October 14, 2025 • 40 mins
Dan Benamor began his film career as an intern, quickly working his way up to head of development at a small production company. That experience gave him a deep understanding of story and the industry, shaping his perspective on what makes a screenplay stand out: confidence, strong character work, and purposeful storytelling. While he has tried directing, Dan discovered that his true passion lies in writing. He believes the hardest part of the process is in the planning and development stage, where theme, character arcs, and structure are carefully mapped out. Once the blueprint is clear, writing becomes the rewarding part — a process he mastered through developing dozens of scripts and watching them come to life on screen.
That skill set came full circle with Initiation, the indie horror-thriller he co-wrote with his cousin Oren, who directed the film. The story follows strangers forced into a deadly cult ritual, blending genre thrills with deeper meaning about inner strength and survival. Despite being a low-budget production, the film secured distribution through Gravitas Ventures and earned strong reviews, showing that ingenuity and disciplined storytelling can overcome resource limitations. Dan’s journey is proof that with persistence, craft, and a confident voice, independent filmmakers can create work that resonates with both audiences and industry professionals.
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/indie-film-hustle-a-filmmaking-podcast--2664729/support.
That skill set came full circle with Initiation, the indie horror-thriller he co-wrote with his cousin Oren, who directed the film. The story follows strangers forced into a deadly cult ritual, blending genre thrills with deeper meaning about inner strength and survival. Despite being a low-budget production, the film secured distribution through Gravitas Ventures and earned strong reviews, showing that ingenuity and disciplined storytelling can overcome resource limitations. Dan’s journey is proof that with persistence, craft, and a confident voice, independent filmmakers can create work that resonates with both audiences and industry professionals.
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/indie-film-hustle-a-filmmaking-podcast--2664729/support.
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Speaker 1 (00:03):
You are listening to the ifh podcast Network. For more
amazing filmmaking and screenwriting podcasts, just go to ifhpodcastnetwork dot com.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Welcome to the INDIEILM Muscle Podcast, Episode number eight twenty three,
Cinema Should make You Forget. You're sitting in a theater,
Roman Polanski.
Speaker 1 (00:22):
Broadcasting from the back alley in Hollywood. It's the Indie
Film Hustle Podcast, where we show you how to survive
and thrive as an indie filmmaker in the jungles of
the film biz.
Speaker 3 (00:32):
And here's your host, Alex Ferrari.
Speaker 2 (00:35):
Welcome, Welcome to another episode of the Indie Film Huscle podcast.
Speaker 3 (00:38):
I am your humble.
Speaker 2 (00:39):
Host Alex Ferrari. Today's show is sponsored by Rise of
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filmbiz book dot com. That's film bizbook dot com. Enjoy
today's episode with guest host Dave Bullis.
Speaker 3 (01:54):
On this week's episode of the podcast My Guests new
film Initiation, which he co wrote. It's being distributed by
Gravitas Ventures. We talked writing, working as a development executive,
and so much more with guest Dan Bennimore. Hey Dan,
thanks love for coming on the show.
Speaker 4 (02:11):
My pleasure.
Speaker 3 (02:13):
You know, so, Dan, just to get started, you know,
since you've listened to the show before, you know what
the first question is going to be and that question
Dan is you know, how did you get your start
in the film industry?
Speaker 4 (02:27):
Well, I mean, you know, for me, I mean, I
guess the real definitive moment was I came out here
to la and I got an internship with a production company,
and then I was doing app about six months, and
I pretty much, you know, I ended up getting hired
as an assistant, and then I got promoted from there
(02:47):
and eventually I became the head of development. So it
was sort of I mean, really, I guess to be
broken down, it would probably be when I just first
got hired from an intern to actually being an assistant
and then it sort of ball from there.
Speaker 3 (03:02):
Now does that still work in a similar way, you know,
because you know, things are always changing and with with
the changing face of the distribution and everything, is it
still that that that way where you think interns are
used as sort of like that farm system where they
can be brought up within an agency.
Speaker 4 (03:19):
My opinion on it, you know, was that because I
was at a small company where basically, you know, the
principles of the company were right there, like you know,
you're dealing with them every day, and it wasn't you know,
I think that sometimes if you go for an internship,
you could get an internship with somewhere really cool, like
you know, like say, for example, I got an internship
(03:42):
with Lion Skate or something. Right, so I'm a really
big company like that, I would just be a guy,
you know, one guy in this massive machine. I think
in a scenario like that, it would be a little
bit harder to have the trajectory that I ended up
having a small company, because in a smaller company, you
go act dirrectly with the it's the bulls. They get
to know you, and you know, it's a more it's
(04:03):
so much more personal relationship, and so it's not I
don't think it says when it's a bigger machine, you know,
I think you might have a tougher time having any
sort of you know, upward mobility like that.
Speaker 3 (04:16):
Now, So when you went in there was that was
that your goal to be to be hired or did
you maybe have another aspiration h to you know, to
or another goal to maybe work for another company, or
or maybe you know, just goal from your own.
Speaker 4 (04:28):
Yeah, I mean I had no particular aspiration. I mean
I showed up here in LA with my buddy from
film school, and we got an apartment in Hollywood, and basically,
you know, for the first week, who went to the beach.
But then after that it was like, all right, what
are we going to do? So I figured it would
be worthwhile to try to learn, just learn as much
as I could. And so I actually had a couple
(04:49):
I think I had like two or three different internships
at the same time. And I just, you know, I
had no real particular goal. I mean, I I've always
my endgame was always to be a writer. But you know,
when I first got to l A, I just figured,
as much as I can learn, it's all positive. So
I just kind of showed up and uh, you know,
and things things took the course they took, yeah, you know.
Speaker 3 (05:11):
And and you know that that's great because you know,
uh because I've had friends who have moved to LA
and uh, you know, the things are the same thing.
They're like they always felt guilty about not being outside
because they're like, look, it's a beautiful day out. The
beach is down the street. What the hell are we
doing inside? You know?
Speaker 4 (05:28):
Yeah, yeah, for sure, man. I mean the longer you're
here too, the less you.
Speaker 3 (05:33):
Go until until like somebody like a relative or something
comes right and then you're like.
Speaker 4 (05:39):
Oh, yeah, yeah, exactly.
Speaker 3 (05:42):
Uh so you know this and since we're talking, you
know about this part of your career, I want to ask,
you know, because some of the people that have been
on I didn't get a chance to ask them this,
but what are some of the skill sets that did
you think that you had at this point that really
helped you stand out and really help them? You know,
your bosses and your managers that they you know, they
they saw you, and they saw your skill set and
(06:04):
they wanted to keep you. So do you do you
know any like any of the skills off hand that
you think that really helped you, you know, get that promotion.
Speaker 4 (06:14):
You know, it was funny because I started as an intern,
and at the end I was in charge of the interns.
So I would, you know, I would kind of manage
the interns. I would, you know, me and other people
at the company, of course, but I think primarily I
was part of my job, so I would kind of see,
you know, you would give some interns, like you give
them a script, and you know, there were times when
(06:36):
I was really busy and I genuinely needed to have
like a really in depth creative discussion about a script
and I didn't have time to read it. I would
give it to an intern to read, and then I'd
get up, you know and say, hey, give you that script,
what do you think? And you really it was very
noticeable and it's actually interesting. So now a couple of
years are pas since I was at that job. The
(06:58):
guys that were my interns that I could tell had
something extra, they've had continued success, Like they've transitioned to
other jobs where they've they you know, some of them
would become produced filmmakers. Some of them work at other
companies now. And you know, you can tell the guys
who basically had confidence, that had an opinion. That's pretty
(07:18):
much what blows down to you know, if if I
got up and I would ask an intern like, hey,
what do you think of that script? And he was
just like yeah, all right, you know, like that, that's
that's not really what you're looking for. You know, you're
looking for somebody who has confident as an opinion and
also is like has a strong opinion. You know, Like
so if I like something and you know, the intern
(07:42):
that I'm checking in with him and he didn't like it,
and I say, well, you know, I thought, you know,
I felt this work and that work, and he kind
of backs off his opinion. I think that is also
another thing that like, your opinion is your opinion, and
it's important, in my opinion, to be strong in your
convictions because once you walk full you kind of lose credibility,
you know. So it's stuff like that, I think. And
(08:05):
then also just the basics, right, like just being responsible,
like you're if you're giving a job to do, do
it to the best of your ability, be on time,
be pleasant to deal with. You know. It's that that
type of stuff is really important too.
Speaker 3 (08:18):
So would you ever sit down with a lot of
these interns and go over things like this is how
you read a screenplay and these are the things to
look for, you know? Would you do stuff like that?
Speaker 4 (08:28):
Yeah, well, I mean when you would first bring them in,
we'd usually try to get a coverage sample to show
that they knew how to read a script basically, and
you know, I mean we we had our own template
and stuff like that, but that you know, typically if
somebody's coming in to be an intern at a production company,
we want them to have some reading experience because we
(08:50):
don't want them starting from absolute scratch. I mean, then
they have no real place to have a strong care
of opinion. So usually we try to find somebody who
had some sort of background in reading script maybe they
you know, whatever that might be, and uh and hopefully
you know, start from there.
