Four Walls

 This post first appeared in my e-newsletter I WAS BIGFOOT'S SHEMP.

Timehop showed me this image just the other day; that brief, shining moment when I had four movies I'd written in Family Video at the same time; especially memorable to me in that writing HAUNTED HOUSE ON SORORITY ROW and JURASSIC PREY is what coaxed me back out of self-imposed exile, because I really wanted to write a movie called HAUNTED HOUSE ON SORORITY ROW and I really wanted to write a stop-animation rubber dinosaur movie.  Working with friends Henrique Couto and Mark Polonia was also a bonus.

My latest for Mark is DUNE WORLD, which I wrote in quarantine and is already out.  One of my favorite things is when I write a script that gets turned into a movie that gets turned into a tee shirt, and it's happened more often than one might think.  

It is obviously a mockbuster, but it's more Philip K. Dick and Samuel R. Delany than Frank Herbert, with a coda from the Strugatsky Brothers.  I finally had a chance to see it, and was happy to see director Mark Polonia really leaned into the psychedelic sci-fi elements.  Who knows what the world will think of this one.  The trailer is here.

It is leaking out there that I wrote a movie for Henrique Couto called JESSE JAMES UNCHAINED and after a few COVID-related fits and starts over the last year or so it finally wrapped in Ohio.  I worked as a Production Assistant two days on set--one very cold, one very hot--and it was neat seeing it come to life.  I got to be there to see scenes with John Hambrick and Rachael Redolfi, who appeared in both of my films, and work with some people who crewed mine as well, Eric Widing and Buck Marinara.  I had forgotten it is more boring to PA than to direct but it was fun to hang around anyway.
There's more coming.  I believe three more I have written over the last few years are in post or completed.  One is going to be announced pretty quickly, I think, and is for an established b-movie director I had not written for prior and always wanted to.  Could be a big year for releases.

As the doors slowly open up again everywhere, I was happy to see my old friends at Film Scene back at it. I hope to return to Iowa City one day with another film but until then will happily rep this shirt they sent me.

The Midnight Hour live horror podcast invited me to be interviewed on their show which I only agreed to when I learned it started at 10 p.m. and not midnight because I'm in bed by then.  They said they have a lot of questions for me, which actually worries me a bit.  You can check it out here July 25.

After a year of driving the highways and byways hunting Little Free Libraries to stave off the isolation, somebody went and put one in my town, just a half mile away.  Check it out if you are ever around.

Our summers on the Back Five are full of projects and weekend trips.  Hope you are enjoying yours, and thanks for sticking with me.  More soon.

Walk the Dinosaur

This post first appeared, in a slightly different form, in the e-newsletter I WAS BIGFOOT'S SHEMP, which you can subscribe to in the sidebar.

I have been off the grid a bit lately.  For one, I have been building a DIY chicken coop, carefully designed by my dad, for the last six weekends, pounding nails until my hands throbbed.  Secondly, I just wrapped on a new freelance project.

I had been turning down work for a while--what with moving, and probably the busiest year I've ever had at the day job in a long time, I'd decided I needed to go away for a bit.  Sometimes I feel like I have to do like Lestat did in INTERVIEW WITH A VAMPIRE--burrow down into the ground and pop out a long time later as somebody else.  But I didn't feel like being gone quite so long.

I have patterned a lot of my e-newsletter on the one I admire from writer Warren Ellis, who comes up with code names for all the projects he is working on under nondisclosure, only revealing them when they become real.  So in that spirit I am calling this one TWICE SHY even though I can't tell you the real name anyway because I'm not sure one has stuck.  I'm getting to the point of only wanting to do projects that really catch fire for me, and this one did; an opportunity to write a second movie on a topic I like, and a chance to set it in a different time period--in this case, that ancient forgotten era that represents my early teen years.

If all goes well, this one should lens in June, and I was asked if I was interested in visiting the set, which a writer should never take lightly as by and large nobody wants to see you anymore after the screenplay is turned in.  So it's flattering, and I think I will try to do so.

