Season 5 Episode 20: THE BEAST OF WALTON ST Director Dusty Austen

On this week's episode of LOW-BUDGET REBELS, I sat down to chat with director and amazing human Dusty Austin. We discussed her new movie The Beast of Walton St. and how a love of visual effects led to experiments with film and made the process seem possible.

We also discussed finding the genre you prefer, self-discovery of the type of director you want to be,  the challenges of adapting on set when things go wrong, taking the "No's" you receive as possibilities, and trying to balance what you can do to help the independent film community while also creating your own art.Make sure to follow Dusty online and keep an eye out for The Beast of Walton St. this November from Scream Team Releasing!

CHEERS!
Josh

Episode Transcript

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 (00:15):
There are some questions I'd like to ask you.

Speaker 3 (00:19):
Low Budget Rebels pocast.

Speaker 2 (00:25):
I don't tell me you're taking all this seriously.

Speaker 3 (00:34):
Hello everybody, and welcome to another Low Budget Rebels podcast.
I'm your host, Josh Stifter, and I am here to
talk with Dusty Austin. This week on the show, I
talked to low budget independent filmmakers about what got them
into it, their process, We tell some tips and tricks
and sort of commiserate about the challenges of low budget filmmaking.

(00:55):
And Dusty Austin is a transgender woman, award winning filmmaker.
She's been doing this for a long time, starting in
some like grindhouse exploitation stuff, but then moving away from that,
which we talk about and was a fascinating conversation about
working on projects that do feel like exploitation and how

(01:17):
our personal preference has sort of moved away from that.
Dusty has done a film recently called The Beast of
Walton Street, and I had the pleasure of watching it
right before we did the episode. But Dusty is just
an incredibly unique and original type of person for this show,

(01:39):
and I was so happy that we had the opportunity
to talk before I get started, before we play the episode.
I gotta get this out of the way. Patreon dot
com slash Flush Studios, that's where you could see this
or listen to this podcast ad free. There's so many
freaking ads on the free stream. I don't know how

(02:00):
anyone can handle. I don't do well with tons of ads,
so it drives me nuts. But for a dollar a month,
I think it's like eleven dollars. If you subscribe for
the year, you get all of these podcasts ad free.
There's an RSS feed you can link up to on
a Spotify if you are a subscriber. You can also

(02:21):
just download them straight from the website or listen to
them on the Patreon super easy. But with all that
being said, Patreon dot com slash flush Studios, that's how
you support the independent filmmaking that I'm doing. And I
am so fucking excited to say that we are going
into production like this week. This weekend, I think we're

(02:43):
going to try to do some filming for my new film,
Get That Dick, which is a movie starring my friend
Sean Ashley, who you might know from Homicide McLoud fame.
I'm gonna have him on the show soon to talk
about old Manslaughter, Get That Dick, some other projects we've
worked on recently together, and he's probably gonna be the
season finale for season five of Low Budget Rebels podcast.

(03:06):
But I'm super super excited to get going up production
in that and you can go see how the process
has come together on the Patreon. There's a bunch of videos.
I sort of have taken a break from posting those
videos as I've been in the boring part of production,
but there should be a new video coming out in
the next week or so, and then there will be
another video about actually going into production that I'm super

(03:29):
stoked about. That's when you're gonna see a lot more.
I'll be going live, I'll be doing some stuff, doing
podcasts with people from the set, and it's just going
to be really interesting. I'm also talk to my wife
and we are talking about bringing back a podcast where
we can talk about just creating art and you know,
doing it in a family setting, and it'll be a

(03:50):
lot about flush studios and what's happening behind the scenes
sort of updates that we'll do maybe maybe once a
month or twice a month or something like that. I
don't know. I'm we're still trying to figure out exactly
how that would work or what would be a fun
way to do it. But I also liked the idea
of you all hopping on there and being a part
of that show, being a part of the Plush Studios

(04:13):
Patreon podcast. I don't have a name for it yet.
We'll figure that out. But all right, Well, without further ado,
here is my conversation with the wonderful Dusty Austin. So
I saw on your IMDb that it says that you

(04:34):
started getting interested in filmmaking and picking your genre of
choice horror, at the age of three. Now, this sounds crazy,
I mean, it sounds wild, except then I started thinking
about it, and I'm like, I did the same thing.
Like we moved out of our first house and into
our second house when I was five, and I was
already a horror fan by that point and was already

(04:55):
stealing my dad's video camera to go make movies. So
tell me about what that was like for you.

Speaker 2 (05:00):
You yeah, you know, it's really it's really incredible. I
owe it to my dad. He was a huge horror buff. Yeah,
you know he's he was very avid reader, a very
avid film watcher. And we have this tradition that I
can remember all the way back to three of every
and I'm old enough that I was a video store kid, right, yeah,

(05:20):
And we had this amazing video store called Star Video
and they have the largest like horror selection the entire planet,
at least when I was a kid, it looked that way, right,
And there were all those beautiful box arts and everything
popping out at you. And we would pick out like
this whole stack of movies, good or bad sometimes because
they look bad. And every Sunday, that's that's how we

(05:42):
spend our Sunday together. You know. My my parents were
pretty very open and and willing to let me sort
of dive into things I was interested in, and you
know what I was able to see, and of course,
you know, the hands went over the eyes for a
lot of you know a lot of things, especially when
I was that little. But you know, the first real
film memory I can recall is America Marvel from London,

(06:07):
and it just it fundamentally, it changed me. It really
that movie just changed me, especially then when I turned
around and asked my dad. I was like, well, how
do they do that? Because you know, you keep telling
me it's not real, it's fake, blah blah blah blah blah.
It was like, oh, well, you know, it's a puppet
and it's it's rubber and it's all these things. And
I was like, what is that? How does that happen?