Speaker 3 (09:07):
So was there ever a you know, a time when
when you you know, you read a screenplay and maybe
you loved it and you wanted to get a feel
for all these interns, and maybe you gave it to
them and there was a point where they said, hey,
you know, hey, boss, uh we we ruined it like this,
and then and then maybe you said like, hey, yeah,
I loved it actually, and and was therever? Was there
ever a time like that?
Speaker 4 (09:28):
Sure? Yeah, I mean always, I mean that's but that's why. Yeah,
that's what you need, uh, you know, readers for basically
to kind of check you so you can get a sense,
especially if it's something a little bit out there where
you're like, you know, I think this is great, but
it's pretty pretty weird. You know. You need a lot
of times you need that extra voice to kind of
you know, get a sense of how it's playing. So
(09:50):
often in the situations like that, I would actually have more
than one person read it, I'd have like five people
read it, and then I'd be able to look at
sort of the general response and and you know compare
and see what was consist in and stuff like that.
Speaker 2 (10:03):
We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor
and now back to the show.
Speaker 3 (10:11):
Yeah, and that's two Verger takeaways too, is uh, you know,
one have confidence and two have an opinion. You know,
that's very important to mention Dan because I you know,
just through everyone listening, I you know, I think that's
very important too in the general in the film industry
is that you have to have, you know, confidence and
you have to have that opinion, which you know, if
you're as a director, you need that. As a writer
(10:32):
as you know, you need that point of view from
where to tell your story.
Speaker 4 (10:36):
Yeah, that's and that's you know, it's it's a funny
thing because it comes back on you in so many
different ways because if you project confidence and it's leaven
on the page. You know, if you project confidence on
the page and you project confidence when you then later
go into a development beating or whatever, you can kind
of slay people. Like people want to buy into that confidence,
(10:58):
Like you know, somebody's sitting to read a script, if
that first couple of pages is written with a really
strong authorial voice, they'll kind of come with you, you know.
And if you, as the writer have a really strong
take on a story and feel really strongly about it
and can back it up on all that stuff, people
you know, kind of want to take that journey with
you and they want to trust your credibility as a writer.
So it's so important. Well, I think once you it's
(11:22):
not to say that like, oh, you know, don't be
be inflexible, it's not about that, But it's just you
got to be confident in what you're doing because if
you're not, and there's no ways no one ever else
will ever be confident in you. You have to be
confident in yourself number one, and then other people can
basically trust you. And you know, in our business it's
so tough already that if you don't project that confidence,
(11:44):
I think it makes it way tougher.
Speaker 3 (11:48):
So what are some of the things that you notice,
Like when we were talking about confidence on the page,
you know, what are some of the things that usually
jump out at you and you can usually say like, hey,
you know that writer, he believes he or she believes
in her own not her writing.
Speaker 4 (12:02):
Yeah, absolutely, I mean it's I think it's a lot
of different things. I think I think one thing for
sure would be starting out with a storytelling sort of
approach where you're not you're not waiting for us, like
you're the story's going and we're either coming with you
(12:22):
or we're not, but you're not going to hang around
and hold our hand, you know. I think that that
is something you'll definitely see in professional scripts, and it's
a very noticeable difference from when you're reading a script
maybe by a more beginning writer. You can tell the
level of confidence in terms of a shorthand of communicating information,
(12:46):
you know, where it's using it's it's asking a lot
of us as the audience that hey, you you got
to keep up with me kind of thing. And I
think that you when you when you read something like that,
it actually sort of galvanizes you as the reader because
you are suddenly empowered to like figure out what's going on,
and it just makes it a more dynamic experience. The
(13:09):
worst thing you can do is, you know, have something
where it's just spelling it out to you. You know,
in every way, whether that dialogue or just the slowness
of the presentation of information or presenting old ideas as
if they are new ideas, you know, and there's there's
you know, the audience now is so savage that it's
(13:29):
really you know, there's a lot that can be done
in shorthand, and if you're not using that shorthand, I
think that's where you can kind of get into a
scenario where it doesn't come across to the same level
of confidence on the page.
Speaker 3 (13:43):
Yeah, I'd agree to the audience is very savvy now.
I mean, you know, sometimes I'm watching movies and I see,
you know, cliches, and I'm always thinking to myself, you know,
if they I wonder if the writer, director, whoever it was.
I'm We're always wondering, you know, why didn't they try
something else? You know what I mean, because you know,
you know, now, Dan, what I do is the movies.
(14:03):
I'm always dissecting them in my head, not even just
you know, like a piece of paper, but in my head,
I'm always thinking to myself, you know, is this a setup?
Is this is you know, what would the payoff be?
You know, you know, I wonder what the incding incident's
going to be and when it finally comes there, you
know you know what I mean. I mean, do you
do the same thing do you said? You know when
you watch movies now, are you just dissecting them and
sort of ms trying to get ahead of the story
(14:25):
to see if you could, you know, predict what the
writer was thinking.
Speaker 4 (14:28):
Yeah, I mean I'm pretty much ruined as an audience
member at this point. I mean, I remember, I remember
I used to when I was when I was in college.
I would go my buddy and we would sneak, you know,
we would both see one movie and then sneak around
the theater and we would do that for like twelve hours,
and we would see every movie that was in the theater.
And I can actually should and watched literally I watched
(14:48):
literally anything. But now you know, I'm such a that's
an awful audience member. I'll find something, you know, like
you'll quick something new on Netflix two minutes if there's
stuff in there. I just I'm watching it and I'm
just like, ah, man, you know, I'll turn off, Like
I'm I've become such a terrifable audience member exactly because
of what you're talking about, Because we were in it
(15:10):
so much that it's like you stop consuming it kind
of as like a regular consumer, you become a lot
more sort of I guess hypocritical when you're when you're
watching stuff because they're always thinking about the design of
it and things like that.
Speaker 3 (15:28):
Yeah, I know what you mean, because sometimes you know,
I watch movies, right, even if you're a trailer now,
and I'll say, let me guess what happens in this movie,
And sometimes, you know, I'll stay it out in front
of my friends and like, how the hell do you
would you get that from seeing this? And I'm just like,
because I just you know what I mean, You see
that stuff, you see those points, you know what I mean?
Like there was you know, okay, well this is obviously
(15:50):
last part of the movie. I know this sounds a
little bit redundant, but the first time I ever had
not the first time, but the most time that sticks
out in my mind was when Paul Blart Molcop came
out and I saw the trailer and a friend of
mine went to always screening of it and I told
him exactly what I think happens in the beat base
based on the trailer, and he goes, wow, you're really
good at this and I know I now granted obviously
(16:12):
we don't go see Paul bart Molkoff for the writing,
but but you know that's I was just bringing that
up as a point of reference.
Speaker 4 (16:19):
Yeah, I mean, in general, you know, that goes back
to the authorial conpetence thing, right. It's like, but soon
when you're starting the story, the audience is ahead of
you in the same way of what you're talking about.
Like if you set it up and they're they are
going to be predicting a certain storyline. So you the creator,
you got to kind of know that, and you're sort
(16:39):
of knowing that you have to give them something that's
at least a little bit different, because otherwise it's going
to be exactly like what you're talking about. If the
if the audience is able to predict it like beat
by beat, then you're screwed. I mean, that's really you know,
that's a really tough it's a tough place to get
away from if you're in that scenario. So you got
(16:59):
to or some sort of wrinkle that makes it a
little bit different.
Speaker 3 (17:04):
Yeah, very true. And you know, I actually, you know,
just as we talk about all this writing and everything else,
I want to you know, get get into your writing.
You know, so did you always you know, have the
inclamation that you wanted to be a writer director?
Speaker 4 (17:18):
Well, no, so I have. I've directed one movie and
some shorts and then you know, for me, the experience
of directing my movie, which is called Betrayed, pretty much
told me that I would prefer to just be the writer,
which you know, I enjoyed it, but it's just so
all consuming. So I give a lot of credit to
(17:38):
my cousin in Orange, who directed our movie Initiation. It's
it's really an immersive thing that she kind of just
you give up. You got to put a lot of
yourself into it. So for me, I prefer being the writer.
I mean, the experience that we had making this film,
it's kind of like exactly what I love about being
(17:58):
a writer is that I was able to come in
and contribute to the story and then they went off
and made the movie and I watched the movie. I
mean that's you know, that's like, so that's when it's
cool being a writer, because it's literally like you wrote
something on a piece of paper and then you get
to see that it exists, and you know, it's pretty
pretty neat.
Speaker 3 (18:18):
Yeah, very true, you know, because I you know, I
looked at your I MDB. I did see you have
the short then you you did direct Portrade, and you
know I wanted to, you know, just ask you know,
what was the biggest difference that you found when you
when you had to direct. I mean, was there any like,
you know, challenges that you weren't anticipating or you know,
did you just say, you know what, I prefer to
(18:38):
be a writer.
Speaker 4 (18:40):
I mean, I think that when you're gonna direct, I
mean I very much. I love working with actors. I
think working with actors is so fun. And you know,
if I ever end up directing again, it will be
because of that. The part that I felt, you know,
and you kind of have to be all in or
not in at all. For me, that was the visual authentic.
I had a really great uh cinematographer on my film Betrayed,
(19:04):
and you know, he was really good about like basically
checking me and being like, hey, that's not gonna look good.
