Frappinos Wrap Up

"The Frappinos" my ongoing comedy feature film. This is the third time I tackled the characters from this series and I have to say THE BEST! 

I have had constant requests to re-visit Tony Frappino and his family ever since the premiere of the SECOND FRAPPINO film. ( Which was titled THE FRAPPACHINOS back then.) 

I decided to go back and RE-DO the story, yet again, while things for DARK PASSAGES were being  put together. 

So after securing the cast (after several major cast changes) we scheduled the shooting for 9 days. Which is not a lot for an 85 page script but I knew we could do it. (Besides it was only what we could afford!) 

For months the cast and I prepared by rehearsing. We worked on character, dialogue, interaction and scene. So by the time it came to filming we just went right into it. The only thing that took up the time was camera and light set ups. 

The cast was tremendous! They took everything we have worked on made it all happen. They came prepared and ready to rock. This made filming go incredibly fast. Every day we were done at least 2 hours ahead of schedule! 

The crew and I busted our asses to make sure we set up camera and lights as quickly as possible so we can just shoot and move on. 

We did so well we were able to have a day off in the middle of the week! We were also able to finish a day early. So our 9 day shooting schedule turned out to be 7 days. 

I was so pleased and excited about how everything was going, I just couldn't believe it. The cast and the crew were able to have fun and enjoy the whole process so much more since we weren't shooting at ungodly hours. 

This was the best shoot OutWorld Entertainment has ever done. The footage looks amazing and the cast/crew did a terrific job. This will be our best project to date. 

Now it's off to editing and the awesome post production process. I am excited about putting together the film and bringing it all to life in the editing room.  

I'll keep you updated! 

YO JOE!!!

I was able to see the new GI JOE: RISE OF COBRA this past friday with my son and two close friends, Ryan and Bill.

I have to say what an awesome time at the movies it was. The movie was a lot of fun to watch. Lots of action, laughs and hi-tech gadgets! It was everything the cartoon world was. Complete with an UNDER WATER BASE! (You have to love COBRA.)

Was it perfect? No! Did it have a story? Yes. ( Though simple and straight forward, it has a "classic" action feel to it.) It's definitely one of the best 2009 Summer Blockbuster films.

Let me tell you what I didn't like about the film before going into what I liked:

1) Channing Tatum and Dennis Quad! Their acting was flat and emotionless. Channing Tatum plays Duke, GI JOE's greatest team leader. And he was completely boring the whole movie. He hardly gets excited or emotional making him feel like a robot. Especially during the scenes where he should be emotionally charged. Dennis Quad plays General Hawk, another great GI JOE leader who is just flat and emotionless. Quad plays the role extremely cheesy making his lines sound ridiculous. Thankfully he wasn't in the film very often.

2) The love story between the Baroness and Duke. It was pointless and uninteresting. (Forget about it being way off from the Comic and Cartoon. Since Duke and the Baroness never were in love.) But the fact that the love story in the movie between them two just didn't seem to have any real relevance. They tried to make it seem like it did but it fell flat.

3) Cobra Commander's mask! I'm not going to be a purest and say that they should have it like the show, but the mask they designed for the film looks terrible! It just was cheesy and terrible looking. Hopefully he gets an upgrade in the sequels.

4) The lack of background of the GI JOES.

Now what I liked:

1) Most of the back stories of the characters were pretty damn close to the comics.

2) The story felt like it could of been an actual episode of the old show. Cobra trying to take over the world and GI JOE has to stop them. This time though, Cobra is meaner, nastier and deadlier then the cartoons.

3) The story of how COBRA comes to be was really interesting and fun to watch unfold.

4) Despite the fact that the Baroness is lacking her infamous accent in the movie, Siena Miller was awesome as the Baroness. She was merciless, tough, and funny. She really helped bring the movie together.

The movie had a very JAMES BOND and classic action film "Feel" to it. They haven't made movies like that in a long time. Lately it's all about "flash" and these absolutely horrible twist endings to try and make you go "Wow!" THE RISE OF COBRA had a plot that was simple, yet exciting enough to make you want to see what happens next.