I am headed back to Chicago on Monday, April 24 for another Horror Society Trash Movie Night where the lunatics of the Horror Society will be screening my rubber dinosaur epic mockbuster JURASSIC PREY (which I wrote under the title MEATEATERS before it was mockbusted).  For better or for worse, this is the screenplay that helped bring me out of a years-long self-imposed exile because I couldn't turn down writing a stop-motion dinosaur movie for my old friend Mark Polonia (that and HAUNTED HOUSE ON SORORITY ROW for director Henrique Couto, because I couldn't turn down writing a movie where the only superfluous word in the title was "on."  Speaking of flattered, I was very flattered to be asked back after just screening SEX MACHINE there in December.  It was flat cold zero with about a half foot of snow or more last time, so I think we can do better on weather this time--though it's still April in Chicago, so it's a tossup.

I'm a little behind on my secret e-newsletter Book Club, so let me get both February and March out of the way.  I can't get John Darnielle's creepy UNIVERSAL HARVESTER out of my mind, a skin-crawling sketch of midwestern life centered around weird footage spliced into VHS rentals at a lonely store in rural Iowa.  Next I have to recommend the absolutely bats PIRATE UTOPIA by Bruce Sterling, a post-World War I-era thriller about a little upstart sliver of a country between Yugoslavia and Italy chock full of anarchists and rebels with names like "The Art Witch" and "The Ace of Hearts"--all the more crazy because it is (somewhat) grounded in real events.

Talk to you again soon, thanks for sticking with me.

Bookends

I always ask for books for my birthday, and also got an Amazon gift card, so I am stocked up for the first winter in my new house.  Turning 50 was slightly philosophical but I felt buoyed by these two discoveries in a book I was given and one I bought--a mention of a movie I worked on in Brian Albright's REGIONAL HORROR FILMS 1958-1990 and reviews of two movies I wrote in Jason Coffman's THE UNREPENTANT CINEPHILE.  Makes half a century go down easier.

I'm Just Looking for Clues at the Scene of the Crime

Sharknado 2 is loose upon the world, and--I'll say it--the world is better for it.

I watched a shark movie marathon on SyFy leading up to it, and as a result found this interview with screenwriter Jose Prendes.  It did make me a bit melancholy how the AV Club spoke to Jose Prendes (in full disclosure, I don't know him).  It reminds me of the time an interviewer asked me what was the worst movie ever made.  Does my spiritual guide Michael Tolkin get asked this?  (Answer:  probably not.  Also, Michael Tolkin once wrote an email to me that I treasure.)(PS I answered Triumph of the Will.)

It makes me mad people say all the SyFy movies are automatically "bad."  There are some that are lazy, some that are cynical, some where people are cashing checks, but that is all movies.  The SyFy ones where the people behind the scenes are fans as well differentiate themselves.  And the fans can sniff out honesty vs cynicism, as I have said before.  Do you think Sharknado director Anthony Ferrante (disclosure:  we are FB friends) was serious when he had a guy get swallowed by a shark and chainsaw his way out?  He did it because he is a fan, and made it for fans.

I think people mix up "bad" and "cheap."  You know what movies are really bad?  All the Transformers movies, both GI Joe movies, both Thor movies, the first Hulk movie, Pacific Rim, Battleship, on and on and on.  They just look better.  If you put the screenplays side by side, with no money attached, they are no smarter than the cheaper SyFy movies.

I had somebody once tell me that if they couldn't get a "real" movie made, they would just whip out a few quick b-movies.  The truth is, people work just as hard making b-movies.  I challenge anyone who thinks it is easy to make a b-movie to try and produce one.  And then, if you can get that far, get somebody to distribute it.  I have sold (I think about) 25 scripts in the last 15 years, and my ninth movie is coming out in September.  I think that is a very high batting average for screenwriting, and I think many would agree.

Same with acting.  Is there anyone worse than Megan Fox in Transformers?  I think Sarah Lieving in Super Shark and Mega Shark vs Crocosaurus is much better, and probably got paid Transformer's coffee money.  I think Danielle Donahue in Meateaters and Joni Durian in Haunted House on Sorority Row are better than Sarah Lieving, and probably got paid Super Shark's coffee money (in full disclosure, I wrote but did not cast both of these).