(06:28):
It was cool because my dad then took me to
the library and we got all these like making of
you know, books and stuff like that, like the Making
the Old like little like Making Us Star Wars, and
then you know, the Dick Smith book, and you know,
later on I got the Tom Savini book and I
was just like, really, just monster movies and making those

(06:50):
things kind of became my first like goal.

Speaker 3 (06:52):
Right for sure.

Speaker 2 (06:53):
And then it was much later then that I decided,
you know what, writing and directing is really dope too.
I should I should look into that process. So it
was just this natural sort of evolution over time.

Speaker 3 (07:05):
It's funny how much effects captured the imagination of a
certain generation. Whereas like I talked to my mom and
dad about the movies and they were big movie fans,
both of them. In fact, like one of the big
family stories is when I was I think what would
have been like ten, my parents went and saw Pulp
Fiction in the theater and that was like the story
behind pulp Fiction, even to a ten year old, was

(07:27):
like insane, Like it had got standing ovation and like
it was this huge event at can and all this
other stuff. And then it was being released and it
was this movie that people were like, no one is
going to go see this, and then people went to
see it and my parents went together and they said
as they were sitting in the theater the movie played
and like now we get all sorts of fucked up movies,

(07:48):
like oh yeah, yeah, I was just talking about substance,
Like we get these movies all the time, but like
and we're kind of spoiled on it, but like something
like pulp Fiction was unheard of to release theaters like
that just was not something that Yeah, And so my
parents went to see the movie and as they came home,
I was like, what did you guys think? What did
you guys think? And they were like, don't tell anyone,

(08:10):
but we loved it, Like don't say it in church,
don't say it to Grandma, Yeah, it was shameful for
them to watch pulp fiction and enjoy it. And they said,
like as they were watching it, like people were getting
up and leaving and they were like covering their faces
just in case like a neighbor was there and saw
them as they were getting up, Which is crazy to think,
like pulp fiction doesn't seem that bad retrospectively, but at

(08:32):
the time it really was like pretty pretty crazy. But
for them, like the movies, that the magic of filmmaking
wasn't as big of a deal as the storytelling, the actors,
the movie star. I think there was a certain generation that,
like our generation was very much going like how did
they do the Freddy Krueger arms? Like how do they

(08:53):
do this stuff? And especially the effects where you could
kind of see them, made us go like how do
you do that? And I want to do that? So
that's fascinating to hear that it affected you in that
way as well.

Speaker 2 (09:03):
Well. And there's a tangibility to it. And I know
this is like the cliche thing for everybody, like you know,
every filmmaker from that generation to say, but like you know,
it was tangible, so it was like, well, you know,
my tiny little like little kid brain. I was like, well,
that means I can maybe do it right, you know,
I can figure that out. And of course, you know,
that leads to a lot of like kid experimentation with

(09:25):
like you know, stuff around the house that you gather
up and that you stick on your friend's faces, or
like these weird rigs that you build out of like
absolutely nothing.

Speaker 3 (09:34):
Stealing met up out of the fridge for blood, like
all of those fun things. I love it. Yeah, And
it's funny because the new generation. I have two children
and both of them are like they see a crazy
thing happen, and they're constantly like that was CGI, right,
that was CGI. So when when we see things that
they're like, how did they actually do that? And I

(09:56):
could be like that wasn't CGI. I could tell you
how they did this moment or whatever, it's always like
we I just showed them rush hour, the rush hours,
Oh yeah, yeah, And there's so many like they just
watched it going like why are they doing all of
these moves? And I'm like, cause it's awesome. They're like, yeah,
it is. But I don't know how to explain that
because now it would be like cameras swooping around things

(10:17):
and like it just be so much different but modern movies.
In fact, I just watched Diehard with a Vengeance and
there's the scene where they jump off of the bridge
and the thing swings down. It cuts the guy in half,
and you I've noticed that the camera actually does a
one point eighty in cuts. It shows like one side

(10:38):
of the bridge as they jump off, it switches to
like a like a forward shot of the boat in
the bridge. Then it switches to the other side as
they're falling, which now the camera would have spun all
the way around, but they just did it and cuts,
and it gives you the exact same feel. So I
brought my my eleven year old home and was like, dude,
check this out. He was like, that's amazing, but it's

(10:59):
tam you said, like, like you said, it's tangible and
you see it, and you're like, I can do that.

Speaker 2 (11:05):
Yeah. And as you know, and I think to that
generation because we were very, very lucky in the fact
that we really got to live through sort of like
where all the big the the effects innovation boom was happening.
I mean, you had all these innovators like Rick Baker
and Steve Johnson and Kevin Jeger and Mark Cannon, and
they were just like they were rock stars then, like

(11:26):
makeup effects guys were freaking rockstar. Have you read Steve
Johnson's books.

Speaker 3 (11:31):
I haven't, but that's a I'm a huge reader, so
I have not read Steve Johnson's book. So that's something
I got to go.

Speaker 2 (11:36):
To bonkers, Like you're reading it going like these are
effects guys, but like the book is just telling these
wild stories that sound more like a rock memoir, and
I'm just like, this is wild because now, like you know,
obviously it's it's it's such a hybrid process of makeup
versus CG, and you don't really the innovation we've pushed

(11:58):
it so far, like an animatronic like you've seen that CG.
You've seen that so like, But back then it was
such this beautiful little moment in time that we were
lucky enough to live through in film where everything was
just innovating like so rapidly and crazily, Like you know,
I still remember seeing that the big back creature at

(12:20):
the end of like Fright Night, when Jerry Darandridge bursts
into flames and thinking like what is that? How is
that even working, it's so cool where now that would
be like, you know, it'd be a CG thing, and
it's not gonna anti CG. But I think there's I
think a hybrid model is maybe a little more appropriate
sometimes and just saying throw the computer at it.