Even though the film is a bit "cheesy" at times (it is based off of an 80's cartoon!) it still doesn't treat the viewer as stupid. Which Transformers 2 did. ( And I even Liked Transformers 2 despite all it's stupidness, lack of character and terrible plot holes.)

In GI JOE, director Stephen Sommers has a lot of characters but manages to never forget about them in the film. He doesn't rely on immature jokes to make you laugh, nor does his action feel like it's pointless. Everything in GI JOE: THE RISE OF COBRA has a purpose and everything that happens has a re-action. Therefore it makes you feel like you had a full experience instead of walking out of the theater asking what the hell just happened?

In closing, I have to say I really liked this film. I thought the trailers looked horrible and pointless. I thought I was going to hate this film. (Especially since GI JOE was my favorite thing growing up.) But, the movie was 100 times better then the trailers and they respected and stayed true to most of the GI JOE world that was in both the show and comics.

After such a horrible summer of movies:

WOLVERINE: ORIGINS

TERMINATOR: SALVATION

and even TRANSFORMERS 2

GI JOE: THE RISE OF COBRA was a great way to end the summer in a high note for movies!

Summer Movies

This summer has been a sorry summer for movies. At least for the "Summer Blockbusters!" 

I don't get much free time to go the movies so I catch most of them on DVD. (Thanks to the awesome NETFLIX!) 

However, this summer I caught the following films on the Big Screen:

Star Trek (Enjoyed)

Wolverine (Hated!!)

Terminator:Salvation (Hated!!!) 

Transformers 2 (Fun but completely pointless and tasteless) 

Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince (Enjoyed but wanted more to be in the movie) 

The Proposal (I went with my girlfriend for all those bad movies I dragged her to see. I actually found the movie enjoyable and funny) 

Excuse me for wanting a story to go with my block buster. I mean the fact that studios, producers and directors are just focusing on action and effects is just insulting. Especially when the price of going to the movies and/or renting a DVD just gets higher. I like character, I like dialogue and I like purpose. Wolverine, Terminator:Salvation, and Transformers 2 had none of that! What is mind blowing is the fact that all three of those movies have years, books, stories, movies, TV shows, and more worth of character development, story, etc. But when it came time to making the movies they through all that shit out and made a mix of incoherent, dumb, senseless and worthless movies. I love Wolverine, the Terminator and Transformers, but not their 2009 Summer movies. They sucked! Transformers was the most enjoyable one out of the three. Michael Bay has to stop saying "I just wanted to make a pop corn movie." He says that for everyone of his films. It's just a smoke mirror to hide his lack of talent of making a movie, that just isn't camera angles, effects and hot women. 

Finally, I am looking forward to seeing GI JOE  after reading Aint It Cool News' review. I am a GIANT GI JOE fan and was completely horrified by the movie's trailers.  But after reading Harry's review a glimmer of hope appears. I hated Stephen Sommers VAN HELSING. It was total trash. And I saw it in the theaters for FREE. I still wanted my money back! 

We will find out next week if he destroyed my childhood. LOL!!! 

PREPARING TO SHOOT

We are about 2 weeks from Principal Photography for Outworld Entertainment's black comedy "The Frappinos." 

I am extremely excited! I haven't made a film in over a year, and I truly miss it. "The Frappinos" came to me for two reasons:

1) The great amount of fans from my early rendition of the characters (titled "The Frappachinos" back then) were demanding me to make a sequel or revamp the characters. 

2) With all the heavy pre-production going into our upcoming horror film "Dark Passages" I wanted to make something on a smaller scale that I can film in a week. 

Since early spring the company and I have been working on getting "The Frappinos" together. I have to say it wasn't an easy road. I had one casting issue after another.  After 3 months I lost the entire ORIGINAL cast of "THE FRAPPACHINOS" due to scheduling conflicts and the shitty economy. ( Let's face it, putting together a Indie/Guerilla style production isn't easy.) 

The casting problems brought me to some great new talent. And caused me to make some creative changes that I never thought about. In the end, I am extremely happy with what we have come up with in our rehearsal stage. The actors are comfortable with each other, their characters and the script. They are all looking forward to filming! 

Over the next two weeks I will finish up my shot list and all the other fun "work" aspects of film production with my Assistant Director, Meghan Haring. 