Let's do it like this. You know, when you're when
you're promarlier writer, you don't necessarily think in that visual
in the way that a director can become on the
same tools. You know, if you're if you're someone who's
confident directing stuff and your aspiration is absolutely to direct,
(19:27):
then you're going to be doing the same study that
you and I do for writing, right where we we
know it so in and out and we know all
the tools and tricks and things like that. I think
that you know, uh and obviously you want you lean
on your cinematographer as a director, of course, But I
just felt like for me, I enjoy sort of trying
(19:48):
to master this one facet of it as opposed to
like trying to I felt like it would be kind
of a jack of all trade situation if I tried
to directing thing as much as I like it.
Speaker 2 (20:01):
We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor,
and now back to the show.
Speaker 4 (20:10):
I don't I don't have the same you know, energy
with it as I do with the writing.
Speaker 3 (20:16):
Yeah, I you know when I I haven't directed anything
for like five years, but you know, I find that
it's not because I don't want to. It's just because
I've learned Dan that the writing has to be not
good but great, you know what I mean. You're going
to do any projects, I've learned that it has to
be you have to like you, yourself, whoever, you know,
(20:38):
for everyone listening to this. If you're writing something, you
and yourself have to get so excited about it. You're like,
how the hell is this not a movie made already?
Even look, you know what I mean, And you have
to be so And that's something that I've learned. So
what I've I've been doing is I took one step
forward to take two. I'm sorry, I took one step
back to take two steps forward. And basically what I
mean by that is I just wanted to make sure
(20:59):
that I got better at things. And during this whole
five year period, I I've actually produced stuff, I've actually
had a graphic novel get made, uh, you know, stuff
like that. And but but it's really, you know, comes
back to you know, making sure that writing is phenomenal.
And you know, when you when you talk about writing,
you know, I can you know, I can hear you
(21:20):
get excited about it in your voice, and that's good
exactly you need that, right, So I wanted to ask,
you know, Dan, when whenever you're writing, you know what
I mean, like, is there any things that you keep
in mind to you know, make sure that you're always
sort of going forward, if you know what I mean.
Speaker 4 (21:36):
Yeah, there's a million things. I mean, that's the part
that kind of it kind of sucks about the more
you learn about it, right because I mean when when
when I started, you know, you would it was a
little bit more free because you were just like, yeah, man,
you know, it's once you learn so much about it,
then there's so many different things that you got to
be thinking about, and so it actually makes you know,
(21:59):
once you actually get on the page, I'm good. But
the planning, the planning stage, you know, there's a lot
that you have to be thinking about, and it helps
to just do it a million times. You know. I'm
very grateful for the time that I was a development
executive because I basically you know, develop I mean dozens
of scripts and we made a bunch of those movies too,
(22:22):
so I really got to see the whole process many times.
And so that that helps because you sort of get
almost like a muscle memory for it. But yeah, you've
got so much stuff you have to think about. You
got you know, theme and character and dialogue and arc
and structure and mood, and it's uh, yeah, there's a
lot to kind of manage, you.
Speaker 3 (22:45):
Know, one thing I've learned, and you know, like you said,
you know, the more you learn, the more uh you know,
the more the more you do, the more you learn,
the more you learn, you know, you realize how complex
this gets. And you know, I've read every screen running
book on the market. I literally, you know, you can't
see it because it's the podcast, but i have every
screen writing book out there, and I've read it from
cover to cover. You know, I've done what everybody else does.
(23:08):
You start with screenplay by Sidfield, and you work up
to Save the Cat. Then you get a story by
m Key, you know, any sort of and then you
sort of branch off from there after read those three
works because you know, everyone sort of talks about it.
But one thing I've learned over the years is that
everything comes back to character, you know what I mean,
Like everything, you know, when we talk about scenes, when
(23:29):
we talk about favorite parts of a movie, when we
talk about this or that, it always stems from a character.
Speaker 4 (23:36):
I mean, it's very true. Yeah, I mean I would
always say when we would you know, when I was
a dumb executive and we try to put a movie together,
it was pretty in every movie that we made that
actually ended up getting made. There was always a moment
where we would attack somebody that was meaningful, whether that
was an actor or director or whatever, and that person
(23:57):
when they would come in, it wasn't like they said,
you know why I'm doing this movie because I love
the you know the midpoint, Like, no nobody ever said that.
It's it was always about whatever the emotion was of
it or whatever the character thing was that we were doing.
That was what they would key in on and say, Man,
you know, really that meant something to me. And I
(24:19):
got company out of that. So yeah, nobody, it's it's
all you know, the plot is informed by the character,
and then they have to they have to not only
coke this, but actually sort of be intrinsic to each other,
like the the best movies or movies where the plot
has to happen because of the character. Like those two
they can't exist outside of each other.
Speaker 3 (24:41):
Yeah, you know, it's very true. And I think the
mistake a lot of writers make, and and I've made
this mistake, you know, more times than I can count, is,
you know, developing a plot and trying to plunk characters
insaid plot if you know what I mean.
Speaker 4 (24:54):
Yeah, and I.
Speaker 3 (24:55):
Think when when you yeah, when you try to reverse that,
when you try to reverse engineer or something like that.
I I think that's where you sort of get stuck.
Speaker 1 (25:02):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (25:05):
So you know, when you know your new movie Initiation, Uh,
it's it's being you know, distributed by Gravitas Ventures. Congratulations,
by the way, that's freaking huge.
Speaker 4 (25:14):
Yeah. No, we're we're we're very excited, you know, and
we're very proud of the film. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (25:20):
I mean that that is you know, absolutely phenomenal. And
I wanted to ask, you know, where, so where did
your idea come from for the film? You know, did
was this an idea that came to you or was
this just something that you know that that you have
been sort of working on for years?
Speaker 4 (25:35):
So this this is actually something that you know, my
cousin or and he had the initial idea, He had
a script, and he basically, you know, we being thousands
we both live in LA I would always come hang
with him, and you know, he mentioned that he was
working on this, and at one point he, you know,
he and I talked about working on it together and
so basically I came in and I co wrote it.
(25:57):
I I you know, we we ended up writing revising
that script and and working on it together through to
the end, and he directed the film and edited it
and produced it. And so I this was a situation
where basically I came in where there was already a
product that existed, and I just gave my sort of
(26:18):
careerive energy to it. And I think that we both
kind of complimented each other in that process, and you know,
that was that was the process played out on this one.
Speaker 3 (26:28):
So for those for those listening who aren't familiar with
the film, could you give us a brief explanation about
about the film?
Speaker 4 (26:34):
Dan, Yeah, So it's basically a group of strangers are
kidnapped and they're taken to this kind of a serious
house and they basically come to realize that they've been
kidnapped to take place in an initiation ritual for a cult,
and to be initiated into this cult, you have to
fight somebody to the death. And so these people that
(26:56):
are complete strangers to each other, they're just random people
and they thrown into this insane situation and they have
to try to figure out a way to survive, and
that's what the movie is about.
Speaker 3 (27:07):
Very cool and it's actually cool that it's coming out
right around this time, you know, this fall Halloween time.
You know what I mean. It sounds like the movie
that's ripped out alley Way.
Speaker 4 (27:16):
Yeah, I mean, you know, it's it's well, it's what's
been cool about it is that it sort of it
towes the line between action and horror. So you know,
we've been we've been really happy to see that a
lot of horror websites have reviewed the film and given
us nice notices because I think that it it's something
that's a fun movie for people that like horror movies,
but it's also a fun movie for you know, an
(27:37):
action fan thriller type of thing.
Speaker 3 (27:41):
Yeah, that is very cool. And you know because I
mean whenever you can see the horror you know, horror sites,
whenever they can get excited about something, you know, it's
always awesome because, like we were talking about, with all
the films you know that we've seen and you know,
being able to sort of you know, spot the story,
you know, they seem ton of horror films. So you know,
when you get them on board of something, you know
(28:03):
what I mean, it's like, okay, great, now you got something,
you know, because if if they like it, I mean, what,
what's the general public going to think? You know what
I mean?
Speaker 4 (28:10):
Right? Yeah, No, And we've been I mean we've you know,
we have shown the film to a lot of people
at this point, and you know, enough people where it's
a funny thing your relationship with your own work, right,
I mean, anytime you show something to somebody that knows you,
you're kind of like, well, you know, they might they
might just tell me to be nice. So they thought, like,
but we we've shown it to so many people, and
(28:32):
then obviously I think we have you know, on IMDb
there's some some reviews linked and uh and you know,
Bloody Discussing gave us a met review. And we know
these are people that have no reason to tell out
one way or the other. Right, So when when somebody
that has no relationship to you tells you they got
something out of your work, then that that's uh, that's
(28:52):
that's big because then you figure, okay, well maybe you know,
maybe it does work, you know, And and this is
a sort of more objective for that.
Speaker 3 (29:01):
Yeah, exactly. And you know I see that on the
i n dB page. It's up on Amazon Video right now.
Is there is there any other places that that people
could find the movie.
Speaker 4 (29:13):
Yeah, it's all over. It's on It's on iTunes, on Amazon,
it's on PlayStation, it's on It's on a lot of
cable on demand providers. I was in I was home
in Baltimore, and I I saw it on my parents,
you know, cable at their house. It's on Blue Doo,
It's it's on the majority of video on demand providers.
Speaker 3 (29:36):
And I will link to that everyone in the show notes.
