November 11, 2025 • 31 mins
Welcome back to The Film Dept. Podcast!
In today's class, our hosts chat with Danny Chandia, local Las Vegas filmmaker, writer and director of MARGARET THE BRAVE and co-founder of Desert Cactus Films. They delve into Chandia's complex feelings about Las Vegas and presenting his upcoming project as a "Love letter to Las Vegas" that explores the local culture and community beyond the typical tourist attractions.
Chapters
00:00 Introduction to Danny Chandia and MARGARET THE BRAVE
01:03 Danny's Journey into Filmmaking
05:29 The Creative Process Behind MTB
10:54 Exploring Themes of Family and Personal Experience
19:21 The Festival Circuit and Future Projects
Watch this episode (and all previous episodes) on UNLV College of Fine Arts Podcasts:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLgbLVA87WVDTKLP095pINKBeHXSe6brRn
Email us: thefilmdeptpod@gmail.com
Credits:
HOSTS - Lex de Asis, Matthew Trudeau, Robby Baker
PRODUCERS - Tom Bjelic, Sam Decker
PRODUCERS - Vance Mellen, Theresa Twa
EXECUTIVE PRODUCED BY - Adam Paul, Roudi Boroumand
PRODUCTION COORDINATORS- Isa Privetera, Tatyana Odobasic-Cuevas
SOUND CREW - Brandon Aguilar, Hunter Cole, Marcie Gentile
KEY GRIP- William Stanfield
EDITORS - Molly Bilbray-Axelrod, Asher Garduno
For The Beverly:
Kip Kelly, Founding Creative Director | Chief Experience Officer
Alexi Harber, General Manager
Ivy Ergunes, Marketing Manager
To read the hosts' reviews, head over to:
https://thefilmdeptpodcast.substack.com/
Once again, The Film Department has teamed up with the mad geniuses of The Beverly Theater. Imagined by The Rogers Foundation, The Beverly Theater brings cinematic connectivity, novel collaborations, live happenings, cultural portals, and a zest for independent spirits to DTLV. With a mission to stage uncommon cinematic, literary, and live experiences, The Beverly Theater is Las Vegas’ first and only independent film house, storytelling arena, and live music venue.
For the latest screenings and events at The Beverly, visit thebeverlytheater.com The Film Department Podcast is supported by UNLV Film.
At the film department of the University of Nevada Las Vegas, every story has a beginning.With degree programs for undergraduates and graduates, state of the art equipment and facilities, incredible professional internships around the world, and expert guest speakers, students discover the power and potential of cinema as they prepare for the film and television industry… and beyond.
Learn more at UNLV.EDU/FILM UNLV Film. Find your voice. Tell your story.
In today's class, our hosts chat with Danny Chandia, local Las Vegas filmmaker, writer and director of MARGARET THE BRAVE and co-founder of Desert Cactus Films. They delve into Chandia's complex feelings about Las Vegas and presenting his upcoming project as a "Love letter to Las Vegas" that explores the local culture and community beyond the typical tourist attractions.
Chapters
00:00 Introduction to Danny Chandia and MARGARET THE BRAVE
01:03 Danny's Journey into Filmmaking
05:29 The Creative Process Behind MTB
10:54 Exploring Themes of Family and Personal Experience
19:21 The Festival Circuit and Future Projects
Watch this episode (and all previous episodes) on UNLV College of Fine Arts Podcasts:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLgbLVA87WVDTKLP095pINKBeHXSe6brRn
Email us: thefilmdeptpod@gmail.com
Credits:
HOSTS - Lex de Asis, Matthew Trudeau, Robby Baker
PRODUCERS - Tom Bjelic, Sam Decker
PRODUCERS - Vance Mellen, Theresa Twa
EXECUTIVE PRODUCED BY - Adam Paul, Roudi Boroumand
PRODUCTION COORDINATORS- Isa Privetera, Tatyana Odobasic-Cuevas
SOUND CREW - Brandon Aguilar, Hunter Cole, Marcie Gentile
KEY GRIP- William Stanfield
EDITORS - Molly Bilbray-Axelrod, Asher Garduno
For The Beverly:
Kip Kelly, Founding Creative Director | Chief Experience Officer
Alexi Harber, General Manager
Ivy Ergunes, Marketing Manager
To read the hosts' reviews, head over to:
https://thefilmdeptpodcast.substack.com/
Once again, The Film Department has teamed up with the mad geniuses of The Beverly Theater. Imagined by The Rogers Foundation, The Beverly Theater brings cinematic connectivity, novel collaborations, live happenings, cultural portals, and a zest for independent spirits to DTLV. With a mission to stage uncommon cinematic, literary, and live experiences, The Beverly Theater is Las Vegas’ first and only independent film house, storytelling arena, and live music venue.
For the latest screenings and events at The Beverly, visit thebeverlytheater.com The Film Department Podcast is supported by UNLV Film.
At the film department of the University of Nevada Las Vegas, every story has a beginning.With degree programs for undergraduates and graduates, state of the art equipment and facilities, incredible professional internships around the world, and expert guest speakers, students discover the power and potential of cinema as they prepare for the film and television industry… and beyond.
Learn more at UNLV.EDU/FILM UNLV Film. Find your voice. Tell your story.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
The Film Department is supported by UNLV Film.
(00:04):
At the Film Department of the University of Nevada Las Vegas, every story has a beginning.
With degree programs for undergraduates and graduates, state-of-the-art equipment and
facilities, incredible professional internships around the world, and expert guest speakers,
students discover the power and potential of cinema as they prepare for the film and
(00:24):
television industry and beyond.
Learn more at unlv.edu/film.
UNLV Film.
Find your voice.
Tell your story.
Hello and welcome to the Film Department, the official movie review podcast of UNLV Film.
My name is Matthew Trudeau and today I've got...
I'm Lex De Asis.
And Robbie Baker.
(00:44):
And we are here with our new friend, Danny Chandia.
Thank you so much for coming.
Danny, you are a Las Vegas native, director of Margaret the Brave, which is an incredible short
film featured in multiple, multiple festivals that we've been looking into and it's been
wowing audiences all along the way.
So we are so glad to have you here.
Oh, thanks for having me.
Yeah, I mean, I guess you are very interesting.
(01:06):
I was doing my research as a podcast host, would.
I love Margaret the Brave, but I actually want to start about your history and how you kind
of got into filmmaking and just tell us about you.
What makes you view?
Well, I think like a lot of people, I've been obsessed with movies and filmmaking since
I was a kid.
And over the years, I've sort of worked my way towards believing that I can actually have
(01:30):
a career doing film.
I think it kind of happened through different influences.
I think about like Robert Rodriguez, the first time I saw El Mariachi and realized, oh my goodness,
you can actually make a movie with limited resources and it will work.
It will actually play for an audience.
So I've watched that with the commentary, I don't even know how many times.
(01:53):
In terms of doing visual effects and things like that, I actually kind of started doing that
through UNLV if you can believe it.
I used to be the in-house graphics for the Thomas and Mac Center.
And so I learned to do like the stuff for the jumbo tron and be like, you know, make some
(02:14):
noise for the Rebels games.
And that was sort of how I started to learn After Effects.
Wow.
I loved that.
So you've done many roles.
