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Talking With The Dead: 15 Questions with Terrence Williams
1. A series of films created by you that harkens back to titles like I Spit on Your Grave (1978), The Hills Have Eyes (1977), At Midnight I'll Take Your Soul (1964) and Slaughter Disc (2005) has created an aura of mystique and awe that surrounds Cinema Threat Productions and Terrence Williams. How does it feel to be one of the flag bearing writers and directors for a generation of genre fans tired of the same Hollywood crap?
Honestly I never set out to be a flag bearer or innovator or anything like that. I just paid attention to what was going on in the horror industry. The remakes, make-a-quick-buck flicks and what not that Hollywood just keeps on churning out reminds me of what happened to horror in the late 80s. There was an over saturation of content, most of it unimaginative and uninspired. A lot of folks who didn’t really like horror but liked the money that came attached to horror projects saw a business opportunity. I love horror. I eat, sleep and breathe horror films… all types from all corners of the world. From the biggest budget red carpet roll out film to the ‘smallest’ obscure Indie flick shot on a flip video camcorder. I like horror films first and foremost as a fan and I was seeing a watering down of horror movies and a surge in for profit only projects. Mostly cookie-cutter flicks targeted to the masses of tweens. I am a major hater of pg-13 horror so I set out to do something about it. I love this genre too much to see it destroyed yet again.
Years later here I am, slowly building a cult following, not because I intentionally set out to do so, but because I wanted to make films that made people uncomfortable, that made them shift in their seats a few times and fans seemed to like the crazy movies I was making. This is where I’m most comfortable. With people who appreciate the rough edges around the slashers rusted horror knife. My slashers blade isn’t slick and doesn’t shine lustrously. What’s ironic but utterly sad to me is that most of these modern day remakes are of films that were ignored by the masses back in the day. They were the type of movies at the time that I am now making. Stuff the mainstream dismissed. Stuff the average film goer didn’t care about. Those horror films where like the masked orgy party in Eyes Wide Shut. Only a select few knew about them and would search the ends of the Earth to find a particular film. Now everyone is invited to the party and everyone knows the Fidelio password and the orgy is unmasked, all sex is protected and only good looking people are invited. They fuckin’ remade Last House on the Left, Halloween, My Bloody Valentine and the Wicker Man for Christ’s sake! And there’s no sign of them slowing down.
2. Your style of shooting gives your films that gritty and exploitative look that was the norm back in the Grindhouse days of cinema. While your films are not the classic definition of horror, you do manage to bring many horrific elements to them. What films and directors from that bygone era have influenced you and why?
Cinema Threat Films are Gangster Rap Cinema: I'm not talking that sissy crap on MTV that plays between Lil Wayne and Soulja Boy Tell 'Em. I'm talking gangster like Spice 1, back when g-rap was something that most people hated and didn't get. Our movies sort of do have a certain Spice 1 mentality to them like there are no limits and no holding back. It's like there's nothing with any main stream appeal and it's not pretty at all. 85% of the people who see our films won't get it and they'll hate it but that's what it's there for, to appeal to a small hardcore fan base. The people who don't get it can watch Saw and Devil’s Rejects but what makes a movie like The Hood Has Eyez unique is that it doesn't feel like a movie, it feels like you're seeing what a fly on the wall would see if it stumbled upon some serious gangster shit taking place. My point is that Hood Has Eyez is true underground cinema that doesn't hold back and doesn't comprise. It's like the gangster rap of cinema but hopefully it doesn't die and end up getting brought back as everything it was created to fight against just like what happened to gangster rap.