I will make sure to link to all those places
that you can check out. H the initiation. Uh, you know,
I wanted to ask, you know, also about the initiation.
You know, Dan, what's what's one thing you want to
be able to take away from the film? I mean,
did you I mean, you know, did you want to
have people leave going you know, damn that was intense
or was there any other sort of theme that you
(29:58):
wanted people to walk away from that walk with but
from We'll be.
Speaker 2 (30:02):
Right back after a word from our sponsor, and now
back to the show.
Speaker 4 (30:11):
A friend of mine just watched it, and that was
pretty much what he emailed me. He said, that was
intent the the you know what was cool about it
for me was that I think we should feed it
something that I'm always trying to do, which is ached
with the genre movie and basically invest it with a
real meaning, meaning that it's not just kind of an
(30:32):
empty genre exercise that's actually it has a has a
message and a point to it that is emotional, that
is you know, I mean, this really is basically about
the idea that no matter what situation you're kind of
put into, if you have this sort of inner strength
to defeed it, then no one there's nothing anyone can
do to you. And you know, we sort of explore
(30:54):
that in a lot of different ways in the film,
but it was something that you know, meant something to me,
and I think it gives the film a weight that
you know, if we sort of just relied on all
the genre stuff, it wouldn't have that same weight to it.
So that that was the thing to me that I
was most satisfied with.
Speaker 3 (31:12):
You know, just as a side note, you know, a
screenwriting professor once told me a great piece of screamwriting advice,
and that was when you're sitting down to you know,
brainstorm a concept or whatever for for your movie, he said,
this is a question you asked yourself, what do you
want audiences to leave. What do you want audiences when
(31:32):
they leave to take away from this movie? Do you
want them to say, oh my god, that was hilarious.
We know, And He's like that helps guide you throughout
the process when you're making the movie.
Speaker 4 (31:42):
Yeah, for sure. I mean, you know, you gotta you
gotta do it for a reason. And there's just too much.
There's too much stuff out there, all this It tasts
too long, it's too much of a pain in the
ass if you're not doing it out of some strong
impulse of And it doesn't necessarily always have to be heavy,
you know. I Mean we're like right now, how we
h My cousin and I are talking about doing another
(32:02):
film together, and and we're we're talking about doing one
that's a little bit more sort of light at least
in the tone. Uh, and uh, you know that that
can be fine too, But it's just whatever that impulse
is that you have that makes it interesting and exciting
for you. You know, you got to really feel strongly
about that and kind of and and key on that
(32:23):
throughout the whole thing, you know, because that's what you
want the person who watches it to have that thing feeling.
Speaker 3 (32:29):
Yeah, And that's exactly right. And uh, you know, I
I think, you know, when we can finally convey that,
you know what I mean, Like I think, uh, you know,
like for instance, Quentin Tarantino, whenever he writes, I'm thinking,
that's the same thing that people pull away from, is
the same mood he's in, you know what I mean,
particularly like, heyful late, I have a I have a
you know that's sort of like a It was the same,
but it was different for him. And I sort of
(32:51):
think that, you know, you could sort of pull away
what he's what, you know, what he puts into the script,
if you know what I mean. And and you know,
I want to ask you Dan, as we know we
were talking about your your future projects. I wanted just
to ask, you know, what does a typical writing day
for you look like?
Speaker 4 (33:09):
Man, it's just if I can just get some time.
It's really time is the most important thing. I mean,
I I'm not for me. It's not like I'll write anywhere.
I'll write at any time. I don't need to like,
you know, consult the mus or anything like. I can
just down and bang some stuff out. But I think
that I have a tough time. I'm sort of an
(33:32):
impatient person, which I think is probably a pretty important
part of any figure out that I have had or
will have is done. You know, I'm just I'm not
patient to like just let things comb as they may.
Like I want to get stuff done, and you know,
kind of that's always my ethos. So when I the
(33:52):
planning part of it, that's the part that takes forever.
Like I'll do research, you know, on initiation. I did
research into military stuff on other projects I've written, you know,
I'll read like three books about it. But once it's
time to write and I actually have figured out the story,
I'm so I have such a burning desire to just
get it out of me and get it onto the page.
(34:13):
It's almost to the point where like I feel like
I'm gonna lose it if I don't that it comes
very fast, you know, and I almost I almost will
consciously try to set aside, you know, just a couple
of days or whatever where I know it's going to
just be kind of flowing out of me and h
and just be able to kind of bang pages out,
because you know, that's I don't I don't, Yeah, I mean,
(34:33):
it's just a difference in process, right, For me, the
real cracking of the story comes in the planning. The
actual writing is just putting the planning on a piece
of paper. So the writing itself is the fun part.
The hard part of the is coming up with the
actual story.
Speaker 3 (34:49):
Yes, I could not agree more. That's something that I
found too, is that you know, uh, because once once
I have an outline or a treatment or anything, you
know what I mean, like any even if it's a
piece of paper work some ideas, you know, scribble down
on it that looks like the journal from seven. Uh,
you know, just something. I know where I'm going, you
know what I mean? And you know, the biggest part
(35:11):
that was always you know where the plot is going.
But then I've realized it always comes back to where
the characters start, you know what I mean. So you
know when the when the when the script starts is
where the movie starts. So then where do we find
our characters when the script starts, you know, you know
what I mean? Or do they have something? Do they
not have something? You know, what's their desire? Uh, you know,
what's what's their intention? What's their obstacle?
Speaker 2 (35:32):
Yeah?
Speaker 4 (35:34):
Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 3 (35:37):
So Dan, I mean, like how on average, how off
I mean, how many hours a day do you write?
I mean, is it like sometimes like a thirty minutes,
then sometimes maybe it's like two hours.
Speaker 4 (35:46):
I think that on a day when I actually can
really you know why, I have nothing going, I can
really just sit and focus on writing, well, usually I
think after like three or four hours, you got to
stop and I've done it. I've had times where I'll
fit and I'll write for like you know, I'll write
the whole day. But I think, as a general rule,
(36:08):
unless it's something where I've gone insane and I have
to you know, I think that three or four hours
of a focused writing, after that it has to become
diminishing returns. Just your brain kind of. It takes a
certain sort of brain muscle I think to come up
with this stuff, and after a while you start like
you don't have that theme because you know, I mean,
(36:29):
it's sort of what we were talking about before, Like
each scene that you write, you really got to sit
and think about it and think about like, Okay, you know,
here's the regular version of this scene. Why is this
scene going to be somewhat cooler than the regular version?
Like how can I make it different? How can I
make a different not just in what happens, but in
how the characters interact with each other with the visual
(36:51):
thing that I'm doing in this scene or the reversal
in this scene. So it's so much like mental effort
to go into it that I think after three or
four hours, I got to stop. So for me, a
good three or four hours of writing and then maybe
some research you know in the afternoon, or a lot
of prep for the next day, you know, like okay
and tomorrow. I know, I got to write these themes
just kind of what I'm thinking, and I at least
(37:11):
have a little bit of a roadmap of the actual
precise execution, and then you can kind of flow into
the next day.
Speaker 3 (37:19):
Yeah, that's kind of like which I think Stephen King
maybe said that. He said basically, he he ends on
a high note that way, and the next day he
comes in, he knows exactly where he's gonna go, and
he keeps that flow going on every day.
Speaker 4 (37:31):
Yeah. I tend to do that as well.
Speaker 3 (37:36):
Great mind stick alike, you know, and that and that's
great advice, by the way. So you know, Dan, in closing,
you know, is there maybe anything that we can talk
about that you wanted to or any sort of parting
thoughts you want to want to add to this conversation.
Speaker 4 (37:51):
No, I mean, you know, I think the thing that's
cool to me about this project specifically, and I think
is relevant to what we're talking about and probably to
a lot of people listening to your podcast to you know,
this is something that any of us could do. You
could you you could have made this movie. You know,
anybody listening to this could have made this movie. It's
a movie that we made for a low budget. But
(38:11):
you know, one of the reasons that it's been so
cool getting some nice reviews from some cartscle is that
they basically said, yeah, it's a low budget movie, but
the sort of ingenuity and the effort that went into
it and that that made it it didn't. It doesn't
feel low budget, you know, like it's not. It's the
point being that there's nothing to stop at any of us.
(38:31):
I'm just going to make in a movie, and not
just a movie that we sort of is enablegating for
our own edification, but a movie that anybody can sit
down and watch and enjoy at a real movie. You know,
even if you have to do it for a low budget,
you know, and I think that this is sort of
to me a good case study of that that we
actually went made this movie, got it distributed by a
(38:54):
very legitimate distributor. It's out everywhere, you know, and you know,
we we've on a lot of nice responses to the movie,
so we do think that the movie works. And you know,
we we just look forward to hopefully having people to discovered,
you know, and and maybe we can go make another one, you.
Speaker 3 (39:11):
Know, and that's that's phenomenal. And you know, honestly, Dan,
I'm gonna make sure check out the Initiation. I will everyone.
I will link that in the show notes. Dan, where
can you find you out online?
Speaker 4 (39:24):
I mean, you know, just just stuck with the movie.
I'm not I'm like the worst person ever for all this.
I don't have a Twitter or something. I'm not a
social media dude. But the Initiation movie we have a
website with Facebook page, and obviously it's on iTunes, it's
on Amazon, it's all these other platforms.