Like you said, you started at UNLV with the visual effects.
You've done camera operating and directing.
How did you get to each part?
Camera operating.
(02:36):
I started running around with a home video camera when I was about eight and making like
little stop-motion videos with my action figures.
And I'm sorry, what was the other part of that?
How did you get to like all those other roles that you've done?
And you have a favorite, yeah.
Yeah, the other favorite, yes.
I mean, you would think that I really like doing visual effects because I put so much
(02:57):
work into those, but truly I am trying to kind of branch out from that.
And I think Margaret was an attempt to do that so that it was in all VFX that was actually
some on-location stuff.
Oh yeah, it was a great combination of both.
Oh, thank you.
Thank you.
Those visuals, I can't get enough of them.
Sorry, I'm totally nerding out about it.
They were great, they were great.
And we got to ask how you did that.
(03:19):
Yes.
Well, it's essentially the same way you would make like a diorama or a pop-up book.
It's just flat layers kind of stacked on top of each other in a 3D space.
And then in After Effects, you have this feature, the 3D camera, and you can move it through
that space.
And that's essentially what every shot is.
It's just a diorama, you know.
(03:41):
Instead of, you know, a little cardboard cutouts, it's footage of people on a green screen.
Yeah.
How meticulous was that hole?
It took a long time.
Yeah.
It took a long time.
From beginning to end, from the time that I started writing Margaret till when it was finished
was about five years.
Oh, goodness.
Okay, yeah.
And I would say a good, you know, like the first three years of that were having on production.
(04:08):
And then the last two years was mostly just doing the visual effects.
How long was the shoot?
30 days in total.
Okay, so.
Stretched out over a few years.
Oh, okay, okay.
So.
And yeah, it just meant a lot of sitting at a computer.
And just taking it one shot at this time.
(04:28):
There was like over 150 VFX shots in the film, so.
Yeah.
For a 30 minute film, that's a lot.
That's a lot.
Yeah.
Sorry, did it remind you of when you were eight years old and you were doing stop motion?
Oh, yeah.
Oh, absolutely.
Yeah, I wanted to do something in the adventure, fantasy genre, because you know, to me, I
(04:49):
make movies to escape just as much like as the audience would go to a movie to escape.
I like to be in that world of make believe.
And, you know, as much as I love shooting the stuff on location with the actors where they're
giving like hefty, you know, dramatic dialogue and I'm having to direct an actual dramatic scene.
I love being on a green screen with people just dressed up as like nights or, you know,
(05:13):
whatever.
And we're just, we're playing and we're just, we have the music blasting because you don't
have to worry about the music.
So yeah, I love that part of it.
So even though I am trying to branch out to do more just straightforward, kind of narrative
stuff, I don't know if I'll ever want to give up, you know, just it's hard to, especially
when it works out so well.
I gotta say that.
I am curious.
(05:35):
The whole movie, it felt like a really good combination of what's the word I'm looking
for, like, straight film and theatrical performances.
And then towards the end, it was kind of merging the two and the music was swelling and
there was this big, beautiful ballad of a, ooh, I'm so sorry, a ballad of a speech and it
(05:56):
felt like a stage production.
And the balance was beautiful.
Oh, yeah.
Yeah, I love intercutting.
I think it's a very effective editing technique.
And I've kind of used that throughout, you know, my work, even when I used to do like the
48's, I would try to find a way to tell it in two different timelines so you could kind
(06:18):
of cut back and forth between the past and the present.
And I just feel like there's something lyrical about that, you know.
Oh, sure.
So yeah, thank you.
Thank you.
Very Chris Nolan.
Yeah, I love that too.
Yeah.
That was a good comparison.
Can I also ask where the other storyline with the dad and Caroline, where did that, if I
may ask?
Yeah, yeah.
(06:39):
Well, I am a child of divorce.
You know, I have a complicated family tree.
So I think writing that character of the father was sort of a role-playing exercise, like writing
a kind of advice that I would have wanted to hear growing up, not to get too personal,
(07:00):
but I mean, it was also that we were shooting in my grandparents' house, oddly enough.
The house was up for sale because my grandmother was in a home at that point.
She had Alzheimer's and my aunt called up and said, "Hey, they're going to sell the house,
you know?"
And it didn't click for me at first.
We were locations scouting for a long time before I put two and two together and said,
(07:21):
"Oh, we could shoot there."
And so the fact that that was my grandparents' house and then it was such a kind of personal
story for me.
I mean, it made it all the more meaningful, certainly.
Yeah.
I'm also a psychologist, you made it.
So I'm also studying to become a therapist.
But with that being said, I felt the passion, I felt like the therapeutic fives to that
(07:45):
whole film and I truly, I really thought it was beautiful.
Yeah, the family dynamic worked really, really well.
And I'm curious to know what the actors brought to it and how you worked with them.
Well, when I was writing this script, I was actually writing it for Roberto and Veronica,
the two actors who played the dad and the daughter.
And I still went through the whole process of putting out a casting call, holding auditions,
(08:08):
but that was sort of just double check and make sure and just prove myself right.
The instinct was to go with these people from the beginning and to just see what the other
options were really just made it like crystal clear, like, okay, these are the actors.
And then it was just going through the process of rehearsals with them.
(08:28):
I think we had probably like three rehearsals before we got on set.
And we also had a blocking rehearsal.
It was great that we were able to shoot at that house because my aunt was sort of like
the location manager for that.
And we went over there one night with Ryan Galvin, our DP.
I think you and OV, Helm also.
Represent.
Yeah.
(08:48):
And we blocked out the whole short, the whole film with the actors me and him, which is
kind of be over in the corner of the room, like scoping it out and being like, okay, yeah,
this could be the frame for this.
And then it also made the actors more comfortable because now they're not going to show up on
the first day, having never been to that location.
It's like demystified.
So, so yeah, that really helped.
(09:09):
I can ask a specific question, sorry.
I can go for it.
There's the scene where, you know, the dad is starting to get really passionate and
everyone back and forth and he, he breathes his voice a little bit, you know, is getting
very passionate.
I wanted to ask what directing that was like, like, was there any improv?
Was that Roberto's decision, your decision, like where did that originate?
I got a big smile on your face.
(09:30):
So you better have a story.
Oh, because that's me.
I mean, that's, that's, that's, you know, I, I struggle with ADHD and anxiety and sometimes
I do get very passionate and even in the course of writing this and when I would, you know,
kind of take the script to other people, I would read it to them.
(09:53):
I would read that whole finale and I had it timed out to the music and everything.
I had the Chikowski piece in there.
I had the, I had the Wagner piece for, you know, the, the beginning, like it was all timed
out to this music and so thank goodness we were really good at those songs.
But yeah, no, it was, I don't know how much it read in the film, but the dad is
struggling with his own, you know, mental health.
(10:16):
And so it's sort of his moment of breaking down because he's kind of been keeping a mask
on the most of the film.
So, yeah.
As someone who went as a child of divorce myself and everything, it read crystal clear what
was going on in that moment, especially and I know that we cried when we watched it.
(10:40):
It was just a very powerful, very moving moment and like you said a moment ago, it's something
that I wish that I had heard as a kid from one of my parents and so it was very great to see
this represented in the film.
Thank you.
Yeah.