When it comes to directors there are many, but the following had a profound influence on me - Melvin Van Peebles, Stanley Kubrick, Jim Wynorski, Abel Ferrara, Lucio Fulci, Joe D'Amato, John Waters, Ruggero Deodato, Roger Corman, Russ Meyer, Herschel Gordon Lewis, Larry Cohen, Claudio Fragasso, Alex Cox, Jack Hill, Herman Yau, Wes Craven, Juan Lopez Moctezuma, David Cronenberg, John Carpenter, Jim Jarmusch, Sergio Leone, Takeshi Kitano, Peter Jackson, Chris Seaver, Takashi Miike, Charles Band, Frank Henenlotter, George Romero, Paul Naschy, and Mr. Lloyd Kaufman to name a few. All of their works influenced me in one way or another. Mostly though it was their approach to film making They broke the cinema rules that existed, redefined the rules as they were being written and resurrected cinema at various points when it was dying. As far as my favorite horror movies go, I would have to say Near Dark, Street Trash, Sisters (the original), Frankenhooker, The Crazies, The Entity, The Hidden, Scanners, Re-Animator, Videodrome, The Thing, They Live, 28 Days Later, 28 Weeks Later, Dawn of the Dead (the original), The Crazies (the original), Phantasm 1 & 2, Candyman, Black Christmas (the original), Guinea Pig: Flower of Flesh and Blood, Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer, Phantoms, The Incubus, Braindead, Bad Taste, Alien 1 & 2, Schramm, Funny Games (the original) Ils – Them, Family Portraits: A Trilogy of America, Aftermath/The Genesis, The Last House On Dead End Street, Basket Case, Night Breed, Vinyan, The Begotten, Ebola Syndrome. I can watch those films over and over. I do as a matter of fact. What makes them my favorites is that over time they have held up. I loved them as a kid, as a teenager and I still love them now as an adult. They never stopped entertaining me. Anytime I’m feeling low I can just pop one of those bad boys in and whala.
3. Let's start with the "Llorona Trilogy" films first. You have The River: Legend of La Llorona (2005), Revenge of La Llorona (2006), and Curse of La Llorona (2006). The character of Llorona reminds me of a combination of Bloody Mary and Angela from Night of the Demons. How did you come up with the concept of the character and how did you come by casting Mary Sanchez for the role?
It’s funny you say that because La Llorona – Spanish for the Weeping Lady, is basically a Latina version of Bloody Mary. When we were making the films that’s how I would pitch it to people who had never heard of La Llorona or folks who had a hard time pronouncing the name. It’s a very popular legend among Latinos It’s our version of the boogie-man, or in this case boogie-woman. It’s based on real events. There are various versions of the tale as the facts and occurrences have changed over time and with each retelling. Since we made the Llorona films there have been a string of Llorona movies released, which is odd because prior to us making it no one had really explored that mythic figure on film and that was just insane to us. I grew up in a predominately Latino community and there were two things parents would threaten their kids with if they didn’t behave, El Cucuy de la Manana and La Llorona. You didn’t fuck with those things right there.
We found Mary Sanchez when she answered a casting ad to the first Llorona film. When she auditioned we knew right away that she had to play both Ann Marie and La Llorona. She was that dynamic. After we rapped the first film I told her about the sequels. She was interested, especially in Revenge of La Llorona, and our relationship went from there. In large part she made the trilogy the success that it is. She was the glue that helped hold all three films together.
4. The Hood Has Eyes can first seem like a cheap re-envisioning of Wes Craven's The Hills Have Eyes, but once you start seeing the plot lines develop, you see that it leans more towards I Spit on Your Grave and The Last House on the Left. How where you and your actresses able to work through the graphic rape scenes and keep the emotional level at the raw peak that at times surpasses those classics?
I had always wanted to make a disturbing movie like A Texas Chainsaw Massacre or Deliverance, however I didn’t grow up in Texas or the dangerous American back-country, I grew up in Inglewood California. I escaped a war-torn country where as a kid I saw some very gruesome things, however nothing prepared me for what I saw when I arrived in Inglewood in the mid 80’s. At the time I lived in an area called ‘the bottoms.’ That area was plagued with drugs, gangs, and a level of violence that far surpassed anything I had ever saw in my home country. Gang violence terrified me as a kid because I was shot at, my family was shot at, friends of mine got killed for no apparent reason other than being in “the wrong place” at the wrong time, and everyone in the community was affected, one way or another. A gang-banger that lived in front of me who had stole my bike as a kid and my uncle’s car was found in the dumpster at my high school years later. His head was missing and to this day they haven’t found it. Another gangster I saw around the neighborhood was found hung on the fence of the school across the street from my house at the time - his penis was cut off and stuffed in his mouth. I had a female friend get gang raped by twenty plus gangsters at a ditch party. No bullshit, gangsters terrified me when I was younger. So in the back of my twisted mind I always wanted to take those nightmarish elements and make a horror movie out of them, a semi realistic horror flick, one that could happen.