Speaker 3 (39:43):
Dan, I want to say thank you very much.
Speaker 4 (39:45):
For coming on my pleasure, a good conversation, Oh my pleasure, sir,
Take care, take care any way.
Speaker 2 (39:53):
I want to thank Dave so much for doing such
a great job on this episode. If you want to
get links to anything we spoke about in this episode,
head over to the show notes at Indie film huscle
dot com Forward slash eight twenty three, and if you
have it already, please head over to filmmaking podcast dot com,
subscribe and leave a good review for the show. It
really helps us out a lot, guys.
Speaker 3 (40:13):
Thank you again so much for listening to guys.
Speaker 2 (40:14):
As always, keep that hustle going, keep that dream alive,
stay safe out there, and I'll talk to you soon.
Speaker 1 (40:21):
Thanks for listening to the Indie Film Hustle podcast at
Indie film Hustle dot com. That's I N D I
E F I L M h U S T l
E dot com.
You are listening to the ifh podcast Network. For more
amazing filmmaking and screenwriting podcasts, just go to ifhpodcastnetwork dot com.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Welcome to the INDIEILM Muscle Podcast, Episode number eight twenty three,
Cinema Should make You Forget. You're sitting in a theater,
Roman Polanski.
Speaker 1 (00:22):
Broadcasting from the back alley in Hollywood. It's the Indie
Film Hustle Podcast, where we show you how to survive
and thrive as an indie filmmaker in the jungles of
the film biz.
Speaker 3 (00:32):
And here's your host, Alex Ferrari.
Speaker 2 (00:35):
Welcome, Welcome to another episode of the Indie Film Huscle podcast.
Speaker 3 (00:38):
I am your humble.
Speaker 2 (00:39):
Host Alex Ferrari. Today's show is sponsored by Rise of
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today's episode with guest host Dave Bullis.
Speaker 3 (01:54):
On this week's episode of the podcast My Guests new
film Initiation, which he co wrote. It's being distributed by
Gravitas Ventures. We talked writing, working as a development executive,
and so much more with guest Dan Bennimore. Hey Dan,
thanks love for coming on the show.
Speaker 4 (02:11):
My pleasure.
Speaker 3 (02:13):
You know, so, Dan, just to get started, you know,
since you've listened to the show before, you know what
the first question is going to be and that question
Dan is you know, how did you get your start
in the film industry?
Speaker 4 (02:27):
Well, I mean, you know, for me, I mean, I
guess the real definitive moment was I came out here
to la and I got an internship with a production company,
and then I was doing app about six months, and
I pretty much, you know, I ended up getting hired
as an assistant, and then I got promoted from there
(02:47):
and eventually I became the head of development. So it
was sort of I mean, really, I guess to be
broken down, it would probably be when I just first
got hired from an intern to actually being an assistant
and then it sort of ball from there.
Speaker 3 (03:02):
Now does that still work in a similar way, you know,
because you know, things are always changing and with with
the changing face of the distribution and everything, is it
still that that that way where you think interns are
used as sort of like that farm system where they
can be brought up within an agency.
Speaker 4 (03:19):
My opinion on it, you know, was that because I
was at a small company where basically, you know, the
principles of the company were right there, like you know,
you're dealing with them every day, and it wasn't you know,
I think that sometimes if you go for an internship,
you could get an internship with somewhere really cool, like
you know, like say, for example, I got an internship
(03:42):
with Lion Skate or something. Right, so I'm a really
big company like that, I would just be a guy,
you know, one guy in this massive machine. I think
in a scenario like that, it would be a little
bit harder to have the trajectory that I ended up
having a small company, because in a smaller company, you
go act dirrectly with the it's the bulls. They get
to know you, and you know, it's a more it's
(04:03):
so much more personal relationship, and so it's not I
don't think it says when it's a bigger machine, you know,
I think you might have a tougher time having any
sort of you know, upward mobility like that.
Speaker 3 (04:16):
Now, So when you went in there was that was
that your goal to be to be hired or did
you maybe have another aspiration h to you know, to
or another goal to maybe work for another company, or
or maybe you know, just goal from your own.
Speaker 4 (04:28):
Yeah, I mean I had no particular aspiration. I mean
I showed up here in LA with my buddy from
film school, and we got an apartment in Hollywood, and basically,
you know, for the first week, who went to the beach.
But then after that it was like, all right, what
are we going to do? So I figured it would
be worthwhile to try to learn, just learn as much
as I could. And so I actually had a couple
(04:49):
I think I had like two or three different internships
at the same time. And I just, you know, I
had no real particular goal. I mean, I I've always
my endgame was always to be a writer. But you know,
when I first got to l A, I just figured,
as much as I can learn, it's all positive. So
I just kind of showed up and uh, you know,
and things things took the course they took, yeah, you know.
Speaker 3 (05:11):
And and you know that that's great because you know,
uh because I've had friends who have moved to LA
and uh, you know, the things are the same thing.
They're like they always felt guilty about not being outside
because they're like, look, it's a beautiful day out. The
beach is down the street. What the hell are we
doing inside? You know?
Speaker 4 (05:28):
Yeah, yeah, for sure, man. I mean the longer you're
here too, the less you.
Speaker 3 (05:33):
Go until until like somebody like a relative or something
comes right and then you're like.
Speaker 4 (05:39):
Oh, yeah, yeah, exactly.
Speaker 3 (05:42):
Uh so you know this and since we're talking, you
know about this part of your career, I want to ask,
you know, because some of the people that have been
on I didn't get a chance to ask them this,
but what are some of the skill sets that did
you think that you had at this point that really
helped you stand out and really help them? You know,
your bosses and your managers that they you know, they
they saw you, and they saw your skill set and
(06:04):
they wanted to keep you. So do you do you
know any like any of the skills off hand that
you think that really helped you, you know, get that promotion.
Speaker 4 (06:14):
You know, it was funny because I started as an intern,
and at the end I was in charge of the interns.
So I would, you know, I would kind of manage
the interns. I would, you know, me and other people
at the company, of course, but I think primarily I
was part of my job, so I would kind of see,
you know, you would give some interns, like you give
them a script, and you know, there were times when
(06:36):
I was really busy and I genuinely needed to have
like a really in depth creative discussion about a script
and I didn't have time to read it. I would
give it to an intern to read, and then I'd
get up, you know and say, hey, give you that script,
what do you think? And you really it was very
noticeable and it's actually interesting. So now a couple of
years are pas since I was at that job. The
(06:58):
guys that were my interns that I could tell had
something extra, they've had continued success, Like they've transitioned to
other jobs where they've they you know, some of them
would become produced filmmakers. Some of them work at other
companies now. And you know, you can tell the guys
who basically had confidence, that had an opinion. That's pretty
(07:18):
much what blows down to you know, if if I
got up and I would ask an intern like, hey,
what do you think of that script? And he was
just like yeah, all right, you know, like that, that's
that's not really what you're looking for. You know, you're
looking for somebody who has confident as an opinion and
also is like has a strong opinion. You know, Like
so if I like something and you know, the intern
(07:42):
that I'm checking in with him and he didn't like it,
and I say, well, you know, I thought, you know,
I felt this work and that work, and he kind
of backs off his opinion. I think that is also
another thing that like, your opinion is your opinion, and
it's important, in my opinion, to be strong in your
convictions because once you walk full you kind of lose credibility,
you know. So it's stuff like that, I think. And
(08:05):
then also just the basics, right, like just being responsible,
like you're if you're giving a job to do, do
it to the best of your ability, be on time,
be pleasant to deal with. You know. It's that that
type of stuff is really important too.
Speaker 3 (08:18):
So would you ever sit down with a lot of
these interns and go over things like this is how
you read a screenplay and these are the things to
look for, you know? Would you do stuff like that?
Speaker 4 (08:28):
Yeah, well, I mean when you would first bring them in,
we'd usually try to get a coverage sample to show
that they knew how to read a script basically, and
you know, I mean we we had our own template
and stuff like that, but that you know, typically if
somebody's coming in to be an intern at a production company,
we want them to have some reading experience because we
(08:50):
don't want them starting from absolute scratch. I mean, then
they have no real place to have a strong care
of opinion. So usually we try to find somebody who
had some sort of background in reading script maybe they
you know, whatever that might be, and uh and hopefully
you know, start from there.
Speaker 3 (09:07):
So was there ever a you know, a time when
when you you know, you read a screenplay and maybe
you loved it and you wanted to get a feel
for all these interns, and maybe you gave it to
them and there was a point where they said, hey,
you know, hey, boss, uh we we ruined it like this,
and then and then maybe you said like, hey, yeah,
I loved it actually, and and was therever? Was there
ever a time like that?
Speaker 4 (09:28):
Sure? Yeah, I mean always, I mean that's but that's why. Yeah,
that's what you need, uh, you know, readers for basically
to kind of check you so you can get a sense,
especially if it's something a little bit out there where
you're like, you know, I think this is great, but
it's pretty pretty weird. You know. You need a lot
of times you need that extra voice to kind of
you know, get a sense of how it's playing. So
(09:50):
often in the situations like that, I would actually have more
than one person read it, I'd have like five people
read it, and then I'd be able to look at
sort of the general response and and you know compare
and see what was consist in and stuff like that.
Speaker 2 (10:03):
We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor
and now back to the show.
