" For within each seed, there is a promise of a flower, and within each death, no matter how small, there is always a new life. A new beginning." - Dillon (Charles S. Dutton), Alien 3

Post-production is finished now on my feature “I Choose Chaos”. We’re getting into festival submissions and press kits and all that fun stuff. Which means my attentions are also focused on what’s next.

I shot a short film called “Smile” last summer but otherwise, it’s been a fairly quiet year in terms of actual shooting. More info on “Smile” soon enough but here’s a link for the trailer.

I also shot a pitch film for a script I wrote called “Lineage”. That shoot was one of the highlights of my career thus far. Not only was it a very smooth shoot, I also got to work with some of the best actors and filmmakers I have ever had the opportunity to collaborate with. I shot the film with the legendary Director of Photography Dean Cundey (Halloween, The Thing, Jurassic Park… list goes on and on) who was truly a gentleman and gave me the best working experience of my career. He also shoots real purty pictures.

“Lineage” is very character driven as far as horror films go. Think more “Silence of the Lambs” then “Slasher Film 5: The Remake”. My wonderful casting director in LA (the irreplaceable Charley Medigovich) asked me for my dream list of actors which I gave her thinking we might get some good indie working actors that were like the names on my list.

We ended up with Michael Trucco (BattleStar Galactica) in the lead role and a supporting cast that includes Lori Huering (Mulholland  Dr.), Marco Dapper (a vet of my films... this is our 4th time working together), Dee Wallace (where do I begin? E.T., The Hills Have Eyes, The Frighteners), Tom Atkins (Night of the Creeps, The Fog) and William Sadler (The Shawshank Redemption, Tales from the Crypt: Demon Knight).

Any way, I digress. It was an amazing experience and I will start my full scoop on shooting the film (any thing that could go wrong did!) soon.

Now I’m writing a new script (it’s a creature film), working with my old pal Lindsay Lanzillotta of Candleridge Entertainment (who’s “The Vicious Kind” is a gem that you should see if you haven’t all ready) on developing a new film that I’m collaborating on with the very fine writer Chris Todd. It’s a very different kind of genre film. Sort of an anti-“Pleasantville”.

More details on all of this as time marches on but for now, there’s an idea of what’s to come.

"You're not a criminal!"

Over the Christmas break my lovely sister became engaged. YAY!
Her engagement party was about 3 weeks ago so I flew home from LA to attend. The party was a lot of fun and I spent some time in LA catching up with friends and family.
CUT TO:
Time to go back to California.
Flight booked. Bag packed. Drive to the airport in Buffalo.
BUT WAIT...
There's some thing shifty looking about that polite well dressed young man... some thing dangerous.
We better take him into a room and ask him really intrusive questions.
Now don't worry about this finger printing. You're not a criminal.
Well, we've decided not to let you in. You spend too much money here and don't take any and we can't have that. We start letting people like you in, we won't have room for all those illegal immigrants now will we?!

So here I am in Mississauga, Ontario. Waiting. Waiting for lawyers. Waiting for letters. Waiting to get back to work on my new projects (more on that to come).

Moral of the story... AVOID FUCKING BUFFALO WHENEVER POSSIBLE!

Word of advice-
The SYFY premiere of Scream of the Banshee was the week. Two reasons to see this:
- It's a SYFY movie so at its worst it will be a joy to make fun of and ridicule and at its best it will have a cool monster and one or two solid genre names and still be a joy to make fun of (this one's some where in the middle)
- LANCE FREAKING HENRIKSEN... now I'm sure if you stick with this blog you'll find my love of both the actor and the man is rather obvious. This movie is not exception. Lance is truly one of those actors that elevates any thing he's in. This film is no exception. More on Lance to come!
Otherwise, isn't that the chick from Dumb and Dumber? And how come this movie has all the elements to be cool (Lance, some interesting mythology, decent enough FX) but never really has any fun with itself?

SO... my advice is,  you've seen worse but this ain't no Sharktopus!

"Ladies and Gentlemen, we are about to begin our desent into Los Angeles." - The Graduate (1967)

Might seem odd that my first quote on what will more or lest be a blog pertaining to genre stuff is a quote from "The Graduate" but I just couldn't help myself!


This is just sort of an introductory post. My next post will be an update on what I'm working on right now and a quick review of a movie. Just some thing to give any one who's checking this out an idea of what's going to be going on here.

So, let's get into it here shall we?!