Speaker 3 (12:41):
It's yeah, and it still stands up to me honestly,
like there's something about it for me that instantly pulls
me in. I mean, I just saw substance. I'm not
going to like give anything away, but it started making
me think of some of the body horror from the
past and how things were done and how it still
works based on seeing substance. But like I didn't see
society until I was much older. I mean I saw

(13:03):
society like three years ago for the first time and
had no idea what I was missing. And society blew
my mind because of the practical effects that were used.
And you know, it's like I grew up on the fly.
I grew up on Alien and Aliens and I still
watch those movies and for me personally, as I work
on projects, even though I do cgi like for a living,

(13:25):
I do effects on stuff for people, I still tried
to do as much practical as I can for that
very reason that it feels like, oh, that's a living
thing that I'm seeing on the screen right there.

Speaker 2 (13:38):
So when did you start getting into it? This was
a question I've always wanted to ask you. When did
you start really getting into like the animation and you know,
what was your spark?

Speaker 3 (13:48):
No for me, I mean honestly, like it kind of
goes to you as well, for like what got you
into filmmaking, which would be kind of my next question.
But for me, and I think all of us take
this different journey. But I looked at Tim Burton, and
Tim Burton was my inspiration, and so I saw and
I was older at the time, Like I went to
a private high school. I thought was going to be a pastor,
and went to private high school, lived in a dorm

(14:09):
like Daniel and I. Daniel who plays Father Gill, and
he's like my producer, writer friend. We've known each other
since kindergarten. We went to high school together thinking we
were going to be pastors potentially, and he went to
like a few days of college. I like signed up
for the seminary and literally like the day I was
supposed to go, I was like, oh, I don't believe

(14:31):
in God. I don't believe in any of this and
dropped out. But it was you know, you hit eighteen,
you know you're starting to think like what am I
going to do with that life more? And so I
was I was kind of behind on everything because then
I had to start my life from scratch, realizing like
wholl what am I going to do? And so I
just looked at like what have people done? And the
Tim Burton route. I was already kind of animating, making

(14:52):
stuff on my own, and I saw Tim Burton's route
of starting as an animator, learning the process, and getting
into filmmaking from there, and so I was like, well, I'm,
you know, probably going to want to do some animation.
I want to direct more than anything, but I feel
like I can learn a little bit of everything in animation.
And honestly, I still tell people of this day if

(15:14):
like if a kid asked me, or a or a
parent ask me, like my kid wants to get into filmmaking,
how do they start? I'm always like animation, Start drawing pictures,
because then you have to you literally get to play
God in animation, like with the film. Yeah, all of
these there are all these outside elements that get in
the way. But when you're drawing pictures and bringing things
to life, like literally you're just making it out of nothing.

(15:34):
And that's like a huge part of it is just
that ability to play god.

Speaker 2 (15:39):
Yeah, and there is that sort of you know, it's
such a singular thing when you're first starting out because
I did some of that when I was little. I'm
not very good at animation. I learned that very quickly.

Speaker 3 (15:50):
But yeah, I would argue I'm not very good either.
I just do it like I. Daniel has this running
joke where like I just don't care if I'm good
or not. I just don't ask for permission, just like
I go and I wait for someone to tell me
to stop.

Speaker 2 (16:05):
That's actually as discussion I was recently having with a
friend of mine was the whole waiting for permission to
do something, which especially in like any of the arts, right,
you know, music, film, animation, whatever is your fancy, you
can't wait for that, like you just there wait.

Speaker 3 (16:23):
The more people are going to tell you no. Like
that's my biggest thing is, like I've realized recently, my
biggest issue I have is being in Atlanta since I
moved here a couple of years ago, I'm terrified of
getting into trouble here versus being in Minnesota. I had
got in trouble every day, Like that's what I did,
that was my game. So being out of my comfort
zone now I sort of fear it and I have
to lose that fear and be like I just got

(16:44):
to pick up a camera and film, like I gotta
not let people tell me to stop.

Speaker 2 (16:48):
Well, and it's it's strange too, because you know, over
the years, you know, people kind of give you that
same speech right over and over again. I'm just like, well,
you know that it's hard to make a career doing that,
hard to make money. The odds are so slim, and
you know you should do this, this, this and this,
and it's easy to start to like let that like
soak into your brain and start influencing you and sort of,

(17:10):
you know, indoctorate you into this sort of like standard
you know, do the nine to five, do all of
the things that everybody else does. And I think there's
a point where, yeah, you just have to not ask
for permission anymore and just say like, no, I'm going
to do this. I'm going to give it my all
and by God, I'm going to be successful. And success
doesn't necessarily have to be like Academy awards and like

(17:33):
mad riches and stuff. But if I can support my
kids and my family doing this amazing art that like
us as filmmakers like get to do, why would I not?

Speaker 3 (17:47):
Yeah, I think and success it's it's so fascinating the
concept of success, because I'm listening to this book right
now and in the book, it's the book is called
something like something about asking why, the concept. I literally
started it today and always takes me a little bit
of time to remember a book, but it's about it's
about starting a business and asking why instead of asking

(18:10):
how what you know like whatever? And in the book
he talks about the fact that like success is something
that in the past, you know, depression, anxiety, all these
things are at all time high because we are so connected.
We are comparing ourselves to everything, and success is rated
on the level of who has the most who is

(18:30):
the happiest, But like, that's not true success, no, like
and the more the more you think about art, which
is what we're doing, it's like the most successful people
that you know are the least happy or the least successful,
and not that I'm saying you need to be unhappy
to create art, but I'm just but it's like one
of those things where you start to go like, well,

(18:52):
what does make me happy? What is my success? What
is mom like? What what makes me proud to be
the person I am?