Speaker 3 (10:11):
Yeah, and that's two Verger takeaways too, is uh, you know,
one have confidence and two have an opinion. You know,
that's very important to mention Dan because I you know,
just through everyone listening, I you know, I think that's
very important too in the general in the film industry
is that you have to have, you know, confidence and
you have to have that opinion, which you know, if
you're as a director, you need that. As a writer
(10:32):
as you know, you need that point of view from
where to tell your story.
Speaker 4 (10:36):
Yeah, that's and that's you know, it's it's a funny
thing because it comes back on you in so many
different ways because if you project confidence and it's leaven
on the page. You know, if you project confidence on
the page and you project confidence when you then later
go into a development beating or whatever, you can kind
of slay people. Like people want to buy into that confidence,
(10:58):
Like you know, somebody's sitting to read a script, if
that first couple of pages is written with a really
strong authorial voice, they'll kind of come with you, you know.
And if you, as the writer have a really strong
take on a story and feel really strongly about it
and can back it up on all that stuff, people
you know, kind of want to take that journey with
you and they want to trust your credibility as a writer.
So it's so important. Well, I think once you it's
(11:22):
not to say that like, oh, you know, don't be
be inflexible, it's not about that, But it's just you
got to be confident in what you're doing because if
you're not, and there's no ways no one ever else
will ever be confident in you. You have to be
confident in yourself number one, and then other people can
basically trust you. And you know, in our business it's
so tough already that if you don't project that confidence,
(11:44):
I think it makes it way tougher.
Speaker 3 (11:48):
So what are some of the things that you notice,
Like when we were talking about confidence on the page,
you know, what are some of the things that usually
jump out at you and you can usually say like, hey,
you know that writer, he believes he or she believes
in her own not her writing.
Speaker 4 (12:02):
Yeah, absolutely, I mean it's I think it's a lot
of different things. I think I think one thing for
sure would be starting out with a storytelling sort of
approach where you're not you're not waiting for us, like
you're the story's going and we're either coming with you
(12:22):
or we're not, but you're not going to hang around
and hold our hand, you know. I think that that
is something you'll definitely see in professional scripts, and it's
a very noticeable difference from when you're reading a script
maybe by a more beginning writer. You can tell the
level of confidence in terms of a shorthand of communicating information,
(12:46):
you know, where it's using it's it's asking a lot
of us as the audience that hey, you you got
to keep up with me kind of thing. And I
think that you when you when you read something like that,
it actually sort of galvanizes you as the reader because
you are suddenly empowered to like figure out what's going on,
and it just makes it a more dynamic experience. The
(13:09):
worst thing you can do is, you know, have something
where it's just spelling it out to you. You know,
in every way, whether that dialogue or just the slowness
of the presentation of information or presenting old ideas as
if they are new ideas, you know, and there's there's
you know, the audience now is so savage that it's
(13:29):
really you know, there's a lot that can be done
in shorthand, and if you're not using that shorthand, I
think that's where you can kind of get into a
scenario where it doesn't come across to the same level
of confidence on the page.
Speaker 3 (13:43):
Yeah, I'd agree to the audience is very savvy now.
I mean, you know, sometimes I'm watching movies and I see,
you know, cliches, and I'm always thinking to myself, you know,
if they I wonder if the writer, director, whoever it was.
I'm We're always wondering, you know, why didn't they try
something else? You know what I mean, because you know,
you know, now, Dan, what I do is the movies.
(14:03):
I'm always dissecting them in my head, not even just
you know, like a piece of paper, but in my head,
I'm always thinking to myself, you know, is this a setup?
Is this is you know, what would the payoff be?
You know, you know, I wonder what the incding incident's
going to be and when it finally comes there, you
know you know what I mean. I mean, do you
do the same thing do you said? You know when
you watch movies now, are you just dissecting them and
sort of ms trying to get ahead of the story
(14:25):
to see if you could, you know, predict what the
writer was thinking.
Speaker 4 (14:28):
Yeah, I mean I'm pretty much ruined as an audience
member at this point. I mean, I remember, I remember
I used to when I was when I was in college.
I would go my buddy and we would sneak, you know,
we would both see one movie and then sneak around
the theater and we would do that for like twelve hours,
and we would see every movie that was in the theater.
And I can actually should and watched literally I watched
(14:48):
literally anything. But now you know, I'm such a that's
an awful audience member. I'll find something, you know, like
you'll quick something new on Netflix two minutes if there's
stuff in there. I just I'm watching it and I'm
just like, ah, man, you know, I'll turn off, Like
I'm I've become such a terrifable audience member exactly because
of what you're talking about, Because we were in it
(15:10):
so much that it's like you stop consuming it kind
of as like a regular consumer, you become a lot
more sort of I guess hypocritical when you're when you're
watching stuff because they're always thinking about the design of
it and things like that.
Speaker 3 (15:28):
Yeah, I know what you mean, because sometimes you know,
I watch movies, right, even if you're a trailer now,
and I'll say, let me guess what happens in this movie,
And sometimes, you know, I'll stay it out in front
of my friends and like, how the hell do you
would you get that from seeing this? And I'm just like,
because I just you know what I mean, You see
that stuff, you see those points, you know what I mean?
Like there was you know, okay, well this is obviously
(15:50):
last part of the movie. I know this sounds a
little bit redundant, but the first time I ever had
not the first time, but the most time that sticks
out in my mind was when Paul Blart Molcop came
out and I saw the trailer and a friend of
mine went to always screening of it and I told
him exactly what I think happens in the beat base
based on the trailer, and he goes, wow, you're really
good at this and I know I now granted obviously
(16:12):
we don't go see Paul bart Molkoff for the writing,
but but you know that's I was just bringing that
up as a point of reference.
Speaker 4 (16:19):
Yeah, I mean, in general, you know, that goes back
to the authorial conpetence thing, right. It's like, but soon
when you're starting the story, the audience is ahead of
you in the same way of what you're talking about.
Like if you set it up and they're they are
going to be predicting a certain storyline. So you the creator,
you got to kind of know that, and you're sort
(16:39):
of knowing that you have to give them something that's
at least a little bit different, because otherwise it's going
to be exactly like what you're talking about. If the
if the audience is able to predict it like beat
by beat, then you're screwed. I mean, that's really you know,
that's a really tough it's a tough place to get
away from if you're in that scenario. So you got
(16:59):
to or some sort of wrinkle that makes it a
little bit different.
Speaker 3 (17:04):
Yeah, very true. And you know, I actually, you know,
just as we talk about all this writing and everything else,
I want to you know, get get into your writing.
You know, so did you always you know, have the
inclamation that you wanted to be a writer director?
Speaker 4 (17:18):
Well, no, so I have. I've directed one movie and
some shorts and then you know, for me, the experience
of directing my movie, which is called Betrayed, pretty much
told me that I would prefer to just be the writer,
which you know, I enjoyed it, but it's just so
all consuming. So I give a lot of credit to
(17:38):
my cousin in Orange, who directed our movie Initiation. It's
it's really an immersive thing that she kind of just
you give up. You got to put a lot of
yourself into it. So for me, I prefer being the writer.
I mean, the experience that we had making this film,
it's kind of like exactly what I love about being
(17:58):
a writer is that I was able to come in
and contribute to the story and then they went off
and made the movie and I watched the movie. I
mean that's you know, that's like, so that's when it's
cool being a writer, because it's literally like you wrote
something on a piece of paper and then you get
to see that it exists, and you know, it's pretty
pretty neat.
Speaker 3 (18:18):
Yeah, very true, you know, because I you know, I
looked at your I MDB. I did see you have
the short then you you did direct Portrade, and you
know I wanted to, you know, just ask you know,
what was the biggest difference that you found when you
when you had to direct. I mean, was there any like,
you know, challenges that you weren't anticipating or you know,
did you just say, you know what, I prefer to
(18:38):
be a writer.
Speaker 4 (18:40):
I mean, I think that when you're gonna direct, I
mean I very much. I love working with actors. I
think working with actors is so fun. And you know,
if I ever end up directing again, it will be
because of that. The part that I felt, you know,
and you kind of have to be all in or
not in at all. For me, that was the visual authentic.
I had a really great uh cinematographer on my film Betrayed,
(19:04):
and you know, he was really good about like basically
checking me and being like, hey, that's not gonna look good.
Let's do it like this. You know, when you're when
you're promarlier writer, you don't necessarily think in that visual
in the way that a director can become on the
same tools. You know, if you're if you're someone who's
confident directing stuff and your aspiration is absolutely to direct,
(19:27):
then you're going to be doing the same study that
you and I do for writing, right where we we
know it so in and out and we know all
the tools and tricks and things like that. I think
that you know, uh and obviously you want you lean
on your cinematographer as a director, of course, But I
just felt like for me, I enjoy sort of trying
(19:48):
to master this one facet of it as opposed to
like trying to I felt like it would be kind
of a jack of all trade situation if I tried
to directing thing as much as I like it.
Speaker 2 (20:01):
We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor,
and now back to the show.
Speaker 4 (20:10):
I don't I don't have the same you know, energy
with it as I do with the writing.