And I think, I think the other part of it too was, you know, I wrote it in 2019 and even though,
(11:01):
you know, since then, like the last five years have been hell speaking in terms of like
society and what we're going through.
Even in 2019, I had this feeling of like, man, what would you say to a young person coming
up in the world today with everything that's going on?
You know, teenagers should not feel, I mean, sure teenagers, it's expected to feel some
(11:24):
angst, but not hopelessness.
We don't want young people going out in the world feeling hopeless.
So the other part of this exercise was just like what would be the advice to somebody
who has grown up on social media who has grown up on a daily feed of just negativity and
fear and all of this.
(11:45):
And then it brings it back to like fairy tales and mythology and like, why do we tell these
stories and why do they have that staying power?
Why is it important to keep telling them so?
Why do we need a hero?
Why do we need a hero?
Well, we need a hero.
That's for sure.
Just like Bonnie Tyler.
Yeah.
Sorry, we're going to do that.
I mean, I have something.
(12:07):
Oh, go ahead.
Well, so we're talking about the hero.
And at the very beginning of the film, the father's like, where's Robin Hood?
Robin Hood being one of the most famous heroes of all classic literature.
And then at the end, spoiler alert, spoiler alert, she reveals she's got Robin Hood in
hand.
(12:27):
I want to know why Robin Hood?
I mean, other than fitting so perfectly into the fantastical narrative.
Well, this is, yeah, I don't know if I've ever told anyone this exclusive.
Yeah, when I was a kid, you know, like, you go to like the mall and you'll see like a
kiosk where they're making like custom CDs for kids, you know, and you'll, you can put
(12:51):
your, your kid's name in the, in the songs and they'll just like print you out of, I don't
know if they still do that, but they used to do that with books too.
And so it was.
I had a book like back growing up.
Yeah.
So I had a book that I think was like, Daniel and the adventures of Robin Hood.
And like, you know, my mom had it for me and it was it had my name in there and it was like,
it was I was part of the story of Robin Hood.
And so I don't know Robin Hood in terms of my own childhood.
(13:15):
And then at the time that I was writing Margaret, I had just this complete obsession with the
1938 Errol Flynn Robin Hood.
And I've watched that since, you know, dozens of times.
I mean, I'm in love with that movie.
But yeah, so I suppose that's why Robin Hood, even if Robin Hood doesn't quite fit the,
the monomethic structure in the way that other heroes do, you know, Robin Hood typically
(13:41):
comes fully formed when we hear the story of Robin Hood as opposed to like, you know,
Hercules or King Arthur or something like that.
Right.
But because it was just so personal to me and also Robin Hood is such a recognizable iconography,
you know, that just like you put somebody in green with a little feather in their cap,
you know, that's Robin Hood, you know, put the ball under it.
(14:02):
Or Peter Pan.
Or Greene.
Or Greene Aero, you know?
But yeah, it just felt like that was a good shorthand for the stories that are worth retelling
over and over again.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I think I have, this is a favorite question that I like to ask a lot of people is, is there
anything that you would do differently?
(14:25):
Several things.
I mean, there was a, there's a dolly shot in there.
One particular shot that bugs me every time I watch it because it, it's not like anything
else that was shot in reality.
Everything else we did handheld.
And I'm so glad that we did.
I think going into it, I had had this idea that I was going to approach it like a Brian
(14:46):
DiPolma film and every shot was going to be this expertly planned, you know, kind of
precisely moving beautiful picturesque kind of thing.
And once we were there on set and we just, the clock was ticking, I was like, no, we're
going to have to just be handheld and just ready to go.
So yeah, it's the one shot, I think that that sticks out is not fitting the style of the
(15:11):
rest of the reality stuff.
And now when you watch the short, you're absolutely going to know what that shot is.
But it's like, I've got to go rewatch it now.
It's time for rewatch.
Oh, man, I have to rewatch something great.
I know.
How dare you?
But I mean, the fact that it took five years, yeah, I don't have a lot of regrets because I
really did have the time to, you know, at least in my opinion, perfected in a long way.
(15:34):
So, are there any points in time throughout that process that you were feeling impatient
at all or kind of like, I'm ready for this to be done?
There were days I would just sit down at the computer and cry.
Like because I just, I knew what I had to do and I knew it was just going to take all
the day and it would just be copying and pasting things or masking out, you know, characters,
rotoscoping, things like that.
(15:56):
It was just, it was mind numbing the amount of stuff to do in After Effects.
But there were breakthroughs.
I mean, we had a tough time finding the person to make our horse puppet, the one that you
see in the film is actually the third puppet maker that we ended up going with.
(16:16):
So, once we'd have like breakthroughs like that or if I could say like, okay, the great
hall scene is done.
I mean, it was just those little victories that would just inch me closer to the finish line.
And then I'd say like the last year, finally, with the light at the end of the tunnel, I
was able to just really push forwards.
Well, and would you go back and watch those scenes after they're finally, finally put
(16:38):
together and think, okay, it was worth it or...
Yeah, yeah, dig it onto the next.
Yeah, no.
But everything was constantly evolving, too.
The style of the fairy tale changed drastically over the course of making it.
If you go back and watch our project before Margaret, it's called Violent Water and it's
(17:01):
a George Mellies inspired underwater adventure.
And it's got this whole silent film style to it very heavy on, you know, the film scratches
and the grain and the noise and all of that.
And so I thought that that was going to be the look of the fairy tale, that it was going
to be just a straight up silent film.
(17:21):
In fact, for a minute there, I was like, maybe I just need to do the whole film in black
and white because I'm not going to be able to sell these VFX in color.
You're just going to be able to tell that much more that they're fake.
But because of just the amount of time that everything else took, I kept refining and kind
of steering away from the really scratchy look and everything just kind of became more uniform.
(17:46):
So in that way it was a step.
Five years tends to do that, right?
Yeah, for sure.
Well, and now it's done and it's been in the festival circuit for a little while.
How long has it been going through festivals?
We started at the damn short in February.
So I guess, I don't know, seven months?
I have no concept of time now.
And what kind of, I've seen it's won some awards, but could you give us a scope of like
(18:08):
some of the, yeah, I mean, it's been incredible.
We've been in, I want to say like 10 or 11 festivals so far and we've won it all of them
except for one.
Wow.
That's amazing.
Wow.
I'm thrilled.
And I'm so proud for everybody who's involved in it too because it's going to these festivals
in other states and cities and at the end it's saying, you know, filmed on location in
(18:31):
Las Vegas, Nevada.
I don't know.
I think, you know, we keep talking about like Hollywood 2.0 and that's a hot topic.
It's a hot topic and, you know, major studios have their eye on Vegas, but I really, you know,
as much of, as much as that is a phrase that kind of, you know, works, to kind of catch
(18:55):
attention like Hollywood 2.0.
I don't think we could ever be Hollywood 2.0.
I think Vegas is too different and too unique.
I think our filmmakers here are just too weird and wonderful to just be another Hollywood.
Yeah.
You know?
And so, you know, if they want to come in and work in our backyard, that's great, but I'm
(19:15):
excited for when they start to notice the talent that is already here, you know, the filmmakers
that are coming up and coming out of Vegas.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah, come with a lot of jobs in hand, but then we're just going to turn it right back
around on them.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Well, we're giving all this praise to Margaret the Brave,
I want you to talk to us about a little bit about the Malibu film festival.