This really isn't written to fans.  As I have said, fans can smell intent, and they are loyal if you are one of them.  Those are the people that keep me going.

Until later I am at johnoakdalton@hotmail.com.

Bells Started Ringing and Chains Rattled Loud

Streeting everywhere on Planet Earth, today.

And You Touch The Distant Beaches With Tales Of Brave Ulysses

I didn't know I had been gone this long without blogging until a loyal reader emailed me and asked where I was, and up to that moment I didn't realize that people were that hard up for fresh content on the internet.

A lot has happened to keep me away from here, good and bad.  We had the longest, most terrible winter I can remember since those Ice Age late 70s winters, only this was worse because I was the one responsible for the shoveling, and the frozen pipes, and the hot water heater and furnace both quitting, and on and on and on.

Why I bothered to make fake snow, I'm not sure.

It got so bad, I started making hooch again.

But some really good things happened, like my grandson was born on January 1, 2014, the first baby born at Cincinnati Mercy hospital in the New Year, and instantly became the cutest baby on the interwebs.

 

And then there was another special delivery:  Haunted House on Sorority Row.  My screenplay got made into a movie got made into a tee shirt.

Close readers of the blog will note that the time from when I became re-acquainted with director Henrique Couto at a local film festival to when this movie was actually screened was very short indeed.  Close to nine months, ironically enough.  I got to go to the premiere in Dayton, Ohio, this winter and sort of felt like the chaperone at a Juvenile Detention Prom.  But the movie played like gangbusters at both screenings and I'm very happy with how it came out.  I would post a photo, but they were all confiscated by Homeland Security.

Another movie, Meateaters, from my old friend Mark Polonia, came out at very close to the same time, almost a twin as it were (grandbaby theme still in full effect).  It is currently available on Full Moon Streaming and garnering some buzz for its whacked-out dino-noir sensibilities.  I'm also quite happy with my screenplay for this one and hope it sees wider release.

That's all the news fit to print, more or less, and I will try to be more diligent as I have a few more projects in the hopper; a project that is on ultra secret down low lockdown is in post production, but I can blab all I want about Doctor Zombie, a throwback horror film I wrote for Mark Polonia, and a segment I have in Henrique Couto's upcoming horror anthology Scarewaves.

Until then you can catch me at johnoakdalton@hotmail.com.

 

I'll Play the Part, But I Won't Need Rehearsing

I was very flattered to be asked to be an extra in "Haunted House on Sorority Row," which I wrote for director Henrique Couto.  A lot of times screenwriters aren't invited to the set, because they see things like this.  I told him that being a solid citizen in good standing I could only be around for the first five pages and the last five pages of the movie and then Henrique said "Well, we spiced up the first five pages."  So this is from (SPOILER ALERT) the last five minutes of the movie, which is okay to say because I already blabbed it to the twenty other extras standing there, deep in the backwoods of rural Ohio. And that was only because they clapped when Henrique introduced me, and I basked in that in case they booed me after the premiere.  Though I have my doubts, as I met a lot of nice people that night.  Being on set, I would say this house is actually spooky in real life, which bodes well for the movie.  Just driving there, I thought Mapquest was sending me to a mass murderer's kill site.  Hopefully we will all see each other at the premiere, in the not too distant future.

You can read an article I wrote about being an extra, "I Was Bigfoot's Shemp," right here on this site.

Don't Go Into The Basement...No, I'm Serious, Don't Go Into The Basement

Haunted House on Sorority Row started shooting this weekend in Dayton, Ohio.  This screencap from Henrique Couto is scaring me, and I wrote the dang thing. 

It Ain't No Country Club, Either

I was thinking about one time when a b-movie producer whose name would probably be recognizable to readers of this blog called me out of the blue on a Saturday afternoon.

"What are you doing?"  he asked.

"I'm putting a new sink in my downstairs bathroom."

"If I asked somebody out here in L.A. that, they'd tell me all about their projects."