I wrote ‘the Hood’ while filming Curse of La Llorona. On that film I got a chance to work with Cydne Schulte and I was once again working with Antonio Royuela and Ann Stinnet who had joined me again from Revenge of La Llorona. I trusted these actors and they trusted me, and we had all become comfortable enough with one another where I felt I could show them the script for The Hood Has Eyez and their reaction wouldn’t be to never speak to me again. I knew if they accepted the offer to be in the film they would go the distance. As a director I didn’t want to wuss out on this film. I didn’t want the actors to bitch out at the last minute either. Some actors did, but not those people. We made a commitment to try to make one of the most brutal films ever and I think we succeeded. Before the cameras would roll to film the rape scenes and torture sequences we would be laughing and clowning around, but the minute I yelled action everyone would become deathly serious and at times the tension and acting out of these events were too much, even for me. I remember how quiet the set became after filming Kimmy’s rape scene, it just felt so very, very wrong. It was taboo and we knew it. We all felt violated. At that moment I knew we had created something dangerous and powerful. Something raw and uncensored. It was a strong performance by all those involved. I think the trust factor was key in getting us all through that film. Revenge of La Llorona took a lot of trust as well because it dealt with racism and rape, but The Hood Has Eyez thoroughly tested that trust… sorta like walking in on your African American wife while she’s getting gang-banged by a group of Ku Klux Klan members, after which she promises never to cheat again – it would test your trust and patience in one another and then some.
5. Horno feels like the new wave of genre film entitled gorenography or "torture porn." More and more mainstream films are being labeled with this title, including Hostel 1 and 2, The Devil's Rejects, Rob Zombie's Halloween and the Saw series. Movies off of the mainstream radar like Steel Web Studio's Slaughter Disc have integrated hardcore porn to go along with the unmitigated gore. Do you feel like your films fall into that category (fairly or unfairly) and what do you think of this style of film making?
I love these types of films. Whether people call them torture porn, exploitation, b-movies, T&A films, whatever your cup of forty-water is it’s my shit. My most recent films; Horno, Hood Has Eyez, and Revenge of La Llorona do get put in that category a lot. I think those films are exploitation/B-movie type films first and foremost, a genre of films that has existed way before the ‘torture porn’ label came along. That label doesn’t bother me, however I don’t like when people call my projects pornographic because they are not. When I make a porno film (and I eventually plan to do so) then they can call the kettle black because it will be. It’ll be jet black as a matter of fact! That’s one of the reasons I made Horno. It was to poke fun at people’s uninformed labels and stupid opinions regarding my films. If you put a naked chick in your film these days most square people automatically consider it porn. If an actress in your film sucks on a dildo it’s definitely porno, regardless of if there’s a story there or not and it advances the plot. Since that happens in the beginning of Revenge of La Llorona – an actress deep throat’s a dildo, a lot of people began associating my work with porn and a few stopped wanting to work with me… mostly actresses who were afraid of being ‘branded’ or associated with that type of thing.
From that point on I had to constantly defend everything. Especially once I made The Hood Has Eyez. Some family members, actresses and acquaintances of mine began acting all weird and shit, not wanting to any longer be my MySpace friend or whatever, and lord forbid if you posted a trailer on their profile. To them it was just smut, so I made a film about a smut director who decides to make a mainstream film to break out of being branded a ‘porn director’ but no matter what he does everyone, including his actors still think he’s a porn director. That’s how I get treated at times. If those people ever took the time to actually watch one of my films or any 70’s or 80’s grindhouse films I think their opinion would change. But their idea of horror is Sleepy Hollow. They would realize it’s not porn and I am not a pornographer, I am just insane. It’s all just funny to me, really.
6. Horno is also a step away from your other films in the sense that it is much more of a comedy/horror flick where as your other films had more of a serious exploitation/revenge tone to them. Was this done in a deliberate fashion and what influences did you draw upon for this film?
Yes it was deliberate. It’s a commentary on people’s judgments of my films, an illustration on their beliefs about micro-budget films and micro-budget filmmakers. Yes it is horror but it’s a lot more comedy because it takes all these asinine ideas and merges them together with an asinine plot, tits, ass, gore and more. It’s the journey I have made as an independent filmmaker. I drew inspiration from Porno Holocaust, Orgazmo, Living in Oblivion and a more recent film, Pervert. I didn’t try to imitate these movies I just borrowed elements, mostly the tones of these works. I think most of my exploitation films are funny mainly because of the characters and some of the off-the-wall shit they say or do, or the over-the-top situations. ‘Hood’ totally falls into this category, the characters are so crazy its funny, but with Horno I just wanted to try my hand at something totally comedic with a dash of horror. Do the reverse. Since ‘the Hood’ was so angry and evil I wanted to take a breather before going back to the depths with ‘Hood 2.’