I heard that we can stream.
(19:35):
Yeah.
We're going to be streaming in their online portion of the festival from November 1 through
the 8th.
Yeah.
So, everybody better go watch.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And, and yeah.
No, I'm excited about that for sure.
Yeah.
Nice.
So, well, and so your, while it's in the festival circuit right now, is this a point in time
(19:56):
where you're like, okay, what's next?
Are you writing anything right now?
Is there anything on the horizon?
That you can talk about?
Yeah.
Yeah.
No, I'm happy to.
Yeah, I'm writing a feature now.
I, I suppose the, the smart thing to do might be to make a few more shorts.
But I, I have had this idea cooking for a long time.
(20:19):
I've written, I don't even know how many features at this point.
And just never had the resources to get them made, never had the support or the connections
of.
But now, you know, I mean, gratefully, like because of the attention that Margaret has gotten,
it just seems like there is no better time for me to finally swing for the fences and
(20:41):
make this thing.
Absolutely.
It's my, I don't, I don't necessarily like saying this, but it's like my love letter to
Vegas.
I have very complicated feelings about Vegas.
I'm, I'm born and raised here.
Yeah.
My, my mom was born and raised here.
But, you know, it's, it's, it's meant to be this, this, this exploration of what it means
(21:02):
to be a Vegas local.
And it's this big ensemble.
And it's, it's people who live all over the city in these different, you know, pockets of
the, you know, the, the East side and, and Summerlin and, and North Las Vegas downtown,
all of this.
And to show Vegas in a way that it's never been seen in, and, and, and, and, and, and, and,
not just flashy neon lights, but, no, exactly.
Exactly.
The fact that we're not just a tourist town, we're actual people living lives here.
(21:26):
Right, right.
And so, you know, I, I'm, I'm flattered when we see Vegas in movies, but it's typically the
same treatment every time it has to do with gaming and, you know, maybe you get an Elvis
impersonator in the, right, yeah.
Yeah.
Right. The Hangover
Yeah.
Right.
Exactly.
So something different.
Right.
Something authentic to Vegas.
Yeah.
Yeah.
(21:46):
When I've always said that whenever, whenever people come into town or like, so what, what do you think?
What do you, I used to work at like a very, very attraction place.
They were like, what do you recommend we do?
I'm like, go to Mount Charleston.
Right.
Go to Red Rock.
Go to, go to Valley of Fire.
Yeah.
They're like how far is that?
I'm like an hour outside the city.
Oh, yeah.
Or the wetlands.
Just like in town, basically.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Hoover Dam has a good tour.
Oh, yeah.
Hoover Dam is beautiful.
Oh, yeah.
Have you ever been to the railroad pass?
(22:07):
It's on the way there.
Oh, so beautiful.
We're getting off topic.
I know.
I know.
I'm sorry.
Yeah.
This is the film department.
Thank you very much.
We film at these locations.
Hey.
Yeah.
Hollywood 2.0.
All right.
All right.
I'm trying to think.
What else?
I was going to say, can you talk to us about Desire Cactus films?
Oh, yes.
Yeah.
(22:28):
Desire Cactus films.
Me and my partner, Rachel, we founded that in 2019.
Mostly, you know, we started out doing music videos.
Our first music video, News, we did that for the Elocidate's Film Festival, when that was still a thing.
And it was for the music video lab.
So we actually had like two weeks to make this music video for a budget of like 400 bucks.
(22:54):
We came in under budget.
I think we ended up spending like 250 bucks and like 50 bucks of that was for pizza.
So I'm really proud.
And it was like a breakthrough for us because it showed that we could make something in a short amount of time.
And actually be happy with the music.
Yeah.
Yeah.
You mentioned earlier that you did 48's.
Do you still do 48's?
(23:15):
We just had someone who won this year's 48-hour film project.
Edwin, right?
Yeah.
Yeah, he was in Margaret too.
I haven't done the 48 in a while.
It's stressful.
It takes a lot.
It's very stressful.
It's a whole weekend of no sleep.
Yeah.
But it is its own kind of film school for sure.
Yeah.
Totally.
(23:36):
Well, it's a whole school of trial and error.
You know, if you failed this year, do it again next year.
You're going to learn from those mistakes.
I know I did that.
I did it twice in a row and I was like, okay, maybe not again.
But now I'm like, wait, maybe I want to get back into it because I know when I can sleep now.
Maybe it's just the sleep.
Maybe I'm just upset about that.
Yeah.
Sleep and the food.
Yeah.
I want to talk to you more about your ADHD as well.
(23:57):
I'm sorry if that was really blunt or straightforward.
No, no you're fine
I'm not realizing,
I was like, that was a weird, weird word that.
But a lot of people in the arts and in the film industry have all sorts of struggles.
ADHD being one and then with a lot.
And what I've heard is that it's what gives them their story to tell.
Oh, yeah.
Do you feel that is the case?
Yeah.
(24:18):
As much as like the father character in the film is sort of a version of me.
So is the daughter.
I was diagnosed with ADHD when I was six and so going through school and being tried out
on all these different medications and just really struggling the entire time.
I mean, I barely graduated high school and I wouldn't want to go through that experience
(24:41):
again.
You know.
If I could avoid it at all cost.
So yeah, I mean, I suppose that part of it came out in her character too is she's struggling
in school and then of course she's going through the separation of her parents and all
of this.
Yeah.
I don't know if that answers your question really.
(25:02):
No, for sure.
For sure.
I'm kind of getting more of a reflection of the daughter character than anyone it seems
like.
Yeah.
Well, and that's the thing.
I don't know how some writers do it where they're able to just compartmentalize all these
different characters and write them as if they're there's separate people.
I mean, I'm aiming for that.
But I can't not bring my own experience to each individual character and even
(25:27):
the structure of the story as a whole is me the fairy tale writer being critiqued
by me the screenwriter.
Like it's writing a fairy tale that fits all the you know, the tropes of a classic
adventure fantasy.
Yeah.
And then every time we cut back to reality, it's the daughter poking holes in that in that
(25:50):
story.
So yeah, it was a way for me to criticize my own writing.
Yeah.
Yeah, it worked really well.
Honestly, honestly.
And then add for comedic chops.
Yeah.
Which in a story like this, it's there's a great message there's a great moral, but if you're
laughing as well, it makes it all the better.
For sure.
I can't agree with that more as a writer myself, finding those nice moments in between the
(26:12):
serious stuff is so important.
And I think once again, it really shined through in the poking of the holes of the story.
Sometimes you just need some character to just be like, Hey, man, this doesn't make sense.
What are you talking about?
Yeah.
Yeah.
I'm terrible writing dialogue.
I can't figure out how people actually speak.
Yeah.
(26:32):
And so that's kind of why I wrote a person telling a story because that's more the kind of.
Your dialogue was pretty natural though.
Thank you.
Thank you.
I have to credit the actors.
They brought it to life.
I mean, it is such a thrill when you actually get other people to read your dialogue.
Oh yeah.
And also quite revealing too because you can immediately see like, Oh, well, that doesn't sound natural.
(26:56):
So let's tweak that.
Did you do a table read at all with all the actors?
Yeah.
