Dead Harvey TV/Lobsterface Screening

This will be a short post since I'm about to leave to do some drinking. I just wanted to remind all our readers that dead harvey is a site that represents the people. And that's why we're inviting you to our screening of dead harvey tv. The screening is free. It's not like those Hollywood movies that rip you off and charge you twelve bucks and make you watch garbage and twenty movies of shitty previews and fifteen minutes of pre-show non-entertainment.

With dead harvey, you get to be subjected to our garbage for free. Plus, there's going to be free beer. It's just our little way of giving back to the community. I guess, deep down underneath all the booze we're just really nice guys.

So come one, come all. Dead Harvey TV: Episode One will screen first, followed by Jonathan Ritter's, "The Lobsterface Chronicles" (it's a beauty, it's got a puppet in it). Further info is on the attached flyer. Hope to see you there!

Ted's note: Don't worry, we'll keep reminding you about this...

Dead Harvey TV: Episode One (Day One)

I'm so f'ing lazy... I'm writing this after we've already shot the episode. But whatever, I just wanted to admit to it.

Moving on, I wasn't really sure how day one was going to pan out and I was nervous before we started. The other thing that was shitty was getting up early. I hate getting out of bed before the sun rises, but it was a necessary evil because if you don't get started by seven or eight am, the risk of finishing on time is much higher. Especially when shooting nine pages, as we had planned.

The day started out rocky, with an outside scene that we had planned to only take half an hour. We scheduled that scene at 7:30 with one of the actors and had the others arrive at 8:00. That's when Murphy's Law stepped up to the plate and started cornholing us. Every car behind the actor moved and new ones kept taking their places. A garbage truck pulled up next to us and starting dumping a large pile of s into a new construction site. A-holes kept walking through the shot and staring at the camera. The list goes on. Thank God the rest of the s we had to shoot that day was in the apartment.

Due to every a-hole on the street f'ing up our shoot, the rest of the actors arrived and had to wait until we finished an hour and a half late. That sucked because I hate making people wait and it's makes us look like unprofessional douche-bags.

Fortunately, everyone was cool and got along famously. The actors started boozing, but no one got of out control. Everyone was friendly and professional and I can honestly say that this was the best group of actors we've ever had. There were no divas. There was no bullshit. It was a comfortable environment and everyone was having fun.

Then the neighbors upstairs started making noise. Loud, irritating, banging and clanging noises. I flashed back to a couple days before, when the wife came over and introduced herself.

"Hi, we're your new neighbors from upstairs", she said. "Over the next couple weeks it may be a little loud. We're going to be doing a lot of work up there so just let us know if things get to be too much".

"Motherfucker", I thought to myself, quickly followed by, "And I bet they'll start on the day of the shoot".

They did.

Flash forward back to the day of the shoot with the loud ass neighbors. "Fuck it", we decided. We'll just write it into the script. And our fearless team kept going.

Fortunately the noise decreased after a bit and we reached the point where we could actually hear the actor's dialogue.

The last scene involved me on the toilet and, for some reason, the d.p., Joe, started laughing his ass off. The look in his eyes was one of a small child who's just discovered candy. Pure, unadulterated glee. We wrapped and he added that that was officially his favorite scene so far. I have no idea why he enjoyed filming me on the toilet so much but I was glad he was happy because it was a long day and the last memory of the day tends to stick out in your mind the most. It's like when you watch a movie and it's all shitty but the last twenty minutes is good and it kind of makes you forget about how shitty the other hour and ten minutes was.

Anyway, we finished between eight and nine pm. A good, twelve hour shoot. Long but not torturous by any means. We shot an s ton of coverage and completed everything we had scheduled that day. Then we hung out for a bit, had some beers and shot the s. You know it's a good shoot when everyone wants to stick around and hang out when the day is done.

I went to bed happy, looking forward to the next day.

Day two post to follow just as soon as I can muster off the strength to get off my lazy ass again and get some more work done. Hopefully, i'll be able to finish all the posts for this thing before the screening. Until then, take care my friends and thank you for reading.