7. It would seem obvious from the films that you make that you are not a fan of the MPAA and the ratings system that is in place. With all of the heat being lain at the feet of producers and directors these days by studios to tone it down so that films can be released to theaters for a mass teen-age audience, what message are you sending out the so-called haters of the genre about the types of films you are making and what can be done to fix the broken system that is now in place?
The MPAA's death grip on the movie industry has been significantly loosened by the DVD and Internet boom, similar to what happened with the drive-in B-movies of the 70’s and VHS boom of the 80’s. For some filmmakers straight-to-video or Internet downloads are not glamorous enough, it’s the kiss of death. For me it’s the only way to go. I don’t aspire to make films that a mother, her teenage son and his girlfriend can all enjoy equally at AMC theaters. Those are cookie-cutter films. I make love ‘em or hate ‘em gems. It reminds me of high school. I’m that guy that some people liked a lot and some people hated with a passion and I was fine with that then and I am fine with that now. I don’t want to be all things to all people and I sure as hell don’t want my films to be. If people from all walks of life and age brackets liked all my films all the time I would stop directing, because obviously that would have meant I failed myself and my fans. That would mean I stopped making films from the heart. My black heart. For me, the true quality of a good movie is it’s ability to make you react regardless if it is in anger or enjoyment. Cinema Threat movies may be filmed on a budget financed from food stamps and pocket change, but the lack of money doesn't stop me and company from doing what 90% of Internet fan-boy haters and film snobs have never done: make a movie.
I have never had to deal with the MPAA and think that their ‘ratings system’ is designed to keep true independents out of the game, or at the very minimum severely cripple them. As an independent filmmaker I don’t have the big budget, the name actors or the flashy effects, what I do have is an original, uncensored story, to not film this in its purest form would be detrimental to both my film and me as a filmmaker. I make films to entertain and stimulate people, big Hollywood makes films to make money. A lot of creative people shuffle around in that world but are severely restricted by the ratings system. In my world I don’t worry about shit like that. If I make a movie that has the equivalent of an NC-17 rating it helps me sell my film, if you get an NC-17 slapped on your film in Hollywood-land that limits your films distribution, which then limits how much money the film makes… at least that’s the formula the corporate big-wigs have come up with, so in turn the money people make sure your film never gets that rating, because in their brain that would mean less money. So they would rather cut the picture to death until it resembles an A sexual movie. Even an R rating scares some of these money seekers. So, what you get is a shell of a movie. Many films that could have been great end up not being so because of this system. Things are taken out, shuffled around, deleted, cut – the vision gets lost. Then sometimes you get to see the stuff the MPAA wanted taken out on the directors cut of the DVD and you’re like, “that’s it!” It’s very bureaucratic to say the least. My company’s vision is simple; low budget, good story and free of Hollywood's red-tape! A movie like The Hood Has Eyez could never be seen in a wide commercial release, instead it will rot in the annals of cult/exploitation film history and I’m fine with that.
8. Many actors, actresses and crew members that have aspirations of being big time in this business will nowadays run as far as they can from micro-budgeted horror. You have always seemed to bring together a very talented cast and crew for your productions. Can you tell us a bit about various members of your production crew that have been with you from day one, and a little bit about some of the actors and actresses that have turned in some great performances in your films?
In the 6 plus years that I have been making movies I have met a lot of people. 90 % of them I no longer work with or even speak to, mainly because of their egos and fear of the real. My first film was a drama so I had a lot of people wanting to take the filmmaker journey with me because in their minds drama was more likely to lead to fame and fortune than horror, by the time I got around to making Revenge of La Llorona half those people no longer wanted anything to do with me. Even though they weren’t getting roles elsewhere and didn’t have any projects lined up they held out from being in my projects in hopes that they would make it big. I guess they forgot the thousands of actors who enter this game daily. Competition is stiff. What never made sense to me was they would rather opt not to act than be in a project even if it were a little risqué. If I were a full-time actor I would jump at every chance I got to act. Actors especially feared the horror genre, particularly the brand of horror I wanted to indulge in. I lost a lot of collaborators over my choice of projects through the years. Mainly because they wanted to see their names in bright lights and micro-budget horror I guess doesn’t mesh with that fantasy. But that’s all it is… a fantasy. My films end up on the same shiny round discs that Hollywood movies do. While those types of people have sat around holding out for that ‘big role’ I have continued to make films and the actors and actresses who have starred in my movies have went on to build notoriety and a name for themselves.