Speaker 2 (19:01):
Yeah? Yeah, And I think it's so easy to just
get caught up in all of the hyper bowl that
fights against that, that idea that like success does not
have to mean you have millions and millions of dollars.
And I think it's a misconception too, that like, you know,
you can't make a career in the arts, and you know,

(19:21):
because it's the classic joke, right, Oh you went to
art school, Oh you went to film school. You know,
how's that working out for you? And I've heard that
and I'm like, actually, it's working pretty good because like
it's I don't want to say I tempered my expectations,
but I just was able to look at the playing
field and go like, this is what I want to achieve.

(19:42):
This is success for me, and it's not anything. It's
not nutters. And I think one thing a lot of
people do too is they get stuck and it's it's
an unfortunate thing. They get stuck in the idea of
seeing like if somebody else is successful around them, or
you know, in that same space. Because filmmakers have filmmaker fronts,
instead of celebrating, you know, everybody's victories, they let that

(20:05):
sort of that little jealousy monster, that envy monster in
and you can't do it. You just you can't do that.

Speaker 3 (20:11):
Every day it happened, I mean, it happens every day.
And like one of the reasons I do this podcast
is literally to talk to talk to filmmakers, to number one,
give everyone a platform that's awesome. I also do it
selfishly because I need inspiration constantly, and I find that
talking to other filmmakers who are doing similar things gives
me inspiration. But it also is just like a way

(20:34):
for me to curb any jealousy, Like it makes me
see other filmmakers as just like me. We have a
conversation where just people who are all struggling to do
it all want to do more because we all just
want to keep making stuff. But it's funny, like you
read Don Costcarelli's book and it's like everything in Don

(20:55):
Costcarelli's book is about failure, Like the whole book is
just this negative, Like it starts very positive and then
it just becomes like I couldn't get this made. I
couldn't get this made. I couldn't get this made. Who's
some is someone I looked up to my entire life,
and you're like, oh, it never gets easier. No, every
every filmmaker has these stories. I also think there's this
like misconception right now because we all do know the industry,

(21:17):
we all do know that it's the movie business, not
movie art, that we feel like we should be like
making money and and and getting that like James Gunn's
success story, when the reality is is that that's like one
in a god zillion that's never that never happens. And
even then like that, there's I'm sure if you talk

(21:37):
to James Gunn, he'd tell you every failure versus every success,
you know what I mean?

Speaker 2 (21:42):
Yeah, yeah, and you don't. And you know because especially
now with you know, sort of the the the social
media age, like you're getting the best version of everyone's story.

Speaker 3 (21:51):
Right one, yes, all the time.

Speaker 2 (21:53):
You're you're not like I don't post about when like
a deal falls through because like, first that's personal, that's
something I need to work through and also be It's
like I also want other people to, like, you know,
the five people that like read my feed, I want
them to see like, hey, this is achievable. Yea. So

(22:15):
for me, it's it's always very important to like, if
whatever small, tiny little platform I etch out in the
world for myself, I want to make sure that it's
a little ball of positivity for anybody else that was
like me when I was like twelve and running around
my parents' back hour with a camera to see and
be like, Okay, cool this this chickum she's doing it.

(22:35):
Why can't I?

Speaker 3 (22:37):
Yeah, for sure. And I also think that there's an
element where the more negativity you put out there, the
more negativity you're going to get. So yeah, so why
dwell on it? If you post it, you're dwelling, you're
like living in it, You're like kind of wallowing in it,
or at least that's how the outside sees it. So
it's hard to do it. So I could I could live.
I mean, I've talked about it on this podcast where
I have a big budget film, I mean big for me,

(23:00):
three point two million dollar movie that's like been in
process for forever.

Speaker 2 (23:05):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I remember you talking about it, and
it's just like what we're talking about here.

Speaker 3 (23:09):
Yeah, And it's one of those projects where you're like
I could talk about it every day and be like
still not happening today, because that's the way these projects work.
But instead, it's more fun to talk about the stuff
that I can do. Like it's more fun to be like,
you know, what's screw that? Yeah, that's happening, and I'm
if it pops up tomorrow and I can work on
it tomorrow, awesome. But right now, I literally can do nothing.

(23:30):
It's out of my hands. Instead, I'm gonna go make
a no budget movie with my son because I can
do that, you know, and that.

Speaker 2 (23:36):
Kind of stuff. It's like that where like I have
this sort of mantra that like if someone tells me
no and says like you're not allowed to do that,
you can't you can't do that thing, I'll be like, Okay,
well now I have to do a thing and say like,
well look at this. I took all of your nose,
and I took that energy that I could have spun

(23:58):
into some negative spy and I try to turn it
into creativity. And it's like Okay, cool. I can't do
the big thing right now, what's some small thing that
I can do that's this maybe got you know, just
a lot of heart and a lot of ingenuity behind it.
And you know, I think you get really great films
sometimes born out of that, like almost that necessity to
create despite what other people are gatekeeping for you.

Speaker 3 (24:22):
Yeah, this is I mean, this is a concept and
maybe you can relate to this, maybe not. But for me,
like I have realized that boredom it was one of
the greatest inspirers of creation for me. And the more
success I get, the more stuff gets done, that is
like creatively positive, the harder it gets because then the

(24:42):
boredom starts to go away. And like the best ideas
I ever had were sitting in church bored out of
my mind, going like I got to get the fuck
out of here and go do something. And now you know,
every day is a creative day in its own way.
And I've had to teach myself like, go fucking work
on the yard and be bored because if you do
that tomorrow you'll want to work on art again.

Speaker 2 (25:05):
Yeah, I used to have. I used to work in
human resources. It or not, that was the day job
prior to like us doing the film thing every day.
Now I'm very blessed that we get to do that
every day, But like I had an hour commute to
and from Mark every day and it was the ultimate boredom.
Especially after like a couple of years ran by. You're

(25:27):
just like, oh my god, this drive is abhorrent. Yes,
And it's like I've listened to all the audio books
I've listened to, you know, all of the albums I
want to listen to, And I started putting on film
scores in the car and then I would just vibe
with them and just try to like brainstorm and lose
myself in some creative like zen that would you know.

