00:11
Speaker 3: about I guess maybe about fifty five minutes now, you know,
1:00:14
Speaker 3: is there anything in closing that you have any part,
1:00:16
Speaker 3: like final thoughts or anything you want to say that
1:00:18
Speaker 3: we get a chance to, or even just anything you
1:00:20
Speaker 3: want to say to put a period at the end
1:00:22
Speaker 3: of this whole conversation.
1:00:27
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean, check out the trailer if it seems
1:00:30
Speaker 4: like a movie that interests you, or follow us along.
1:00:33
Speaker 4: We're really active on social media and we always let
1:00:36
Speaker 4: people know where the film is going to be and
1:00:38
Speaker 4: when it's going to be out, and we'd love for
1:00:40
Speaker 4: people to watch it. Really do not have to know
1:00:42
Speaker 4: anything about professional wrestling at all to enjoy the film
1:00:45
Speaker 4: that is, and that's me quoting hundreds of people who
1:00:49
Speaker 4: have seen it who have no interest in professional wrestling,
1:00:52
Speaker 4: and that was just as important to us as making
1:00:54
Speaker 4: a film that hardcore wrestling fans would love as well.
1:00:58
Speaker 4: So we think we've struck the balance. Yeah, and you'll
1:01:01
Speaker 4: definitely get some last out of it. So I really
1:01:03
Speaker 4: hope people can check it out and hopefully it is
1:01:05
Speaker 4: out there in the big wide world of the internet's
1:01:09
Speaker 4: early fall, maybe like early October, And.
1:01:12
Speaker 3: I'm gonna make sure check out the movie when it
1:01:13
Speaker 3: comes out, Danny and into the October, because I do
1:01:16
Speaker 3: want to check this out again because it is right
1:01:18
Speaker 3: up my alley way and Danny, where can people find
1:01:20
Speaker 3: you out online?
1:01:23
Speaker 4: Online? They can find me at the Underscore Danny Mack
1:01:25
Speaker 4: pretty much everywhere, Danny Mack.
1:01:27
Speaker 3: I want to say thank you so much for coming
1:01:29
Speaker 3: on and Chatt and Heel Kick Movie and all this
1:01:31
Speaker 3: good stuff and everyone. Everything but that Danny and I
1:01:34
Speaker 3: talked about will be in the show notes at Dave
1:01:36
Speaker 3: Bulls dot com. Danny, I wish you the best luck
1:01:38
Speaker 3: with Heel Kickmovie, and I look forward to see what
1:01:40
Speaker 3: we got coming out next after this is all said
1:01:43
Speaker 3: and done, all the dust settles, and you know, I
1:01:46
Speaker 3: want to see what you come out with next.
1:01:49
Speaker 4: Thanks very much. I'm ot of the show and I
1:01:51
Speaker 4: think it's a great tool for filmmakers to listen to,
1:01:53
Speaker 4: so I appreciate being on.
1:01:55
Speaker 2: I want to thank Dave so much for doing such
1:01:57
Speaker 2: a great job on this episode. If you want to
1:01:59
Speaker 2: get links to anything we spoke about in this episode,
1:02:01
Speaker 2: head over to the show notes at Indie film Huscle
1:02:03
Speaker 2: dot com. Forward slash eight thirty two, and if you
1:02:06
Speaker 2: have it already, please head over to Filmmaking podcast dot com,
1:02:10
Speaker 2: subscribe and leave a good review for the show.
1:02:13
Speaker 3: It really helps us out a lot, guys. Thank you
1:02:15
Speaker 3: again so much for listening. Guys.
1:02:17
Speaker 2: As always, keep that hustle going, keep that dream alive,
1:02:20
Speaker 2: stay safe out there, and I'll talk to you soon.
1:02:23
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening to the Indie Film Hustle podcast at
1:02:26
Speaker 1: indiefilm hustle dot com. That's I N D I E
1:02:30
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1:02:32
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