In the near future I would like to do some broadcast cable stuff. It’s hilarious to me that actors used to frown on TV and straight-to-video but now they’re all doing it, even the biggest actors. It’s work. It always has been. Some people point their noses up at independent films, horror especially but if they are serious about this (film making) they will have to humble themselves at some point. They all do eventually, the people that stay in the game at least. I have met some pretty dedicated folks throughout my journey however… people that either just wanted to act and enjoyed acting and being in movies regardless, or people who saw that this was not a bad way to build a resume and get the chops they needed to make it to that ‘next level.’ I have had the honor and privilege of working with such talented people as Nicole Williams, Carlos Javier Castillo, Antonio Royuela aka Frank Merchant, Marcelo Molina, Jesselynn Desmond, Ann Stinnet, Mitch Ryan, Oceana Christopher, Andrew Saporito, Denise Gossett, Greg Stanina, Juan ‘Gory’ Reyes, Mary Sanchez, Lukasz Brzostek aka QDC, Joel Bryant, Tina Truong, and Ken Dunn to name a few. Most of these people where in my first film and all of them have collaborated on more than one project with me. Nicole Williams has been down with me from day one even before we became business partners or got married.
9. You have written and directed all of your projects, and one of the names I keep seeing pop up with yours is Nicole Williams as producer. It also states on her bio that she has done special FX artist, still photographer, prop girl, and even making sure everyone is fed on the set. It is a rarity in this industry to meet someone that isn't out to cut your throat to advance their career. How did the two of you meet and how has she built that level of trust with you?
Cinema Threat was founded by me and another lady by the name of Joanna Lyle. She was one of those people I spoke about earlier who are more enchanted with the theory of movie making than the reality. She had other ambitions, other agendas. During our first movie Transit things went south and Nicole saved the film both financially and creatively and didn’t expect anything in return. Nicole stepped in and performed the duties Joanna the producer was supposed to perform. While others were busy yapping their chops and making false promises she delivered. Initially, Nicole didn’t even want to be a producer, she wanted to be a forensic technician. She just wanted to help and offer her support however she could. After Transit I asked her to take over as vice-president of the company and she’s been producing every one of my films since. She is the backbone of Cinema Threat. I wouldn’t be where I am at today as a filmmaker if it weren’t for her contributions.
10. When the statements “unfortunately, we are unable to accept your title The Hood Has Eyez due to it's extremely disturbing graphic nature and we're fans of the revenge flicks, but I think this one is just too strong even for us!” were said to you after the completion of the film, what thoughts went through your mind and how angry did it make you?
Initially I was very upset because I had worked with those distributors in the past and they were supposedly always seeking harder and gorier films, but when I offered them one they passed. They had put out a few of my previous films and I knew they specialized in this type of thing. I have never approached a potential distributor with a project that doesn’t fit into their ‘mold.’ I am smarter than that. I do my research, so it was a big surprise. However, it turned out to be a blessing. We ended up being able to control the artwork, marketing, and direction of the film every step of the way and at all times we knew what was going on with our movie. Something Nicole and I had talked about since day one but had never gotten a chance to implement. Self distribution can be one of the most satisfying ventures, but not everyone is cut out for this sort of approach. Distributors exist for a reason, it’s just that some distributors these days have lost their fuckin’ minds and forgotten why they exist in the first place. Many are only out to enrich themselves. A lot of them are also filmmakers so that is their bottom line, to pump their own pictures and low ball yours. They use the profits from your film to promote theirs. Very few people are going to give your movie the time and attention it deserves, but you have to have a business sense, a marketing sense, you have to be willing to spend hundreds of hours on the computer, on the streets talking your films up and you have to be prepared for rejection and failure. It has very little to do with creativity so to speak or film making, its business 101. I’m glad the distributors we submitted to passed. I sure as hell wasn’t going to cut the picture down for them to carry it.