I mean, in our rehearsals, we would go through it.
We mostly focus on specific scenes, you know, but yeah.
And then so much of the dad's dialogue was done in ADR after the fact that it was in Fairytale.
Yeah.
So we didn't have to spend time actually recording him on the location telling the whole
(27:17):
fairy tale.
Yeah.
I guess when I think ADR, I just think like, Oh, something messed up on production.
So that makes sense.
I'm remembering all the voice over and all the storytelling elements like in Cart with
Brendan Frazier.
Like it's all just over.
Did you have him record the entire thing that way or was it just kind of the snippets that
you needed it to be?
(27:38):
If it was like leading into the Fairytale, you know, and it starts in reality and we know
we're going to cut now to the prologue with the the army and all of that.
Like we would just record that whole thing on set.
But then if it gets like deep into it and it's narrating the like the scene with the
Margaret and her and her father on the farm, that's such a long stretch of dialogue that
(27:59):
it was just like there was no point to take up time on location recording that.
Yeah.
We're not going to see it.
So I know we're running out of time.
So I got one last question for you and it's, I keep hitting the microphone.
What advice do you have for young filmmakers, new filmmakers, filmmaking students?
I mean, we're at UNLV right now.
Our self-taught filmmakers.
(28:20):
Yeah.
This is very important because it's this is coming out of time when I feel like our
industry is up against a wall.
Well first off, if you're really trying to build a career, don't start by trying to make
a feature.
That was my mistake and I spent over 10 years trying to do that.
(28:43):
Start small, you know, our first music video, like I said, 250 bucks, made it in two weeks,
proved to ourselves we could do something worthwhile in that amount of time for that budget
and it got us the support to make the next thing, which was like a thousand bucks from a
kickstarter and you know, like way more people, which then led to the next thing, which is
(29:03):
Margaret, which is like over 300 cast and crew.
So start small, absolutely, and build support that way.
I would also say in terms of like just the craft, it is important to tell stories that are
personal to you, but you really should be going into whatever project you're doing
with the audience in mind.
(29:24):
As much as I love Art House Cinema, as much as I love like the classic, you know, the
Bergmans and the Tarkovsky's and hell even now we have like people who are blending that
with horror like Ari Aster or you know Jordan Peel is doing these more like kind of metaphorical
horror films.
(29:44):
But I'm like, we can't scoff at the Spielbergs or the George Lucas' either.
We need those kinds of voices just as much as we need our serious experimental filmmakers.
We need filmmakers who are going to speak to everyone and not just, you know, not just
(30:08):
a more niche part of an audience.
We need, yeah, we need filmmakers
who are ready to save Hollywood man.
That's beautiful
Thank you so much Danny for joining us
Thank you Robby and Lex, killing it as always.
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Find your voice.
Tell your story.
Hello and welcome to the Film Department, the official movie review podcast of UNLV Film.
My name is Matthew Trudeau and today I've got...
I'm Lex De Asis.
And Robbie Baker.
(00:44):
And we are here with our new friend, Danny Chandia.
Thank you so much for coming.
Danny, you are a Las Vegas native, director of Margaret the Brave, which is an incredible short
film featured in multiple, multiple festivals that we've been looking into and it's been
wowing audiences all along the way.
So we are so glad to have you here.
Oh, thanks for having me.
Yeah, I mean, I guess you are very interesting.
(01:06):
I was doing my research as a podcast host, would.
I love Margaret the Brave, but I actually want to start about your history and how you kind
of got into filmmaking and just tell us about you.
What makes you view?
Well, I think like a lot of people, I've been obsessed with movies and filmmaking since
I was a kid.
And over the years, I've sort of worked my way towards believing that I can actually have
(01:30):
a career doing film.
I think it kind of happened through different influences.
I think about like Robert Rodriguez, the first time I saw El Mariachi and realized, oh my goodness,
you can actually make a movie with limited resources and it will work.
It will actually play for an audience.
So I've watched that with the commentary, I don't even know how many times.
(01:53):
In terms of doing visual effects and things like that, I actually kind of started doing that
through UNLV if you can believe it.
I used to be the in-house graphics for the Thomas and Mac Center.
And so I learned to do like the stuff for the jumbo tron and be like, you know, make some
(02:14):
noise for the Rebels games.
And that was sort of how I started to learn After Effects.
Wow.
I loved that.
So you've done many roles.
Like you said, you started at UNLV with the visual effects.
You've done camera operating and directing.
How did you get to each part?
Camera operating.
(02:36):
I started running around with a home video camera when I was about eight and making like
little stop-motion videos with my action figures.
And I'm sorry, what was the other part of that?
How did you get to like all those other roles that you've done?
And you have a favorite, yeah.
Yeah, the other favorite, yes.
I mean, you would think that I really like doing visual effects because I put so much
(02:57):
work into those, but truly I am trying to kind of branch out from that.
And I think Margaret was an attempt to do that so that it was in all VFX that was actually
some on-location stuff.
Oh yeah, it was a great combination of both.
Oh, thank you.
Thank you.
Those visuals, I can't get enough of them.
Sorry, I'm totally nerding out about it.
They were great, they were great.
And we got to ask how you did that.
(03:19):
Yes.
Well, it's essentially the same way you would make like a diorama or a pop-up book.
It's just flat layers kind of stacked on top of each other in a 3D space.
And then in After Effects, you have this feature, the 3D camera, and you can move it through
that space.
And that's essentially what every shot is.
It's just a diorama, you know.
(03:41):
Instead of, you know, a little cardboard cutouts, it's footage of people on a green screen.
Yeah.
How meticulous was that hole?
It took a long time.
Yeah.
It took a long time.
From beginning to end, from the time that I started writing Margaret till when it was finished
was about five years.
Oh, goodness.
Okay, yeah.
And I would say a good, you know, like the first three years of that were having on production.
(04:08):
And then the last two years was mostly just doing the visual effects.
How long was the shoot?
30 days in total.
Okay, so.
Stretched out over a few years.
Oh, okay, okay.
So.
And yeah, it just meant a lot of sitting at a computer.
And just taking it one shot at this time.
(04:28):
There was like over 150 VFX shots in the film, so.
Yeah.
For a 30 minute film, that's a lot.
That's a lot.
Yeah.
Sorry, did it remind you of when you were eight years old and you were doing stop motion?
Oh, yeah.
Oh, absolutely.
Yeah, I wanted to do something in the adventure, fantasy genre, because you know, to me, I
(04:49):
make movies to escape just as much like as the audience would go to a movie to escape.
I like to be in that world of make believe.
And, you know, as much as I love shooting the stuff on location with the actors where they're
giving like hefty, you know, dramatic dialogue and I'm having to direct an actual dramatic scene.
I love being on a green screen with people just dressed up as like nights or, you know,
(05:13):
whatever.
And we're just, we're playing and we're just, we have the music blasting because you don't
have to worry about the music.
So yeah, I love that part of it.
So even though I am trying to branch out to do more just straightforward, kind of narrative
stuff, I don't know if I'll ever want to give up, you know, just it's hard to, especially
when it works out so well.
I gotta say that.
I am curious.
(05:35):
The whole movie, it felt like a really good combination of what's the word I'm looking
for, like, straight film and theatrical performances.