(25:48):
That's that's where I got the idea for the last
feature that we were we just shot last year and
then we're doing pickups and reshoots in December. I got
that driving in the road.

Speaker 3 (26:02):
That's amazing. Yeah, I can relate. I live in Atlanta now,
so I spend a lot of time in traffic, and
I've had to teach myself to not not to find
the traffic, to not allow it to build my anxiety,
because like that's not boredom. When I hit getting when
I get anxious or get angry at traffic when I
get the road rage going or whatnot. It's like it

(26:25):
definitely does not add to the creativity. Instead, I just
kind of like you said, like zone out, put on
a music, put on a score, or put on a
book on filmmaking. I like, literally, I've listened to so
many books on filmmaking, read so many books on filmmaking.
Two years ago. I've talked about this on the podcast.

(26:45):
But two years ago, I just went like, I'm going
to read forty books this year or thirty books this year,
and like, I don't. I didn't read. This was two
years ago. I'm not a reader. I did. I was
when I was a kid, but you know, having children,
having a full time job, trying to make movies, I
just stopped reading at some point. And I decided a
couple of years ago, I think I actually said I'm
going to read twelve books, one a month, and by

(27:08):
like February, I had five books done and I was like, okay,
I'm gonna try to read twenty five books. And then
it just kept like escalating. So this year I'm trying
to read fifty and I'll have it done like this month.
So now I'm like, well, what's awesome. Yeah, I'm like,
what am I going to do? I just I became
a bookworm at some point and like found ways to
put on audio books where I figure out how to
focus on them and do things that I can still

(27:29):
focus on the book and just let the tedium of
life take over in the background, so like things are
getting done while I'm able to listen and focus. But yeah,
but the filmmaking books. In fact, at the end of
every episode of the podcast, I do a like a
review of a filmmaking book now, so that's like one

(27:50):
of my new go tos. But I think that that's
great that, you know, like finding ways to For a while,
I tried meditation, like legit meditation. I found it didn't
work for me for like a couple of weeks. It dude,
I'm not good at it. I just am like my
brain's too like scrambled and crazy. I can't like sit

(28:10):
still and not have any like. I can't. I don't
have that like Jim Carrey meditate for ten hours straight
thing in me. It's just not in me. Even a
half hour is like agony. So I learned my meditation
is like zoning in on a music score and thinking
a lot like too much.

Speaker 2 (28:29):
Yeah, And you know it was nice too, because like obviously,
you know, being an indie filmmaker is it's hard sometimes
and like things don't work or suddenly you realize like,
oh God, like I have to fix this whole thing
that I thought was gonna work. I do the test,
it doesn't work at all, and you get you get
really frustrated with the process. And actually, you know, thankfully

(28:51):
I had this podcast actually for a lot of my
drives to and from work to like tune into and
hear people like on the ground level talk about their
trials and tribulations how they got their stuff made. And
you know, listening to your podcast really helped me a
lot like reground myself and be like, you know what,

(29:13):
there are all of these other amazing artists out there
and they're going through the same thing as you. And
it was the first podcast that I really came across
that actually really like dug deep into sort of some
you know, cool deep cut filmmakers, and I'm just like, yeah,
this these are my people, this is my jam. So
thank you for even making this show in the first place.
It got me through a lot of a lot of stuff.

Speaker 3 (29:36):
Yeah, I mean, like I said, it's selfish because I
do it for the same reason where like I'm stealing
from all of you. Everyone says something in every episode
where I'm like, oh, yeah, that's why I screwed that up,
or oh that's a good I can't tell you. Like
our last three scripts I wrote have all been based
on conversations that I've had with filmmakers on this show
where that told me a success that they had and

(29:58):
why they had it, and I was like, oh, oh,
you made a movie. Like there was a filmmaker who
made a golf comedy and it was all based on
like they had a golf course, they had access to it.
They started doing these skits and then they were like,
let's make a feature film about it. They made a
ton of money off of it. And the reason they
actually made money off of it is because they realized, like, oh,
there was this like niche audience of golfers who don't

(30:20):
get comedies, who want like, even if it's a low
budget version, they liked Happy Gilmore and Caddyshack, and they
want more of it, even if it's not great. They
just want more. And I was like, Oh, you had
access to golf. You know golf course, you like golf,
you understand the concept, and you built something off of it.
And it made me go like, oh, what do I like?

(30:40):
What do I actually have interest in and know the
world of a little bit or want to know more about?
What do I want to do research on? I think
that's half the battle of writing a good story is
going like, well, what's the thing that I want to
dive deeper into?

Speaker 2 (30:54):
Yeah? I love research mode, like right before I start
a process like of like creation, like on a script
and stuff like I deep dive whatever that subject to
this that I've decided like, Okay, this is my thing,
this is what I'm doing now. I'm dedicating my time
to just like absorbing anything and just immersing in it.
And I'll even restrict like my viewing down to like

(31:15):
it's got to be things in that sub genre because
I want to keep those wheels greased and keep those
little sparks, because you pick up little sparks from everything
that you especially if you're a media kid, You're just
like every piece of media has something to offer you
in it to inspire you. And I'm just like, but
I don't want to end up being the filmmaker, and

(31:36):
I'm this lady, I have flights a fancy, right, you know,
one week You're like, well, you know, I really want
to do a vampire Pico.

Speaker 3 (31:41):
Oh god, yes, And then I ask I should have
an episode with Daniel on where Daniel just talks about
all of like we go back through the year and
every like flight of fancy I have because it's it's daily.
It's like every day I'm like, dude, what if we
just did this? What if we did this?

Speaker 2 (32:00):
Oh?