Speaker 3 (20:16):
Yeah, I you know when I I haven't directed anything
for like five years, but you know, I find that
it's not because I don't want to. It's just because
I've learned Dan that the writing has to be not
good but great, you know what I mean. You're going
to do any projects, I've learned that it has to
be you have to like you, yourself, whoever, you know,
(20:38):
for everyone listening to this. If you're writing something, you
and yourself have to get so excited about it. You're like,
how the hell is this not a movie made already?
Even look, you know what I mean, And you have
to be so And that's something that I've learned. So
what I've I've been doing is I took one step
forward to take two. I'm sorry, I took one step
back to take two steps forward. And basically what I
mean by that is I just wanted to make sure
(20:59):
that I got better at things. And during this whole
five year period, I I've actually produced stuff, I've actually
had a graphic novel get made, uh, you know, stuff
like that. And but but it's really, you know, comes
back to you know, making sure that writing is phenomenal.
And you know, when you when you talk about writing,
you know, I can you know, I can hear you
(21:20):
get excited about it in your voice, and that's good
exactly you need that, right, So I wanted to ask,
you know, Dan, when whenever you're writing, you know what
I mean, like, is there any things that you keep
in mind to you know, make sure that you're always
sort of going forward, if you know what I mean.
Speaker 4 (21:36):
Yeah, there's a million things. I mean, that's the part
that kind of it kind of sucks about the more
you learn about it, right because I mean when when
when I started, you know, you would it was a
little bit more free because you were just like, yeah, man,
you know, it's once you learn so much about it,
then there's so many different things that you got to
be thinking about, and so it actually makes you know,
(21:59):
once you actually get on the page, I'm good. But
the planning, the planning stage, you know, there's a lot
that you have to be thinking about, and it helps
to just do it a million times. You know. I'm
very grateful for the time that I was a development
executive because I basically you know, develop I mean dozens
of scripts and we made a bunch of those movies too,
(22:22):
so I really got to see the whole process many times.
And so that that helps because you sort of get
almost like a muscle memory for it. But yeah, you've
got so much stuff you have to think about. You
got you know, theme and character and dialogue and arc
and structure and mood, and it's uh, yeah, there's a
lot to kind of manage, you.
Speaker 3 (22:45):
Know, one thing I've learned, and you know, like you said,
you know, the more you learn, the more uh you know,
the more the more you do, the more you learn,
the more you learn, you know, you realize how complex
this gets. And you know, I've read every screen running
book on the market. I literally, you know, you can't
see it because it's the podcast, but i have every
screen writing book out there, and I've read it from
cover to cover. You know, I've done what everybody else does.
(23:08):
You start with screenplay by Sidfield, and you work up
to Save the Cat. Then you get a story by
m Key, you know, any sort of and then you
sort of branch off from there after read those three
works because you know, everyone sort of talks about it.
But one thing I've learned over the years is that
everything comes back to character, you know what I mean,
Like everything, you know, when we talk about scenes, when
(23:29):
we talk about favorite parts of a movie, when we
talk about this or that, it always stems from a character.
Speaker 4 (23:36):
I mean, it's very true. Yeah, I mean I would
always say when we would you know, when I was
a dumb executive and we try to put a movie together,
it was pretty in every movie that we made that
actually ended up getting made. There was always a moment
where we would attack somebody that was meaningful, whether that
was an actor or director or whatever, and that person
(23:57):
when they would come in, it wasn't like they said,
you know why I'm doing this movie because I love
the you know the midpoint, Like, no nobody ever said that.
It's it was always about whatever the emotion was of
it or whatever the character thing was that we were doing.
That was what they would key in on and say, Man,
you know, really that meant something to me. And I
(24:19):
got company out of that. So yeah, nobody, it's it's
all you know, the plot is informed by the character,
and then they have to they have to not only
coke this, but actually sort of be intrinsic to each other,
like the the best movies or movies where the plot
has to happen because of the character. Like those two
they can't exist outside of each other.
Speaker 3 (24:41):
Yeah, you know, it's very true. And I think the
mistake a lot of writers make, and and I've made
this mistake, you know, more times than I can count, is,
you know, developing a plot and trying to plunk characters
insaid plot if you know what I mean.
Speaker 4 (24:54):
Yeah, and I.
Speaker 3 (24:55):
Think when when you yeah, when you try to reverse that,
when you try to reverse engineer or something like that.
I I think that's where you sort of get stuck.
Speaker 1 (25:02):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (25:05):
So you know, when you know your new movie Initiation, Uh,
it's it's being you know, distributed by Gravitas Ventures. Congratulations,
by the way, that's freaking huge.
Speaker 4 (25:14):
Yeah. No, we're we're we're very excited, you know, and
we're very proud of the film. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (25:20):
I mean that that is you know, absolutely phenomenal. And
I wanted to ask, you know, where, so where did
your idea come from for the film? You know, did
was this an idea that came to you or was
this just something that you know that that you have
been sort of working on for years?
Speaker 4 (25:35):
So this this is actually something that you know, my
cousin or and he had the initial idea, He had
a script, and he basically, you know, we being thousands
we both live in LA I would always come hang
with him, and you know, he mentioned that he was
working on this, and at one point he, you know,
he and I talked about working on it together and
so basically I came in and I co wrote it.
(25:57):
I I you know, we we ended up writing revising
that script and and working on it together through to
the end, and he directed the film and edited it
and produced it. And so I this was a situation
where basically I came in where there was already a
product that existed, and I just gave my sort of
(26:18):
careerive energy to it. And I think that we both
kind of complimented each other in that process, and you know,
that was that was the process played out on this one.
Speaker 3 (26:28):
So for those for those listening who aren't familiar with
the film, could you give us a brief explanation about
about the film?
Speaker 4 (26:34):
Dan, Yeah, So it's basically a group of strangers are
kidnapped and they're taken to this kind of a serious
house and they basically come to realize that they've been
kidnapped to take place in an initiation ritual for a cult,
and to be initiated into this cult, you have to
fight somebody to the death. And so these people that
(26:56):
are complete strangers to each other, they're just random people
and they thrown into this insane situation and they have
to try to figure out a way to survive, and
that's what the movie is about.
Speaker 3 (27:07):
Very cool and it's actually cool that it's coming out
right around this time, you know, this fall Halloween time.
You know what I mean. It sounds like the movie
that's ripped out alley Way.
Speaker 4 (27:16):
Yeah, I mean, you know, it's it's well, it's what's
been cool about it is that it sort of it
towes the line between action and horror. So you know,
we've been we've been really happy to see that a
lot of horror websites have reviewed the film and given
us nice notices because I think that it it's something
that's a fun movie for people that like horror movies,
but it's also a fun movie for you know, an
(27:37):
action fan thriller type of thing.
Speaker 3 (27:41):
Yeah, that is very cool. And you know because I
mean whenever you can see the horror you know, horror sites,
whenever they can get excited about something, you know, it's
always awesome because, like we were talking about, with all
the films you know that we've seen and you know,
being able to sort of you know, spot the story,
you know, they seem ton of horror films. So you know,
when you get them on board of something, you know
(28:03):
what I mean, it's like, okay, great, now you got something,
you know, because if if they like it, I mean, what,
what's the general public going to think? You know what
I mean?
Speaker 4 (28:10):
Right? Yeah, No, And we've been I mean we've you know,
we have shown the film to a lot of people
at this point, and you know, enough people where it's
a funny thing your relationship with your own work, right,
I mean, anytime you show something to somebody that knows you,
you're kind of like, well, you know, they might they
might just tell me to be nice. So they thought, like,
but we we've shown it to so many people, and
(28:32):
then obviously I think we have you know, on IMDb
there's some some reviews linked and uh and you know,
Bloody Discussing gave us a met review. And we know
these are people that have no reason to tell out
one way or the other. Right, So when when somebody
that has no relationship to you tells you they got
something out of your work, then that that's uh, that's
(28:52):
that's big because then you figure, okay, well maybe you know,
maybe it does work, you know, And and this is
a sort of more objective for that.
Speaker 3 (29:01):
Yeah, exactly. And you know I see that on the
i n dB page. It's up on Amazon Video right now.
Is there is there any other places that that people
could find the movie.
Speaker 4 (29:13):
Yeah, it's all over. It's on It's on iTunes, on Amazon,
it's on PlayStation, it's on It's on a lot of
cable on demand providers. I was in I was home
in Baltimore, and I I saw it on my parents,
you know, cable at their house. It's on Blue Doo,
It's it's on the majority of video on demand providers.
Speaker 3 (29:36):
And I will link to that everyone in the show notes.
I will make sure to link to all those places
that you can check out. H the initiation. Uh, you know,
I wanted to ask, you know, also about the initiation.
You know, Dan, what's what's one thing you want to
be able to take away from the film? I mean,
did you I mean, you know, did you want to
have people leave going you know, damn that was intense
or was there any other sort of theme that you
(29:58):
wanted people to walk away from that walk with but
from We'll be.
Speaker 2 (30:02):
Right back after a word from our sponsor, and now
back to the show.
Speaker 4 (30:11):
A friend of mine just watched it, and that was
pretty much what he emailed me. He said, that was
intent the the you know what was cool about it
for me was that I think we should feed it
something that I'm always trying to do, which is ached
with the genre movie and basically invest it with a
real meaning, meaning that it's not just kind of an
(30:32):
empty genre exercise that's actually it has a has a
message and a point to it that is emotional, that
is you know, I mean, this really is basically about
the idea that no matter what situation you're kind of
put into, if you have this sort of inner strength
to defeed it, then no one there's nothing anyone can
do to you. And you know, we sort of explore
(30:54):
that in a lot of different ways in the film,
but it was something that you know, meant something to me,
and I think it gives the film a weight that
you know, if we sort of just relied on all
the genre stuff, it wouldn't have that same weight to it.