And then towards the end, it was kind of merging the two and the music was swelling and
there was this big, beautiful ballad of a, ooh, I'm so sorry, a ballad of a speech and it
(05:56):
felt like a stage production.
And the balance was beautiful.
Oh, yeah.
Yeah, I love intercutting.
I think it's a very effective editing technique.
And I've kind of used that throughout, you know, my work, even when I used to do like the
48's, I would try to find a way to tell it in two different timelines so you could kind
(06:18):
of cut back and forth between the past and the present.
And I just feel like there's something lyrical about that, you know.
Oh, sure.
So yeah, thank you.
Thank you.
Very Chris Nolan.
Yeah, I love that too.
Yeah.
That was a good comparison.
Can I also ask where the other storyline with the dad and Caroline, where did that, if I
may ask?
Yeah, yeah.
(06:39):
Well, I am a child of divorce.
You know, I have a complicated family tree.
So I think writing that character of the father was sort of a role-playing exercise, like writing
a kind of advice that I would have wanted to hear growing up, not to get too personal,
(07:00):
but I mean, it was also that we were shooting in my grandparents' house, oddly enough.
The house was up for sale because my grandmother was in a home at that point.
She had Alzheimer's and my aunt called up and said, "Hey, they're going to sell the house,
you know?"
And it didn't click for me at first.
We were locations scouting for a long time before I put two and two together and said,
(07:21):
"Oh, we could shoot there."
And so the fact that that was my grandparents' house and then it was such a kind of personal
story for me.
I mean, it made it all the more meaningful, certainly.
Yeah.
I'm also a psychologist, you made it.
So I'm also studying to become a therapist.
But with that being said, I felt the passion, I felt like the therapeutic fives to that
(07:45):
whole film and I truly, I really thought it was beautiful.
Yeah, the family dynamic worked really, really well.
And I'm curious to know what the actors brought to it and how you worked with them.
Well, when I was writing this script, I was actually writing it for Roberto and Veronica,
the two actors who played the dad and the daughter.
And I still went through the whole process of putting out a casting call, holding auditions,
(08:08):
but that was sort of just double check and make sure and just prove myself right.
The instinct was to go with these people from the beginning and to just see what the other
options were really just made it like crystal clear, like, okay, these are the actors.
And then it was just going through the process of rehearsals with them.
(08:28):
I think we had probably like three rehearsals before we got on set.
And we also had a blocking rehearsal.
It was great that we were able to shoot at that house because my aunt was sort of like
the location manager for that.
And we went over there one night with Ryan Galvin, our DP.
I think you and OV, Helm also.
Represent.
Yeah.
(08:48):
And we blocked out the whole short, the whole film with the actors me and him, which is
kind of be over in the corner of the room, like scoping it out and being like, okay, yeah,
this could be the frame for this.
And then it also made the actors more comfortable because now they're not going to show up on
the first day, having never been to that location.
It's like demystified.
So, so yeah, that really helped.
(09:09):
I can ask a specific question, sorry.
I can go for it.
There's the scene where, you know, the dad is starting to get really passionate and
everyone back and forth and he, he breathes his voice a little bit, you know, is getting
very passionate.
I wanted to ask what directing that was like, like, was there any improv?
Was that Roberto's decision, your decision, like where did that originate?
I got a big smile on your face.
(09:30):
So you better have a story.
Oh, because that's me.
I mean, that's, that's, that's, you know, I, I struggle with ADHD and anxiety and sometimes
I do get very passionate and even in the course of writing this and when I would, you know,
kind of take the script to other people, I would read it to them.
(09:53):
I would read that whole finale and I had it timed out to the music and everything.
I had the Chikowski piece in there.
I had the, I had the Wagner piece for, you know, the, the beginning, like it was all timed
out to this music and so thank goodness we were really good at those songs.
But yeah, no, it was, I don't know how much it read in the film, but the dad is
struggling with his own, you know, mental health.
(10:16):
And so it's sort of his moment of breaking down because he's kind of been keeping a mask
on the most of the film.
So, yeah.
As someone who went as a child of divorce myself and everything, it read crystal clear what
was going on in that moment, especially and I know that we cried when we watched it.
(10:40):
It was just a very powerful, very moving moment and like you said a moment ago, it's something
that I wish that I had heard as a kid from one of my parents and so it was very great to see
this represented in the film.
Thank you.
Yeah.
And I think, I think the other part of it too was, you know, I wrote it in 2019 and even though,
(11:01):
you know, since then, like the last five years have been hell speaking in terms of like
society and what we're going through.
Even in 2019, I had this feeling of like, man, what would you say to a young person coming
up in the world today with everything that's going on?
You know, teenagers should not feel, I mean, sure teenagers, it's expected to feel some
(11:24):
angst, but not hopelessness.
We don't want young people going out in the world feeling hopeless.
So the other part of this exercise was just like what would be the advice to somebody
who has grown up on social media who has grown up on a daily feed of just negativity and
fear and all of this.
(11:45):
And then it brings it back to like fairy tales and mythology and like, why do we tell these
stories and why do they have that staying power?
Why is it important to keep telling them so?
Why do we need a hero?
Why do we need a hero?
Well, we need a hero.
That's for sure.
Just like Bonnie Tyler.
Yeah.
Sorry, we're going to do that.
I mean, I have something.
(12:07):
Oh, go ahead.
Well, so we're talking about the hero.
And at the very beginning of the film, the father's like, where's Robin Hood?
Robin Hood being one of the most famous heroes of all classic literature.
And then at the end, spoiler alert, spoiler alert, she reveals she's got Robin Hood in
hand.
(12:27):
I want to know why Robin Hood?
I mean, other than fitting so perfectly into the fantastical narrative.
Well, this is, yeah, I don't know if I've ever told anyone this exclusive.
Yeah, when I was a kid, you know, like, you go to like the mall and you'll see like a
kiosk where they're making like custom CDs for kids, you know, and you'll, you can put
(12:51):
your, your kid's name in the, in the songs and they'll just like print you out of, I don't
know if they still do that, but they used to do that with books too.
And so it was.
I had a book like back growing up.
Yeah.
So I had a book that I think was like, Daniel and the adventures of Robin Hood.
And like, you know, my mom had it for me and it was it had my name in there and it was like,
it was I was part of the story of Robin Hood.
And so I don't know Robin Hood in terms of my own childhood.
(13:15):
And then at the time that I was writing Margaret, I had just this complete obsession with the
1938 Errol Flynn Robin Hood.
And I've watched that since, you know, dozens of times.
I mean, I'm in love with that movie.
But yeah, so I suppose that's why Robin Hood, even if Robin Hood doesn't quite fit the,
the monomethic structure in the way that other heroes do, you know, Robin Hood typically
(13:41):
comes fully formed when we hear the story of Robin Hood as opposed to like, you know,
Hercules or King Arthur or something like that.
Right.
But because it was just so personal to me and also Robin Hood is such a recognizable iconography,
you know, that just like you put somebody in green with a little feather in their cap,
you know, that's Robin Hood, you know, put the ball under it.
(14:02):
Or Peter Pan.
Or Greene.
Or Greene Aero, you know?
But yeah, it just felt like that was a good shorthand for the stories that are worth retelling
over and over again.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I think I have, this is a favorite question that I like to ask a lot of people is, is there
anything that you would do differently?