Dead Harvey TV Intro

As some of you may or may not know, we here at www.deadharvey.com have been working on a spec. pilot for a Dead Harvey TV show. The basic premise is it's about a bunch of drunken micro-cinema filmmakers who host a talk show from their shitty apartment. They interview underground indie. horror filmmakers and it's shot in a reality show style ala "Curb Your Enthusiasm". Antics ensue around a sitcom format. There is cursing (which will be bleeped), boobs (which will be titled), and a big guy in a monkey man outfit branding a machete (who you don't want to f with).

Through the next series of blogs, I'll do my best to document the making of the first episode. Hopefully, if the show continues, there will be many more to follow.

The first episode starts with a courier who can't believe he's delivering a package to a bunch of assholes who host a TV show in their apartment. The apartment is a shrine to micro-cinema and drinking with strong, surrounding Hawaiian themes. The apartment is filled with a bitter cameraman who looks like John Goodman in "The Big Lebowski", a stoned sound man, a drunken secretary and a man in an adult baby outfit. No one can figure out how to work the equipment right.

The host pisses off the adult baby and waits for his headline guest to appear: legendary micro-cinema filmmaker Chris Watson (Zombiegeddon, Slaughter Party). He's so slow he doesn't realize that neither his co-host or main guest haven't arrived. The rest of the episode includes the kidnapping of Chris Watson, his statements about the state of independent filmmaking and the struggle to keep a show which no one's even getting paid for on the air on a porn channel at 3am somewhere between, "Star Tramps" and "Robosluts".

The way we've designed it, each episode there will be ongoing storylines with the main characters centered around a new underground horror filmmaker as a guest star.

The next blog will document pre-production. Then, we'll move onto day one. I've got to go now because my computer broke and my friend is about to kick me out of his house. I'm cutting into their internet porn time.

See you on the next one.

Tales From the Micro-CinemaTrenches: Eric Gosselin on Making, "Psycho Sleepover"

A few weeks ago I was treated to an underground screening of Eric Gosselin and Adam Deyoe's, "Psycho Sleepover". The event was in a downtown L.A. loft that looked like one of those huge apartments you see in the movies. It was also packed with booze which I certainly appreciated. More so, though, I was thoroughly impressed at just how entertaining and well cast this micro film was.

For what their budget was these guys did a stellar job with the production value, gore effects and coaxing great performances out of their actors. They also did something I appreciated even more: they kept the pacing snappy. Now, that's something that's really rare for micro. They knew exactly what kind of movie they wanted to make and scored a home run, proving that money is not the answer to making a great movie.

After watching the movie, I told Eric and Adam how impressed I was and asked if they could do a behind the scenes article on making a micro film, what kind of challenges they overcame to get it in the can, etc. Hopefully, there will be many more to follow. If you're an indie filmmaker and would like to send us an article about the making of your film please send it our way and we'll post it. Better yet, you'll become a part of dead harvey's film school archives and save people an s-ton on college tuition!

Thank's for the article, Eric! Readers, be on the lookout for Eric and Adam's upcoming work and check out their previous flicks: "Yeti: A Love Story" and "Street Team Massacre"!

BEHIND THE SCENES ON "PSYCHO SLEEPOVER"

By Eric Gosselin

Making no-budget movies is probably one of the strangest things you can do. One minute you’re mixing fake blood, the next you’re making quesadillas for the cast and whatever crew you can scrap together, the next you’re trying to convince an actor to drop his drawers and pretend to masturbate on camera (true story).

If you’re really serious about making movies and you have almost no money, be prepared to wear many hats. I’m not taking cool Samuel L. Jackson-style Kangol hats, or even a tasteful fedora. I’m taking that stupid beanie with a propeller on the top. Sorry. I’m getting a little carried away with my metaphor here. What I mean to say is you may be credited as “Writer/Director” on your movie but when you’re working for no budget that really means “Writer/Director/Craft Service/Production Designer/Production Assistant/Coffee Maker/Pizza Orderer/Punching Bag/Insomniac.”

So far my filmmaker partner Adam Deyoe and myself have made 3 features together: YETI: A LOVE STORY, released by Troma Entertainment, STREET TEAM MASSACRE, and PSYCHO SLEEPOVER. All three of our movies are no-budget horror comedies. We chose to make silly horror movies for two reasons: we love schlock cinema, and when you have no money horror is way to go. Horror always has a built in audience who are usually very forgiving of budgetary restraints.