Until then check out "The Frappinos" myspace page:

www.myspace.com/frappinos

Outworld Entertainment

When I started OutWorld Entertainment 10 years ago, the world of cinema was changing drastically.  Independent films were starting to become important players in the industry. And, more and more of them were being made.

 

It was also becoming cheaper and easier to make a film with the release of current modern technology. HD didn’t play the role it does today back then. In fact HD was still something that was being worked on and was far from being affordable.

 

My first films were made on Hi-8 tape and eventually MiniDV. Editing software and computers were becoming very popular and affordable. My first editing system was a Pentium 2 (when that was a big deal) and had the latest version of Adobe Premiere.  I edited most of my projects on that system and exported everything on to VHS! Yes, everyone still had one of those and the general public was still just transferring over to DVD.  

 

A few years later I got an external DVD burner to attach to my system. I remember being extremely excited about the upgrade. I was able to make DVD copies of my films. Technology was moving really fast. Faster then most of us could keep up with. Even though we were capable of burning DVDs most players couldn’t read them! Now every computer has a DVD/CD burner. And every DVD player can read DVD+R and DVD-Rs.

 

My point is that OutWorld Entertainment started at the turning of the tide. We have come along way from our Hi-8 tapes and PC editing systems. We now shoot with professional HD cameras and edit on MAC PRO systems. “DARK PASSAGES” is the project of OWE’s future!

Raising Funds for Indie Films

The movie making business is a hard and time consuming process.  Trying to raise money for a film is one of the hardest things to do when things in the world are good. Now try doing it when the country is in it’s worst economic slumps in history.

 

All of OWE’s films, including our 4 award winning films, were all self funded and had budgets of no more then $500. “DARK PASSAGES” is a  much larger film that needs money to have it made.

 

Though the entire cast and crew (myself included) are not getting paid we still need money. We need to pay the Special Effects company, the music composer, Sound Studio, Costumes, etc.

 

“DARK PASSAGES” truly is the project of our future and it needs to be MADE!

 

Though things may be rough and scary for investors I march on searching for those who would help in bringing this amazing project to life.

 

If you are interested in being an investor or sponsor contact us at: producers@outworldentertainment.com  for a copy of our business plan.

A Dark Tunnel

So it’s been slightly over a year since DARK PASSAGES began it’s long twisted road of PRE-PRODUCTION.  Somewhere in between family emergencies, economic downfall and an over loaded work schedule I was able to keep DARK PASSAGES alive.

 

I’m not a quitter. Never have been. So despite all the crap that has happened over the last year I kept getting things together for this film.

 

I continue to pull through searching for investors and sponsors through a horrible economic time. That alone may make many people quit. But making movies has been a dream of mine ever since I was 12.  Just because the world decides to take a ride down the crap tube doesn’t mean I am going to follow.

 

The cast, crew and I are all going to come out of  this as winners! No matter how much crap we have to go through first.  

 

I have to say little by little, things are finally falling into place. Assistant Director Meghan and I have been working hard on getting things moving for this project and for the company. We’re starting to get people’s interest (again) and we are starting to start a buzz in the Industrial,Goth and Horror Industries.

 

A big plus is the addition of DARK PASSAGES first OFFICIAL SPONSOR!

Say hello to GRAVE CONCERNS EZINE! (www.graveconcernsezine.com)

Grave Concerns E-zine is an internet- based magazine only that specializes in Gothic & Darkwave, Industrial, EBM, Electro, Synthpop, Noise, IDM Experimental, Post-Punk, Alternative Rock, Indie, Glam, and Metal music. Julie Johnson began Grave Concerns E-zine in 1999 and has continued to grow ever since. Grave Concerns E-zine is located in up-state New York, but is known worldwide. Grave Concerns E-zine has become well-respected in the scene and has worked with many talented artists. 

I am extremely excited about having Julie Johnson and Grave Concerns supporting us. The Industrial/Goth/EBM scene may be relatively small here in the U.S. but we are strong and supportive.

So light is starting to shine in this dark tunnel I have been walking through for the last year. With every step I take I will find the tunnels end. Stick along for the ride!