Speaker 3 (32:00):
I saw this thing? What if we went there? I
love this? What if we tried that?

Speaker 2 (32:04):
I do that to my wife and my best friend
Spooky Madison, who's an actor, director, writer, and just like
Coke and Spirit are on everything. I think like once
a week, like I send them a message. I'm like, hey,
I've got this idea. Check it. Here's this little outline,
and I'm just like, you know, you just sent that
one last week that was totally different. Like if you
pick Dusty.

Speaker 3 (32:26):
It goes as far as being like dude, we should
make the most indie of indie to being like dude,
we should find money to make a five million like
like simple concepts of how we can go about doing things.
I am all over the place, and God bless Daniel
for going along on my insane ride, but he does.
And like, luckily you have people like that as well,

(32:47):
because I think without them we'd get nothing made because
we just be like, oh yeah, spiral all the time,
going in circles.

Speaker 2 (32:54):
My wife is the best person on the planet that
just knows how to sort of like take my chaotic
energy and just redirect it in the direction that it
needs to go. If I start to go over here,
she's just like little nudges, loving little nudges back over
because she's you know, she's a producer. And then she
works for a small studio Gde Crank Up Films. It's
in Ashland, Ohio, believe it or not, and she's like

(33:18):
their production coordinator. So she's very very good now at
like just.

Speaker 3 (33:22):
Directing people the rights, yes.

Speaker 2 (33:25):
And and and managing me. So you know, a.

Speaker 3 (33:29):
Funny thing being that sometimes directors are the worst wanted
directing themselves. Like it's just so oh we're terrible at it.
We were good at like figuring out where people need
to be in a moment, like just right, like now,
how do we build something, but like keeping ourselves in
this like cage is sometimes tough, and sometimes you have

(33:51):
to be in that put yourself in that little box
to actually get things made. Well, I guess that leads
us into your film is what what actually got you started?
What were the first movies you made and got you
the bug going to like, I gotta make more?

Speaker 2 (34:08):
Oh boy? So it was, you know, I wanted to
make monsters. I wanted to be an effects artist. And
then and then, and I know a lot of kids
from that gen can can relate to this. I saw
Evil Dead too, right. I did not realize a camera
could do that stuff. I didn't realize a movie could
visually be as frenetic as I was, and as chaotic

(34:30):
and just still like be just this amazing thing. So
then I probably spent a couple of years chasing my
friends around trying to do the Samokam thing through the woods,
ripping off Evil Dead for you know a few years.
And then throughout high school, you know, I was that
kid that always did the thing. It's like, instead of
writing the book report can We Shoot? Like a short

(34:51):
adaption of the book, I adapted Stephen King's The Gun Slinger,
and it was terrible. It was terrible, but it it
was so much fun to sit there. And it's that
early beta test of sitting with a captive audience for
thirty minutes. I had a class full of kids watching
my movie with me, and I got to really learn
that process. And it's addictive, like because when a moment

(35:15):
would hit and somebody go or they would laugh, and
I was like, oh, yeah, I have to do this
for the rest of my freaking life. This is amazing.
And then we did our first feature. It was me
and a small group of friends. It was homegrown backyard horror.
It was called Bad Friend. It was silly, it was
a zombie comedy. We screened it locally, and then I

(35:37):
kind of took a hiatus and started working for some
other companies. I was DP for a little while, and
then I did some via facts work and I did
makeup work, and then I got pretty disenfranchised with just
sort of like what certain scenes were starting to look like,
sort of like the level of exploitation happening on a
lot of those sets and stuff, and I took a

(35:59):
step back. And at that time, YouTube was like starting
to really chug along, and I was like, what is this,
let's learn this, And we did a YouTube series from
like twenty thirteen to twenty eighteen until I was like,
we sort of got We saw some of the scene
around us again veering back towards like that really exploitationy thing.

(36:20):
So my wife and I were like, well, we want
to start a studio that celebrates diversity and doesn't play
into you can have a great film with maybe out
you know a lot of like the really hardcore exploitative
stuff that you just see that people think that you
need to have. You can make good movies without it. Yeah,
not that I'm by any means like I love some

(36:42):
of the hardest of the hard movies out there. Martyrs
is one of my favorite movies ever made. But I
think there's an art and there's an exploitation, and it's
hard to juggle those sometimes when you're an indie filmmaker,
and it's easy to get pressured into saying, well, you
need tons of naked people, do I do?

Speaker 3 (36:59):
I right, exactly, No, It's that's I love this point
because I do think in low budget filmmaking, like the
running joke, it's not really a joke, but like the
running phrase, I would hear all the time when I
was listening to like, you know, Corman and all these
other people, was like, the cheapest special effects you can
get is tits like that's the cheapest special effect, and like, yeah,

(37:22):
I'm the worst. I can't. I'm awful at this. My
movie is all like cis white males like running around.
It's the friends I have, It's the world I grew
up in. So for me, it was like very it
was impossible. I was never going to be that sort
of exploitation filmmaker. Instead, like those I do think we

(37:44):
have to exploit things because we are making movies for very,
very little, so we end up exploiting things like our knowledge,
where it is like what effects can I do? What
monsters can I make? How silly can we go? Like
I knew that I was not afraid to exploit myself
in gray Wood's plot and be like You're gonna run

(38:05):
naked through the woods, covered in fake fake blood, acting
like a monster like I that was. I played every
monster in that movie, like doing all the like little
monster thing because I want to know what it's like
to be you know, when I get my face cut
up in the movie, I was like, I'm gonna we're
gonna do this in my garage on We're gonna make
it into like a fake lab and I'm gonna really

(38:26):
naked on the table and you're gonna cut dand's gonna
cut my face up and we're gonna make it look
nasty and I'm gonna be covered in fake blood. And
that's what I had to exploit was myself because I
wanted to. I really wanted to see what that feels
like so that when I go, Because I'll be honest,
those are the performances I like. I love it when
an actor goes like I'm gonna go. I mean, we