"Well, I don't live in L.A."

I have just, unbelievably even to me, finished four screenplays in 11 weeks.  MEATEATERS is already in post-production for director Mark Polonia and HAUNTED HOUSE ON SORORITY ROW is in pre-production for director Henrique Couto.  The next one I did is a vampire movie that I won't say anything more about at this time and the fourth movie is on double secret lockdown and even I am surprised who I'm working with on it.  I am actually getting ready to go into rewrites on that one so I have to say in fairness my first draft was finished in three weeks, there may be a few more in the next drafts.

Because it's already leaked out, my next project is DOCTOR ZOMBIE for director Mark Polonia and I suppose I need to get cracking on that.

Now that I have returned from self-imposed exile I have to remind myself to be careful; work with friends, pick projects carefully, put one foot in front of the other.

Until later I am at johnoakdalton@hotmail.com.

I Know You're Working For The CIA, They Would Not Have You In The Mafia

Crazily, I just finished another screenplay this week, written right from page one. I started on Wednesday July 3rd and finished Saturday July 13th, a new land speed record. I would not have taken on this insanity except for my wife left the country for two weeks, typically a time of Doctor Who marathons and Sloppy Joes.  Needless to say I had some time on my hands.

It is the third screenplay I have completed in eight weeks.  Astoundingly, one of them, MEATEATERS, is already in post-production after a quick shoot in rural Pennsylvania; and another, HAUNTED HOUSE ON SORORITY ROW, is supposed to go before the lens before the end of August.

I have never seen anything happen so quickly.  The hookers and cocaine promised by one of these two directors mentioned above hasn't even shown up yet.

This latest screenplay is about the lives and loves of a gang of female vampires, so perhaps it is just as well that my wife was out of the country while I was writing it. The rest of the information about this one is redacted until I get the high sign from the director.

I fell into the routine of day job work, coming home and writing for a few hours, and then rewarding myself by watching a movie and eating dinner in front of the TV; a sad glimpse into the grim parallel world I would have lived in had a pretty girl not gone out on a blind date with me in 1987.

I watched 20 movies while she was gone, a nice round number.  Not necessarily the ones I thought were the best, but the top five that inspired me to keep going, were THE DEVIL'S KISS, SARTANA KILLS THEM ALL, THE TALE OF ZATOICHI, A COLT IS MY PASSPORT, and MANNAJA: A MAN CALLED BLADE.

Just as I was delivering the vampire movie another surprising project fell into my lap, which I am hoping to work on during the days next week, while giving my nights over to the Blue Whiskey Film Festival.  Also, redacted until further notice; and I might have a zombie movie after that.  Dinosaurs, haunted house, vampires, (redacted), and zombies; not a bad 2013.  Thankfully it seems I have a little stored up in the tank, after going into exile for several years.

Until later, I am at johnoakdalton@hotmail.com.

The Candles Blew And Then Disappeared

Just as MEAT EATERS with director Mark Polonia started shooting yesterday I delivered the first draft of my latest screenplay, HAUNTED HOUSE ON SORORITY ROW, to director Henrique Couto.  That's right, I delivered two screenplays in six weeks, fueled largely by my 70s Lite Rock Pandora station and Dunkin Donuts French Vanilla coffee (my two favorite albums for inspiration are ELO's "Out of the Blue" and The Fifth Dimension's "Greatest Hits on Earth," then two sugars and some half and half).  Loyal readers may ask, how can you just have delivered the first draft and yet I see a poster before my eyes?  Grasshopper, in the great b-movie tradition, this poster and a treatment were done first to secure funding--a system that has worked since Roger Corman bought his first typewriter.  Truly, when I explained the premise to my daughter and her boyfriend he proclaimed "sounds legit!" but what conflict that might have caused in my feminist daughter's household I don't know, as I do not peek into the window of their relationship.  The good news for me is that this will be shot in nearby Ohio, the bad news being that as a married family man I should probably not be present for pages 3-6, and definitely not pages 28-70, then maybe just be at the craft table for 71-80.