Think about it: if someone said to you “Hey, check out this drama I made for $2,000 with all of my friends” you would probably nod politely to them and say “Sure, I’d love to watch that,” but unless their friends are Phillip Seymour Hoffman and John Malkovich, you would probably really be thinking “Oh please God, make me have a stroke so that I don’t have to suffer through the next 90 minutes of my life.”

Now what if someone (me) said to you “Check out this ridiculous horror comedy I made for $2,000. It has lots of blood and boobs in it”. You’d probably be thinking “Sign me up, handsome stranger.”

Our newest movie, PSYCHO SLEEPOVER, came about when we were finishing up the as-of-yet-unreleased STREET TEAM MASSACRE (any buyers?). We enlisted the help of friend/sexual deviant Kurt Kroeber to write up some of the ideas we were tossing around. There were many, many script revisions—probably upwards of 50. Maybe more. We all know that your script is your baby—your precious, precious baby. Well, always be thinking of ways to cut little pieces off of your baby so that your baby isn’t bloated and boring. Werner Herzog once said to me (well, he said it to a theater full of us, but it sounds cooler if I pretend he was addressing me alone) “If you bore your audience for 4 seconds you have lost everything you have built up to that point.” Nothing could be truer. You should always be revising, even well into shooting. One example of this is when part of the way into shooting our main location fell through. The people who lived in the house gave us two more days to shoot about 60 pages of script. That simply would not work. We went back to the drawing board and not only rewrote scenes to take place in different rooms that we could use other locations for, but we also added a bunch of new jokes and even an entire subplot. I guess the point of what I’m saying is: Always think on your feet and be open to changes. Nothing goes as planned.

Adam and I work very quickly (a necessity we’ve come to enjoy). We don’t storyboard, and hardly ever block scenes out before hand. Usually we come onto set, one of us works with the camera people (unless we are the camera person ourselves, which happens frequently) the other works the scene through with the actors and blocks everything out. We shoot a master, figure out our coverage and move on. Our actors and us would love to have millions of dollars (hell, even hundreds of thousands) at our disposal so that we could have a bunch of rehearsals, and shoot less pages a day, but we take what we can get.

How do we keep budgets so low? We do everything we can to get everything we can for free. In college we “borrowed” cameras from the equipment house. Now we “borrow” from friends and places of employment. None of the actors are paid (except for those who contributed nudity). We even got some people you may recognize in the movie (SLEEPAWAY CAMP’s Felissa Rose, Troma’s Lloyd Kaufman, INGLORIOUS BASTARDS’ Paul Rust, and rap-star CHINGY), and they all did it out of the goodness of their generous, beautiful hearts. One necessary item is food. You have to get food for the cast and crew who are putting in long hours for your movie for no money. Our actors are all very talented individuals, and we would love to pay them, but we simply cannot afford to. Instead of money, we pay them in pizza and Cheez-its. At the end of the day none of our movies wouldn’t have been possible without the dedication of everyone involved, so we try to make it as comfortable for them as possible.

Our special effects are a bit rudimentary, sure, but they get the job done. Most of it is accomplished by running fake blood through plastic tubing hooked up to syringes for all the various blood splatters and squirts. One piece we’re particularly proud of is a cheap and safe alternative to squibs: an insecticide pump that you can buy for about $15 at Home Depot and some tubing. You take the tip off of the sprayer that controls how much liquid comes out (this way everything comes out in one blast), pump it about 40 times, attach the plastic tube to it, fill the tube with blood, press the button and voila! A giant spray of blood that can be taped under someone’s shirt, or behind their head for a nice headshot. It’s not like we’re making SAVING PRIVATE RYAN. Our violence doesn’t need to be completely realistic. In fact it adds the comedy and schlockiness if it looks a little stupid.

So to summarize: It IS possible to make a movie for little to no money. Don’t take yourself too seriously; be willing to roll with the punches and make changes. And most importantly of all, DON’T MAKE A BORING MOVIE!