(38:47):
were talking about substance before and how that was, Like, Yeah,
I was just like, you don't have to fucking do this, Demimore,
But the fact that she was doing it made me like, well,
now you're my favorite actor of the year, Like you
won you won actress in my book, Like it's fucking fantastic,
And I wanted to know what it's like to be
in that performance. I'm a huge fan of There will

(39:07):
be Blood, And there's that moment where Daniel day Lewis
pulls Paul dan out through the mud and then smacks
him around and like beats the shit out of him basically,
And I watch it like unrewind every time I watch
the movie because I'm like, why, Like there's so many
other ways to cut this, but you know that they went, oh, no,
we're gonna do this. If we're gonna do it, you're
gonna drag me through the muddy. It's like wrestling, like

(39:30):
a wrestler is like, drag me through the mud, make
me look nasty. It's the same concept. And I love wrestling,
so I'm a huge aw fan, and I just really
love the idea of like going for it, just giving
something you're all in a performance and seeing them do that,
it made me go like, well, what can I do?
And I'm not I know, I'm known Daniel day Lewis

(39:52):
or Paul Danel, but I get naked on a table
in negative three degree weather and look like I'm giving
a perform because I'm actually freezing out yeah on the table,
Like I've had people go, you know, you look terrified
in that moment, I'm like, thank you, I really appreciate it.
Turns out it's just negative three degrees when we were
filming and I was shaking, like I was freezing to

(40:15):
death and like people talking about the blood effect, they're like, man,
the blood looks so nasty and cool, and I'm like, oh, thanks, Yeah,
it was a lot of work. No, it was just freezing.
The blood was literally freezing to my face. So that's
why it looked like that. So like I will say,
like I totally agree. You watch my movies. Like the
biggest one of the biggest gripes we get is like,
why are there are no boobs? There's no I don't.

(40:37):
I don't do exploitation in that way. I'm not good
at it, you know.

Speaker 2 (40:42):
And I think some people know how to do it
and do it well.

Speaker 3 (40:46):
Substance has a ton of nudity in it, and none
of it felt unwarranted. It all felt like no, wow,
this is like the way this movie needed to play.

Speaker 2 (40:55):
Yeah, and it and because the film was so ingrained
in just like body image things, I don't want to
spoil it for anybody. Yeah, but like that even became
like like an intentional choice because I thought suited the narrative.
And when you suit the narrative, like like look a
look at the original Terminator, Like if if you don't

(41:16):
have that love scene, like literally the rest of the series,
like you won't understand it because like that's such a
pivotal moment in that story, like that's where John Connor's
you know a thing now, So if you don't see
that connection between those two characters, like you never believe
it for sure. So you know, sometimes you do have
to show non tell. But I also I don't at

(41:39):
no point again in that film that I feel there
was you know, Linda Hamilton wasn't treated exploitively or viewed
through that gaze. And I really appreciate, you know, those
type of films.

Speaker 3 (41:50):
No, And I think that I just I like this
topic because of the fact that I think a lot
of low budget filmmakers, people who are listening to this
right now might be thinking to themselves, Okay, I gotta
do this thing. I got to exploit in some way.
I gotta find a way to you know, do this
sort of thing. And maybe you do, like I don't
know what movie you're making, I don't know what you're
doing it. Maybe you do, but you don't have to

(42:12):
it really now, if that's not your prerogative, you don't
have to.

Speaker 2 (42:17):
And that was what we really wanted to do, is
so we we built street rat studios with sort of
that mantra of just like this should be a safe
place for performers, you know, of all walks of life,
filmmakers of every diversity, to come in and feel safe
to just create and not have to worry about because
there's so much pressure. Because I remember early early on,

(42:40):
when we did Bad Friend, we talked to a distributor
and they read me the riot Act because they were like, well,
your film is full of ugly men, I don't have
any sexual content. I can't market this, Like can you
go and shoot some stuff? Can you like put that
stuff in there? I was like absolutely not, you know,

(43:01):
because the whole film is this gay parable anyways, and
I was like it wouldn't fit the narrative that's happening
on screen, so absolutely not. And we didn't end up
getting distribution because we kept getting notes like that of
people saying, well, where's the boobs, where's the sex, where's
the this? And that really just stuck with me, is like,
that's so ridiculous to me, that, like you can't sell

(43:24):
a story.

Speaker 3 (43:26):
Yeah for sure, And I think, yeah, it is fascinating
because there are distributors who just won't get that but
I think as filmmakers, going outside of just the distribution element,
you're learning a lot about the kind of stories you
want to tell and the kind of filmmaking you want
to do. I think the more you worry about like
can I sell this? Can I not, you're just hindering

(43:48):
yourself for your future.

Speaker 2 (43:50):
Yeah, and I get the pressure to do it because
like there is sort of like that moment I think
every filmmaker, and no matter what your final antent is,
you have that moment of like you sit down to
the project and you're like, is this gonna jive for
other people? And sometimes you have to just dust that
off your shoulder and say like, well, I gotta make
this for me first and then and you know what,

(44:12):
maybe that limits, you know, some commercial viability that it
might have later for it at least I have. I
can walk away from the film that I make well
that my entire team, like our team makes and say
like we did the thing we set out to do
and we're proud of it, rather than this is this
thing that was like tampered with to try to appeal

(44:32):
to X demographic. Yes, it's it's so dishonest to me
to do that. And I just yeah, no, interesting.