Netflix who at one time was a kick-ass company has went completely corporate. They initially accepted The Hood Has Eyez, put up our cover on their website and a release date and everything, then they came at us with some bullshit, ended up rejecting the picture. That’s why some of their films are listed as ‘long wait,’’very long wait’ or ‘unavailable,’ they don’t pay much money to Indie filmmakers to begin with, and now they have some ludicrous submission requests and are censoring films. I left them as a customer as well and went over to Blockbuster online because ironically they are now more Indie friendly. At one time they were the bigger cheese. Blockbuster.com carries The Hood Has Eyez but not Netflix? Go figure? Since they are in direct competition with Netflix at the moment and trying to grow their online subscription service it remains to be seen if they’ll continue to support Indie films in the future once they grow.
11. For a company that makes micro-budgeted genre films, you have managed to create a whirlwind of media coverage for the films that you do. This is an aspect of film making that most people do not even consider until it is too late. At what point in the production process do you begin to formulate your plans for media coverage, and how have you managed to keep the spotlight on you and your projects?
I think I have managed to keep people interested in my films by continuing to make things that are, well… interesting. That’s one thing I notice about a lot of independent filmmakers and their pictures today… they continue to try to mimic Hollywood films and Hollywood storylines and then they are surprised or heartbroken when they fail. I know it sounds cliché, but be original or at least attempt to be. Don’t strive to make carbon copy films. If fans are going to spend money on your ‘small’ independent film with no big name actors or big budget effects in it over the glitzy Hollywood picture what’s the incentive? What are they going to get that you are offering that they can’t get from the major players? That’s what you have to ask yourself and that’s what we here at Cinema Threat always ask ourselves. Its called show business not show art for a reason, so you have to get in a business mindset from the beginning. I’m not saying you should make a project simply for money, that mentality is what’s destroying horror at the moment, but you do have to consider that at some point presumably you are going to ask people to spend money to acquire your film, so do your homework.
With my earlier films I typically had a distributor put it out and they pretty much handled all that stuff. I wanted to be involved but many times they limited my involvement or severely restricted it, which was another reason we decided to put out The Hood Has Eyez, Horno and Revenge of La Llorona ourselves. So that we could finally go out there and sell the films. Put our face on it. Let it grow. Participate for once. Transit has been one of my most successful films financially and it is available worldwide, but not many people know who made it or associate it with me. The Hood Has Eyez on the other hand is my Siamese twin. We are connected by the penis but that only happened because we put the film out ourselves. If you sign a distro deal they are going to tell you how it goes because they feel they know more than you. Regardless, as an indie you have to think about marketing and promotion whether you have a deal or not, its just when a big company is involved they tend to shut you out and do what they feel will work and when it doesn’t they blame you. So I rather at this point in my career do things myself. I know a lot of filmmakers who initially thought it would be easy to make a movie, since they see me having some success. So they make their films and try to get it out there and they fail. No one cares and they wonder why. Well it’s because they thought about marketing as an after thought. They didn’t give it a thought until they looked at the thousand plus DVD’s they pressed that is now sitting in their closet.
12. All of the DVD covers for your films have that old school vibe to them as well. Did you design them yourself or was someone hired, and what led to the designs of each, especially Curse of Llorona?
As I stated earlier, when you sign a deal with a distribution company they typically take over and tell you what’s what, whether you like that or not. Curse of La Llorona’s cover was designed by the distributor’s of that film. They did send it to me before releasing the film so that I could check it out, but it wasn’t like they were asking for my approval. I was happy with the cover. It is pretty kick-ass and so far I haven’t been disappointed by a distributor’s choice of artwork, but I have seen other films get grossly misrepresented by the artwork on their DVD’s. We were personally responsible for The Hood Has Eyez cover, Horno and Revenge of La Llorona. Nicole and I designed all of them ourselves. We wanted DVD covers that accurately represented our actual films. As a film goer I hate when a cover is really cool and then you see the film and you’re like, “what the fuck? This is nothing like what was advertised on the cover.” It’s tricky because you want people to pay your film attention. The box art helps achieve this, which as an Indie producer is your strongest tool but you want them to come back for seconds. Many companies I have worked with sometimes go out of their way to design misleading DVD covers and I feel they are tricking people into buying their films, but once you burn fans will they come back? I want that when people see our DVD covers they get interested but are not let down when they see the actual film. I don’t want to be accused of false advertising.
13. You went to school at the Hollywood Film Institute and continued at Los Angeles City College Film & Television School. Do you feel that it is vitally important to everyone's career to attend film school, or can the passion inside of a director that has never been to school burn bright enough to overcome not going?