Tales From the Micro-Cinema Crypt: "The Clown Incident"

Ted has been doing all the work on the site for at least the past month while I've been out drinking, chasing midgets and acting all around irresponsible. So, I figured it was time for a new post before he gets too pissed off and actually sticks the pins in that voodoo doll he made of me.

Before I go any further, I'd like to take this opportunity to invite any indie filmmakers out there to share their stories with us. In the indie/micro world all kinds of crazy shit happens and I know people have some awesome stories, so please share them with us and we'll post it on the site. Besides, the more stories Ted and I get, the more we can catch up on our dvr recordings, drinking and bootlegged donkey show porn.

I mean, the more we can pursue actual film making.

Alright, enough f'ing around. Here's a little tale of something that happened to me awhile back. I figured it was appropriate for Halloween time since it involves a clown suit.

The micro film world revolves around favors. Meaning, you have to somehow convince everyone to work for free while your already broke-ass spends money you don't even have so you can get your movie in the can. Needless to say, when someone works on your movie for free, it's more or less an unwritten rule that you return the favor. The favors can range anywhere from donating equipment to an unpaid crew position to far more bizarre territory.

In this instance, a friend of mine was making a mockumentary about a hit man's last days on the job before his retirement. The hit man was played by my friend that required the favor: a roughly 300 pound cat who's forte is frighteningly deliverence-esque redneck roles. The first scene I was in involved me playing one of the many thugs who meets their fate at the hands of said hit man's gun.

I was slain in the basement of an apartment building which we completely guerrilla-styled. Meaning, we ran around chasing each other with toy guns and air pistols that were painted to look like real firearms. My friend is a helluva guy and the shoot was a blast, but I was nervous as s because most of the neighbors had no idea what was going on. If the cops would have been called we most likely would have had a snuff film on our hands.

My friend approached me after the shoot and our conversation went something like this:

HIT MAN: Hey man, you did a great job getting shot and falling straight back into the cement. That was bad-ass!

ME: Thank's, man! It was fun.

HIT MAN: You didn't f yourself up or anything, right? We don't have insurance.

This I completely understood. We never have insurance on our movies either.

ME: No, it's cool man. The adrenaline counterbalanced any potential damage.

HIT MAN: Cool. How would you like to help me out with another scene?

ME: Sure, what you got going on?

HIT MAN: First off, let me just say there's going to be a porn chick involved.

ME (suddenly more interested): Really?

HIT MAN: Yeah, man. Are you still in possession of that clown suit?

The clown suit in question is one my low-budget ass has used for Halloween and a few micro movies for about three years in a row. It was most recently featured in, "Psycho Sleepover", which I'll add is a fantastic new micro film we'll be featuring in an upcoming article.

ME: Uh... yeah, I've still got it.

At this point things we're starting to sound a little strange. Why the f do I always get myself involved in situations like this?

HIT MAN: You're going to wear the clown suit and f the porn chick.

ME: Uh... say what?

Instantly I pictured myself home for Christmas while one of my cousins finds the tape amidst a slew of Disney classics. The entire family watches in sheer horror, having no idea four years of film school would result in a starring role in the new discovered Clown Porn genre.

HIT MAN: Let me clarify. You're going to have just gotten done f'ing the porn chick. I'll bust through the door and find you two post coituous in a seedy hotel room. She'll be topless, wearing a clown nose and rainbow colored wig. Since I've had a past relationship with this young lady, I'll naturally want to slay you.

ME: Naturally.

HIT MAN: I'll point a gun at your face and you'll say, "Be nice to Bobo!" Then, I'll shoot you in the face and you'll land on the bed where you'll pretend you're dead and watch me f the porno chick in front of you.

ME: Uh... say what?

About a week later, there I was dressed in my clown suit and my friend's creepy ass clown mask. Why the f people think clowns are funny and get paid to entertain children is besides me.

My friend and I waited on pins and needles for the porno chick to arrive. In these situations you have no idea what's going to happen once the camera rolls. My friend, however, was as cool as the high school nerd who'd just scored a date to the prom with the hottest girl in school. I'd never seen the guy so happy before.

HIT MAN: (nearly jumping up and down in excitement) Oh, man, this is gonna' be awesome! Alright, I've got about twenty minutes before she arrives. I'm going to go take a shower and prepare.