So that that was the thing to me that I
was most satisfied with.
Speaker 3 (31:12):
You know, just as a side note, you know, a
screenwriting professor once told me a great piece of screamwriting advice,
and that was when you're sitting down to you know,
brainstorm a concept or whatever for for your movie, he said,
this is a question you asked yourself, what do you
want audiences to leave. What do you want audiences when
(31:32):
they leave to take away from this movie? Do you
want them to say, oh my god, that was hilarious.
We know, And He's like that helps guide you throughout
the process when you're making the movie.
Speaker 4 (31:42):
Yeah, for sure. I mean, you know, you gotta you
gotta do it for a reason. And there's just too much.
There's too much stuff out there, all this It tasts
too long, it's too much of a pain in the
ass if you're not doing it out of some strong
impulse of And it doesn't necessarily always have to be heavy,
you know. I Mean we're like right now, how we
h My cousin and I are talking about doing another
(32:02):
film together, and and we're we're talking about doing one
that's a little bit more sort of light at least
in the tone. Uh, and uh, you know that that
can be fine too, But it's just whatever that impulse
is that you have that makes it interesting and exciting
for you. You know, you got to really feel strongly
about that and kind of and and key on that
(32:23):
throughout the whole thing, you know, because that's what you
want the person who watches it to have that thing feeling.
Speaker 3 (32:29):
Yeah, And that's exactly right. And uh, you know, I
I think, you know, when we can finally convey that,
you know what I mean, Like I think, uh, you know,
like for instance, Quentin Tarantino, whenever he writes, I'm thinking,
that's the same thing that people pull away from, is
the same mood he's in, you know what I mean,
particularly like, heyful late, I have a I have a
you know that's sort of like a It was the same,
but it was different for him. And I sort of
(32:51):
think that, you know, you could sort of pull away
what he's what, you know, what he puts into the script,
if you know what I mean. And and you know,
I want to ask you Dan, as we know we
were talking about your your future projects. I wanted just
to ask, you know, what does a typical writing day
for you look like?
Speaker 4 (33:09):
Man, it's just if I can just get some time.
It's really time is the most important thing. I mean,
I I'm not for me. It's not like I'll write anywhere.
I'll write at any time. I don't need to like,
you know, consult the mus or anything like. I can
just down and bang some stuff out. But I think
that I have a tough time. I'm sort of an
(33:32):
impatient person, which I think is probably a pretty important
part of any figure out that I have had or
will have is done. You know, I'm just I'm not
patient to like just let things comb as they may.
Like I want to get stuff done, and you know,
kind of that's always my ethos. So when I the
(33:52):
planning part of it, that's the part that takes forever.
Like I'll do research, you know, on initiation. I did
research into military stuff on other projects I've written, you know,
I'll read like three books about it. But once it's
time to write and I actually have figured out the story,
I'm so I have such a burning desire to just
get it out of me and get it onto the page.
(34:13):
It's almost to the point where like I feel like
I'm gonna lose it if I don't that it comes
very fast, you know, and I almost I almost will
consciously try to set aside, you know, just a couple
of days or whatever where I know it's going to
just be kind of flowing out of me and h
and just be able to kind of bang pages out,
because you know, that's I don't I don't, Yeah, I mean,
(34:33):
it's just a difference in process, right, For me, the
real cracking of the story comes in the planning. The
actual writing is just putting the planning on a piece
of paper. So the writing itself is the fun part.
The hard part of the is coming up with the
actual story.
Speaker 3 (34:49):
Yes, I could not agree more. That's something that I
found too, is that you know, uh, because once once
I have an outline or a treatment or anything, you
know what I mean, like any even if it's a
piece of paper work some ideas, you know, scribble down
on it that looks like the journal from seven. Uh,
you know, just something. I know where I'm going, you
know what I mean? And you know, the biggest part
(35:11):
that was always you know where the plot is going.
But then I've realized it always comes back to where
the characters start, you know what I mean. So you
know when the when the when the script starts is
where the movie starts. So then where do we find
our characters when the script starts, you know, you know
what I mean? Or do they have something? Do they
not have something? You know, what's their desire? Uh, you know,
what's what's their intention? What's their obstacle?
Speaker 2 (35:32):
Yeah?
Speaker 4 (35:34):
Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 3 (35:37):
So Dan, I mean, like how on average, how off
I mean, how many hours a day do you write?
I mean, is it like sometimes like a thirty minutes,
then sometimes maybe it's like two hours.
Speaker 4 (35:46):
I think that on a day when I actually can
really you know why, I have nothing going, I can
really just sit and focus on writing, well, usually I
think after like three or four hours, you got to
stop and I've done it. I've had times where I'll
fit and I'll write for like you know, I'll write
the whole day. But I think, as a general rule,
(36:08):
unless it's something where I've gone insane and I have
to you know, I think that three or four hours
of a focused writing, after that it has to become
diminishing returns. Just your brain kind of. It takes a
certain sort of brain muscle I think to come up
with this stuff, and after a while you start like
you don't have that theme because you know, I mean,
(36:29):
it's sort of what we were talking about before, Like
each scene that you write, you really got to sit
and think about it and think about like, Okay, you know,
here's the regular version of this scene. Why is this
scene going to be somewhat cooler than the regular version?
Like how can I make it different? How can I
make a different not just in what happens, but in
how the characters interact with each other with the visual
(36:51):
thing that I'm doing in this scene or the reversal
in this scene. So it's so much like mental effort
to go into it that I think after three or
four hours, I got to stop. So for me, a
good three or four hours of writing and then maybe
some research you know in the afternoon, or a lot
of prep for the next day, you know, like okay
and tomorrow. I know, I got to write these themes
just kind of what I'm thinking, and I at least
(37:11):
have a little bit of a roadmap of the actual
precise execution, and then you can kind of flow into
the next day.
Speaker 3 (37:19):
Yeah, that's kind of like which I think Stephen King
maybe said that. He said basically, he he ends on
a high note that way, and the next day he
comes in, he knows exactly where he's gonna go, and
he keeps that flow going on every day.
Speaker 4 (37:31):
Yeah. I tend to do that as well.
Speaker 3 (37:36):
Great mind stick alike, you know, and that and that's
great advice, by the way. So you know, Dan, in closing,
you know, is there maybe anything that we can talk
about that you wanted to or any sort of parting
thoughts you want to want to add to this conversation.
Speaker 4 (37:51):
No, I mean, you know, I think the thing that's
cool to me about this project specifically, and I think
is relevant to what we're talking about and probably to
a lot of people listening to your podcast to you know,
this is something that any of us could do. You
could you you could have made this movie. You know,
anybody listening to this could have made this movie. It's
a movie that we made for a low budget. But
(38:11):
you know, one of the reasons that it's been so
cool getting some nice reviews from some cartscle is that
they basically said, yeah, it's a low budget movie, but
the sort of ingenuity and the effort that went into
it and that that made it it didn't. It doesn't
feel low budget, you know, like it's not. It's the
point being that there's nothing to stop at any of us.
(38:31):
I'm just going to make in a movie, and not
just a movie that we sort of is enablegating for
our own edification, but a movie that anybody can sit
down and watch and enjoy at a real movie. You know,
even if you have to do it for a low budget,
you know, and I think that this is sort of
to me a good case study of that that we
actually went made this movie, got it distributed by a
(38:54):
very legitimate distributor. It's out everywhere, you know, and you know,
we we've on a lot of nice responses to the movie,
so we do think that the movie works. And you know,
we we just look forward to hopefully having people to discovered,
you know, and and maybe we can go make another one, you.
Speaker 3 (39:11):
Know, and that's that's phenomenal. And you know, honestly, Dan,
I'm gonna make sure check out the Initiation. I will everyone.
I will link that in the show notes. Dan, where
can you find you out online?
Speaker 4 (39:24):
I mean, you know, just just stuck with the movie.
I'm not I'm like the worst person ever for all this.
I don't have a Twitter or something. I'm not a
social media dude. But the Initiation movie we have a
website with Facebook page, and obviously it's on iTunes, it's
on Amazon, it's all these other platforms.
Speaker 3 (39:43):
Dan, I want to say thank you very much.
Speaker 4 (39:45):
For coming on my pleasure, a good conversation, Oh my pleasure, sir,
Take care, take care any way.
Speaker 2 (39:53):
I want to thank Dave so much for doing such
a great job on this episode. If you want to
get links to anything we spoke about in this episode,
head over to the show notes at Indie film huscle
dot com Forward slash eight twenty three, and if you
have it already, please head over to filmmaking podcast dot com,
subscribe and leave a good review for the show. It
really helps us out a lot, guys.
Speaker 3 (40:13):
Thank you again so much for listening to guys.
Speaker 2 (40:14):
As always, keep that hustle going, keep that dream alive,
stay safe out there, and I'll talk to you soon.
Speaker 1 (40:21):
Thanks for listening to the Indie Film Hustle podcast at
Indie film Hustle dot com. That's I N D I
E F I L M h U S T l
E dot com.
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