This is a tricky one. I highly recommend film school on the one hand if for no other reason than you will meet the people who will probably help launch your career. In film school I met the person who thought enough of my vision and script to give me thousands of dollars to make that vision and dream come true. And going to school you get a chance to take all those ‘boring’ business classes that will totally help you in the future. If you don’t know business and contracts and how to write them and negotiate them you will get fucked supremely in the future. Luckily there are books on all these subjects and more but you have to learn somewhere. Don’t play yourself cheap however, by skimming through the books and not doing your homework. Too many people nowadays think it’s simply a matter of picking up a camera and shooting. They think that is film making and it will lead to fame. They are sadly mistaken, you have to learn somewhere, whether that’s in a classroom or in the pages of a book written by someone who has done it before. So yes, I recommend school but it is very possible to learn on your own. School does give you access to some cool ass equipment as well. I got to learn how to shoot on super-8 and 16mm film. I got a chance to cut film on a Moviola and Flatbed Steinbeck editing machine, mess with 35mm cameras and all that. Plus having deadlines and teachers breathing down your back and hundreds of fellow students there to judge your completed work helps. Learning on your own means reading, shooting shorts, learning to write, to tell a story, just like in film school. Otherwise you’re just wasting your time because your movie will probably suck. Just because DV cams are available and tape is cheap and your friends and you think it would be cool to make a movie doesn’t make it so. Just because what I do looks easy doesn’t make it true. But if people take their time and learn they’ll be okay. I spent 3 years total in film school and even more time than that just reading any and everything I could get my hands on related to film making I tried to avoid director’s commentaries and behind-the-scenes on the bigger films because I knew that wouldn’t be the realm I would most likely be working in on my first few films or possibly ever. When I did watch those things I focused more on the truly independent movies. Things I would realistically deal with on location. Things that would directly translate to what I’m doing in the here and now. It’s hard for me to watch something like the behind-the-scenes for The Matrix because that’s not the type of budgets and crews I’m working with. That’s a whole other monster. Aspiring filmmakers are always saying redundant shit like you have to break the rules, all that shit sounds good, but what my mom taught me was learn how to do it right first, then you can make the choice to change it, to break it, otherwise you have no idea what you’re breaking and it just makes you look ignorant.
14. You have had obvious success making the films that you have. Do you plan to continue making that gritty style of genre film or are you planning to branch out into different fields?
Yes, I will definitely continue making my lil Indie flicks made with a couple of bucks and a whole lotta enthusiasm. I would like to make an adult film at some point, one with a killer story though, not just fucking for fucking sake… although there is nothing wrong with that, I feel that market is covered. I also plan on releasing a hip-hop album at some point. I have always been deeply involved in music. Growing up I was a part of several rap groups and rock bands but I never got the chance to release an album. Mainly because some of the people I was dealing with were posers or dreamers that didn’t want to do the work and take the next step. They didn’t want to invest in themselves. Now that I am grounded in film making and comfortable with being creative I think its time. I am also working on a dramatic novel based on my first film and shooting a documentary on Nicaragua. But my main focus will be to continue helping Cinema Threat grow. Who knows, at some point we might start a severed distribution arm and help other filmmakers with their films. We sure know a whole lot about it.
15. Congratulations on all of your success so far! What would you like to say to your fans and your detractors, and what advice would you give to the beginning film maker?
To all the fans I’d like to say thank you for all of your support, not just for supporting Cinema Threat flicks but for supporting independent flicks in general. Every time you guys buy one of our films you send a railroad spike through the heart of limp modern cinema… you guys are what help keep pure cinema alive. In the meantime we’ll keep making manic hoodsploitation epics and bloodthirsty shoestring gore-blasts, with a horrifying mix of grindhouse sleaze, torture porn, gore and more. And for the haters, my greatest revenge was to accomplish what you said I couldn’t. Finally, the advice I would give to beginning filmmakers is realize that the most successful creative people are experts in defining reality. They are very good at looking objectively at the gap between what they have and what they need to actualize their vision. It adds up to the confidence that you have the thought process to get from A to B, no matter what A or B are. Work with what you have. Stop fantasizing about the pot of gold at the end of the blood stained rainbow. These are a few simple rules I have followed and they seem to work… If they don't believe in you, they might not believe in anyone. If you have to talk anyone into working on your film, don't. Hire the winners. The losers will seek to destroy you and don't believe the head shots. Follow those and you’ll be OK
MICHAEL JONES
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