ME: Given the nature of the scene you're about to do, you should probably scrub your undercarriage.

HIT MAN: Why do you think I'm taking the shower? I even got a special soap just for the area in question. I might come out of that shower smelling like a bag of s but my crotch is going to come out like a rose garden.

ME: Good luck to you then.

My friend entered the shower and kept his word, spending a good twenty minutes on the area in question. When he exited the shower, the only thing he had on was his underwear. He held a rubber mat in front of his crotch.

ME: What the hell is that?

HIT MAN: I figured I'd be a gentleman and put it between our crotches. The inspiration comes from the groin thongs Sharon Stone and Michael Douglas wore when they boned down in, "Basic Instinct".

ME: That's not your car mat is it?

HIT MAN: Dude, have some class. This is totally different.

Next thing I knew I was pretending to act dead on the sleazy hotel bed and looking out the two eye holes of the clown mask in what can best be described as a Michael Myers POV before he kills his sister in the first ten minutes of, "Halloween".

There are many tests of a man's friendship. These can range anywhere from lending your car, to helping move, to helping bury a body in the desert. Then, there's playing dead in a clown suit and watching your friend f from a Michael Myers POV. This, I had never known existed before.

In the world of micro-cinema, all things are possible.

Linkapalooza - July 9, 2008... Jack Brooks: Monster Slayer gets release date, plus other news.

There's a few things going on out there that I think you should consider looking into...

Jack Brooks: Monster Slayer gets release date - on shocktillyoudrop.com: Okay, the post that I linked to there is probably shorter than the blurb I'm writing on it, but that's not important. What is important is the fact that the kick-ass "Jack Brooks: Monster Slayer", a throwback to 90's horror, now has a DVD release date. Anchor Bay will be releasing it on August 1st. Get it, trust me.

MicroCinema Scene: Well, obviously, it's a site dedicated to MicroCinema. Looking through it, I don't think it's updated that often and it's really a very general site, but the cool thing is that they have forums that you can look through... maybe Dead Harvey should do forums? To be honest, I wouldn't know where to start on that. Either way, it's worth taking a look through. Also, I like how they say in their 'about us' page that we should keep in mind that they're all volunteers. What's your definition of volunteer? Not getting paid? If that's the case... I'm a volunteer... and so are most indie filmmakers. Please keep that in mind.

Hellboy's Mike Mignola Talks 'Language of Monsters' - on Wired.com: It's anything but indie, but Wired talked with original 'Hellboy' book artist / writer Mike Mignola about the monsters they created for "Hellboy II: The Golden Army". Now, what these guys are doing is way above what indie guys do, but there's always something you can take away from guys like Mignola when the curtain is pushed aside for a little bit to see how they work.

Revealed: Secretlives of moviegoers - on Medialifemagazine.com: This is pretty cool, actually. A company called Mindset did a research study on frequent movie-goers to profile them. Why I think this is particularily pertinent to you, as an indie horror filmmaker, is because this is who you're audience is... and probably who you are, too. Let's be honest, it would be rare to find an 'armchair' indie horror fan. Chances are an indie horror fan watches a lot of movies... and I mean a LOT of movies, I know I do. Also, I'm betting that indie horror filmmakers watch a lot of movies, as well. Once again, I know I do. So, from all sides, the profile they came up with is both you and your viewer. Check it out, you might be surprised to find out what they think about you.

Netflix's Online Movie Dreams - on Forbes.com: I'm telling you, this is the device! I've said it in other posts and I'll keep saying it. Well, they keep mentioning Netflix, as they're supplying the content now, but it's really about Roku. This article on Forbes goes more in depth as to what Roku's plans are... and here's the little tidbit that perked my ears up - "Later this year, a simple software update will allow the box to stream content from other "big name" providers." Really? Okay, now we're talking... because if you're planning on getting big name providers this year, it's probably only a few years before 'little name' providers will be able to jump on the bandwagon. Think about it, after you've finished your film, there's no cost to make or ship the DVD's and there's no such thing as shelf space. All people will need is a Roku remote, a 12-pack and their TV and they can search through endless titles of indie-horror.