(14:25):
Several things.
I mean, there was a, there's a dolly shot in there.
One particular shot that bugs me every time I watch it because it, it's not like anything
else that was shot in reality.
Everything else we did handheld.
And I'm so glad that we did.
I think going into it, I had had this idea that I was going to approach it like a Brian
(14:46):
DiPolma film and every shot was going to be this expertly planned, you know, kind of
precisely moving beautiful picturesque kind of thing.
And once we were there on set and we just, the clock was ticking, I was like, no, we're
going to have to just be handheld and just ready to go.
So yeah, it's the one shot, I think that that sticks out is not fitting the style of the
(15:11):
rest of the reality stuff.
And now when you watch the short, you're absolutely going to know what that shot is.
But it's like, I've got to go rewatch it now.
It's time for rewatch.
Oh, man, I have to rewatch something great.
I know.
How dare you?
But I mean, the fact that it took five years, yeah, I don't have a lot of regrets because I
really did have the time to, you know, at least in my opinion, perfected in a long way.
(15:34):
So, are there any points in time throughout that process that you were feeling impatient
at all or kind of like, I'm ready for this to be done?
There were days I would just sit down at the computer and cry.
Like because I just, I knew what I had to do and I knew it was just going to take all
the day and it would just be copying and pasting things or masking out, you know, characters,
rotoscoping, things like that.
(15:56):
It was just, it was mind numbing the amount of stuff to do in After Effects.
But there were breakthroughs.
I mean, we had a tough time finding the person to make our horse puppet, the one that you
see in the film is actually the third puppet maker that we ended up going with.
(16:16):
So, once we'd have like breakthroughs like that or if I could say like, okay, the great
hall scene is done.
I mean, it was just those little victories that would just inch me closer to the finish line.
And then I'd say like the last year, finally, with the light at the end of the tunnel, I
was able to just really push forwards.
Well, and would you go back and watch those scenes after they're finally, finally put
(16:38):
together and think, okay, it was worth it or...
Yeah, yeah, dig it onto the next.
Yeah, no.
But everything was constantly evolving, too.
The style of the fairy tale changed drastically over the course of making it.
If you go back and watch our project before Margaret, it's called Violent Water and it's
(17:01):
a George Mellies inspired underwater adventure.
And it's got this whole silent film style to it very heavy on, you know, the film scratches
and the grain and the noise and all of that.
And so I thought that that was going to be the look of the fairy tale, that it was going
to be just a straight up silent film.
(17:21):
In fact, for a minute there, I was like, maybe I just need to do the whole film in black
and white because I'm not going to be able to sell these VFX in color.
You're just going to be able to tell that much more that they're fake.
But because of just the amount of time that everything else took, I kept refining and kind
of steering away from the really scratchy look and everything just kind of became more uniform.
(17:46):
So in that way it was a step.
Five years tends to do that, right?
Yeah, for sure.
Well, and now it's done and it's been in the festival circuit for a little while.
How long has it been going through festivals?
We started at the damn short in February.
So I guess, I don't know, seven months?
I have no concept of time now.
And what kind of, I've seen it's won some awards, but could you give us a scope of like
(18:08):
some of the, yeah, I mean, it's been incredible.
We've been in, I want to say like 10 or 11 festivals so far and we've won it all of them
except for one.
Wow.
That's amazing.
Wow.
I'm thrilled.
And I'm so proud for everybody who's involved in it too because it's going to these festivals
in other states and cities and at the end it's saying, you know, filmed on location in
(18:31):
Las Vegas, Nevada.
I don't know.
I think, you know, we keep talking about like Hollywood 2.0 and that's a hot topic.
It's a hot topic and, you know, major studios have their eye on Vegas, but I really, you know,
as much of, as much as that is a phrase that kind of, you know, works, to kind of catch
(18:55):
attention like Hollywood 2.0.
I don't think we could ever be Hollywood 2.0.
I think Vegas is too different and too unique.
I think our filmmakers here are just too weird and wonderful to just be another Hollywood.
Yeah.
You know?
And so, you know, if they want to come in and work in our backyard, that's great, but I'm
(19:15):
excited for when they start to notice the talent that is already here, you know, the filmmakers
that are coming up and coming out of Vegas.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah, come with a lot of jobs in hand, but then we're just going to turn it right back
around on them.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Well, we're giving all this praise to Margaret the Brave,
I want you to talk to us about a little bit about the Malibu film festival.
I heard that we can stream.
(19:35):
Yeah.
We're going to be streaming in their online portion of the festival from November 1 through
the 8th.
Yeah.
So, everybody better go watch.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And, and yeah.
No, I'm excited about that for sure.
Yeah.
Nice.
So, well, and so your, while it's in the festival circuit right now, is this a point in time
(19:56):
where you're like, okay, what's next?
Are you writing anything right now?
Is there anything on the horizon?
That you can talk about?
Yeah.
Yeah.
No, I'm happy to.
Yeah, I'm writing a feature now.
I, I suppose the, the smart thing to do might be to make a few more shorts.
But I, I have had this idea cooking for a long time.
(20:19):
I've written, I don't even know how many features at this point.
And just never had the resources to get them made, never had the support or the connections
of.
But now, you know, I mean, gratefully, like because of the attention that Margaret has gotten,
it just seems like there is no better time for me to finally swing for the fences and
(20:41):
make this thing.
Absolutely.
It's my, I don't, I don't necessarily like saying this, but it's like my love letter to
Vegas.
I have very complicated feelings about Vegas.
I'm, I'm born and raised here.
Yeah.
My, my mom was born and raised here.
But, you know, it's, it's, it's meant to be this, this, this exploration of what it means
(21:02):
to be a Vegas local.
And it's this big ensemble.
And it's, it's people who live all over the city in these different, you know, pockets of
the, you know, the, the East side and, and Summerlin and, and North Las Vegas downtown,
all of this.
And to show Vegas in a way that it's never been seen in, and, and, and, and, and, and, and,
not just flashy neon lights, but, no, exactly.
Exactly.
The fact that we're not just a tourist town, we're actual people living lives here.
(21:26):
Right, right.
And so, you know, I, I'm, I'm flattered when we see Vegas in movies, but it's typically the
same treatment every time it has to do with gaming and, you know, maybe you get an Elvis
impersonator in the, right, yeah.
Yeah.
Right. The Hangover
Yeah.
Right.
Exactly.
So something different.
Right.
Something authentic to Vegas.
Yeah.
Yeah.
(21:46):
When I've always said that whenever, whenever people come into town or like, so what, what do you think?
What do you, I used to work at like a very, very attraction place.
They were like, what do you recommend we do?
I'm like, go to Mount Charleston.
Right.
Go to Red Rock.
Go to, go to Valley of Fire.
Yeah.
They're like how far is that?
I'm like an hour outside the city.
Oh, yeah.
Or the wetlands.
Just like in town, basically.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Hoover Dam has a good tour.
Oh, yeah.
Hoover Dam is beautiful.
Oh, yeah.
Have you ever been to the railroad pass?
(22:07):
It's on the way there.
Oh, so beautiful.
We're getting off topic.
I know.
I know.
I'm sorry.
Yeah.
This is the film department.
Thank you very much.
We film at these locations.
Hey.
Yeah.
Hollywood 2.0.
All right.
All right.
I'm trying to think.
What else?
I was going to say, can you talk to us about Desire Cactus films?
Oh, yes.
Yeah.
(22:28):
Desire Cactus films.
Me and my partner, Rachel, we founded that in 2019.
Mostly, you know, we started out doing music videos.
Our first music video, News, we did that for the Elocidate's Film Festival, when that was still a thing.
And it was for the music video lab.
So we actually had like two weeks to make this music video for a budget of like 400 bucks.
(22:54):
We came in under budget.
I think we ended up spending like 250 bucks and like 50 bucks of that was for pizza.
So I'm really proud.
And it was like a breakthrough for us because it showed that we could make something in a short amount of time.
And actually be happy with the music.
Yeah.
Yeah.
You mentioned earlier that you did 48's.
Do you still do 48's?
(23:15):
We just had someone who won this year's 48-hour film project.
Edwin, right?
Yeah.
Yeah, he was in Margaret too.
I haven't done the 48 in a while.
It's stressful.
It takes a lot.
It's very stressful.
It's a whole weekend of no sleep.
Yeah.
But it is its own kind of film school for sure.
Yeah.
Totally.
(23:36):
Well, it's a whole school of trial and error.
You know, if you failed this year, do it again next year.
You're going to learn from those mistakes.
I know I did that.
I did it twice in a row and I was like, okay, maybe not again.
But now I'm like, wait, maybe I want to get back into it because I know when I can sleep now.
Maybe it's just the sleep.
Maybe I'm just upset about that.
Yeah.
Sleep and the food.
Yeah.
I want to talk to you more about your ADHD as well.
(23:57):
I'm sorry if that was really blunt or straightforward.
No, no you're fine
I'm not realizing,
I was like, that was a weird, weird word that.
But a lot of people in the arts and in the film industry have all sorts of struggles.
ADHD being one and then with a lot.
And what I've heard is that it's what gives them their story to tell.
Oh, yeah.
Do you feel that is the case?
Yeah.
(24:18):
As much as like the father character in the film is sort of a version of me.
So is the daughter.
I was diagnosed with ADHD when I was six and so going through school and being tried out
on all these different medications and just really struggling the entire time.
I mean, I barely graduated high school and I wouldn't want to go through that experience
(24:41):
again.
You know.
If I could avoid it at all cost.
So yeah, I mean, I suppose that part of it came out in her character too is she's struggling
in school and then of course she's going through the separation of her parents and all
of this.
Yeah.
I don't know if that answers your question really.
(25:02):
No, for sure.
For sure.
I'm kind of getting more of a reflection of the daughter character than anyone it seems
like.
Yeah.
Well, and that's the thing.
I don't know how some writers do it where they're able to just compartmentalize all these
different characters and write them as if they're there's separate people.
I mean, I'm aiming for that.
But I can't not bring my own experience to each individual character and even
(25:27):
the structure of the story as a whole is me the fairy tale writer being critiqued
by me the screenwriter.
Like it's writing a fairy tale that fits all the you know, the tropes of a classic
adventure fantasy.
Yeah.
And then every time we cut back to reality, it's the daughter poking holes in that in that
(25:50):
story.
So yeah, it was a way for me to criticize my own writing.
Yeah.
Yeah, it worked really well.
Honestly, honestly.
And then add for comedic chops.
Yeah.
Which in a story like this, it's there's a great message there's a great moral, but if you're
laughing as well, it makes it all the better.
For sure.
I can't agree with that more as a writer myself, finding those nice moments in between the
(26:12):
serious stuff is so important.
And I think once again, it really shined through in the poking of the holes of the story.
Sometimes you just need some character to just be like, Hey, man, this doesn't make sense.
What are you talking about?
Yeah.
Yeah.
I'm terrible writing dialogue.
I can't figure out how people actually speak.
Yeah.
(26:32):
And so that's kind of why I wrote a person telling a story because that's more the kind of.
Your dialogue was pretty natural though.
Thank you.
Thank you.
I have to credit the actors.
They brought it to life.
I mean, it is such a thrill when you actually get other people to read your dialogue.
Oh yeah.
And also quite revealing too because you can immediately see like, Oh, well, that doesn't sound natural.
(26:56):
So let's tweak that.
Did you do a table read at all with all the actors?
Yeah.
I mean, in our rehearsals, we would go through it.
We mostly focus on specific scenes, you know, but yeah.
And then so much of the dad's dialogue was done in ADR after the fact that it was in Fairytale.
Yeah.
So we didn't have to spend time actually recording him on the location telling the whole
(27:17):
fairy tale.
Yeah.
I guess when I think ADR, I just think like, Oh, something messed up on production.
So that makes sense.
I'm remembering all the voice over and all the storytelling elements like in Cart with
Brendan Frazier.
Like it's all just over.
Did you have him record the entire thing that way or was it just kind of the snippets that
you needed it to be?
(27:38):
If it was like leading into the Fairytale, you know, and it starts in reality and we know
we're going to cut now to the prologue with the the army and all of that.
Like we would just record that whole thing on set.
But then if it gets like deep into it and it's narrating the like the scene with the
Margaret and her and her father on the farm, that's such a long stretch of dialogue that
(27:59):
it was just like there was no point to take up time on location recording that.
Yeah.
We're not going to see it.
So I know we're running out of time.
So I got one last question for you and it's, I keep hitting the microphone.
What advice do you have for young filmmakers, new filmmakers, filmmaking students?
I mean, we're at UNLV right now.
Our self-taught filmmakers.
(28:20):
Yeah.
This is very important because it's this is coming out of time when I feel like our
industry is up against a wall.
Well first off, if you're really trying to build a career, don't start by trying to make
a feature.
That was my mistake and I spent over 10 years trying to do that.
(28:43):
Start small, you know, our first music video, like I said, 250 bucks, made it in two weeks,
proved to ourselves we could do something worthwhile in that amount of time for that budget
and it got us the support to make the next thing, which was like a thousand bucks from a
kickstarter and you know, like way more people, which then led to the next thing, which is
(29:03):
Margaret, which is like over 300 cast and crew.
So start small, absolutely, and build support that way.
I would also say in terms of like just the craft, it is important to tell stories that are
personal to you, but you really should be going into whatever project you're doing
with the audience in mind.
(29:24):
As much as I love Art House Cinema, as much as I love like the classic, you know, the
Bergmans and the Tarkovsky's and hell even now we have like people who are blending that
with horror like Ari Aster or you know Jordan Peel is doing these more like kind of metaphorical
horror films.
(29:44):
But I'm like, we can't scoff at the Spielbergs or the George Lucas' either.
We need those kinds of voices just as much as we need our serious experimental filmmakers.
We need filmmakers who are going to speak to everyone and not just, you know, not just
(30:08):
a more niche part of an audience.
We need, yeah, we need filmmakers
who are ready to save Hollywood man.
That's beautiful
Thank you so much Danny for joining us
Thank you Robby and Lex, killing it as always.
Of course we have to thank our partner movie house
The Beverly Theater, we appreciate you
Go check us out on Instagram, TikTok
follow us at the film department
film D E P T pod
And be sure to like, subscribe, and share wherever you listen to your podcasts.
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