Speaker 3 (44:40):
I love that. I love that honesty is it's the
way to go, at least for me from a creative perspective.
And I think I mean, with that being said, I
watch tons of grindhouse, nasty movies, like I watch all
of that stuff. So if that's what you want to
do person listening to this, go for it, like truly,
if that is your passion, I don't have any with it. It

(45:00):
just it's not my passion personally to do that that way. Well,
let's talk about the Beast of Walton Street and what
led to this being the film that you wanted to make.
I assume that this was inside of your concept of
making something that wasn't necessarily exploitation. It has a very

(45:23):
what's the term it's I mean, it has a very raw,
you know, punk rock feel to it, but it also
is very polished, like it's very well crafted. I was
super impressed by, you know, some really fantastic shots, really
clean even with that rawness, which is I think is
a testament when you can be visually clean. It looks nice,

(45:46):
but the feeling is very raw. I think there's something
very there's a talent that comes to that so where
did this idea come from and how did it come
to be?

Speaker 2 (45:57):
It was actually it was born. This is that's why
I being on this podcast today is sort of a
full circle moment for me. So it's really cool because
we were we'd been doing the web series for a
while and I had been veering towards like, well, we
should do our first feature soon, like as Street Rat Studios.
And then we saw a couple of movies that were
playing on the local circuit and they were really likeugh,

(46:18):
just like there was a movie where like the entire
cast was just naked women for the whole run time,
and it was like this had to not be fun
for them or anyone. And so that kind of put
a little fire under And then the Rodriguez Show that
you were on came out, and you know, my wife
and I were sitting there watching it and I'm like,

(46:39):
we could we could make a movie for seven K
and we were like yeah, yeah, what would that be?
And I was like, well, you know what, I wanted
to do this wir Olf movie since I was a
little kid. Let's do it now. The budget ended up
being more like fourteen K. After post it doesn't see
that's the thing, like these all bullshit. They're all bullshit because,

(47:01):
like you watched the show, you saw Robert gave us
access to locations that I maybe wouldn't have been able
to get, Like I was able to film at Troublemaker
Studio for a day, and like, yeah, so so the
hell sequence in The Good Exorcist, it all takes place
on a really cool lot that I probably maybe I
could have gotten something similar, but I didn't have to
really work at it or pay anyone to use it.

(47:23):
The house that I filmed at the beginning of the
movie that was our mansion, and I just wrote it
into the movie because I'm like, we have this amazing
location instead of having it at someone's shitty house, Let's
have it at the mansion because that's production value.

Speaker 3 (47:36):
And so like there's lots of stuff like that. So
I say, like, if you're under one hundred K, it's
just it's all bullshit numbers, like it doesn't it doesn't matter.
Fourteen K. Like the Great Woods plot, I don't have
Great Wood plot doesn't have a budget. I don't know
what it is. It was at two thousand dollars, was
it twenty thousand dollars? I didn't pay myself for post production.

(47:56):
So I always say, if I had paid myself, it
would be a two hundred thousand dollars movie.

Speaker 2 (48:01):
Oh absolutely. And that's that's one of the things that
I think people don't talk about a lot with indie
film is the value you're just getting out of yourself
because like for us, I handle you know, I edit
our films, I do most of the VFX. I do
you know, so much a post that we're saving thousands
of dollars that normally you would be paying out to

(48:23):
you know, outsource it. So whatever we can keep in
house is more we can put on screen or you know,
we can actually because one of the things that we're
very very strict about is paying all the actors like
what they're worth. If things get short changed elsewhere, whether
it's me or somebody else, like that's like in house.

(48:46):
But your team, like, I'm so grateful to them because
you can't make a movie alone. I mean you could,
You've done it. You've done some really cool stuff on
your own. I love watching some of that stuff. But like,
I'm so grateful to them, and I think that you
really do need a risk. It's a sign of respect
to say like, hey, you know, we don't have a

(49:07):
million dollars, but like, I'm still going to go out
of my way to make sure that you're getting what
it's worth to be here because we're so grateful you're here.

Speaker 3 (49:16):
Yeah, I totally agree. Yeah, I mean it was one
of the things on Rebel without a crew. They were
very much like I was spending all my money on
paying my cast instead of like buying effects or doing stuff.
And they were like, stop doing that. None of the
other filmmakers. Not not throwing anyone under the bus, it
just wasn't expected that they cast was going to be
paid or anything, and I just kept paying them. If

(49:38):
you were there for a day, you got one hundred
dollars or whatever. And I was like, I'm going to
pay people whatever I can, and I will instead of
buying a monster effect, I'll make it out of a
trash bag, Like we'll figure this out. And at a
certain point the reality crew came over and they were like, hey,
stop paying them. We are paying them like they are
being paid for being on the reality show. So so

(50:00):
no one is losing money on this. Put some money
into the budget, and I end up not putting money
into the budget. Anyway, I ended up paying the people
who at the end, I was like, we're getting they
deserve more. Like Curtis did the score. I was like, dude,
I'm gonna pay Curtis fifteen hundred dollars because he did
the score is like a character of the movie in
and of itself. They deserve the money for the time

(50:21):
they put into it. And that's still you know, small
potatoes compared to what the time that they put in
and what they deserve for it. So yeah, finding a
way to pay people or just you know, make it
worth their time. On Preywood's plot, there's a scene where
we're running through this like zombie forest. I did that
on my birthday. I had everyone come out for my

(50:41):
birthday and I was like, instead of buying me a present,
we'll provide food, we'll provide fear. And instead of instead
of buying me a present, buy zombie makeup. Because it
was right around Halloween, I'm like, go to a spirit Halloween,
buy yourself zombie makeup, yeah, and come out and be
in a movie. So I didn't have to pay them
because they were coming to a birthday party and they
were going to be filmed for a few minutes and

(51:02):
they spent you know, each of them spent twenty dollars
on makeup and instead of buying food that's really present
or whatever. And they felt like it was the best
experience ever because they got to be in a movie
and I got cheap labor, like you know what I mean.
So it worked out for everyone, but it but it
was one of those things where it's like, how do
you work how do you game the system? So everyone

(51:24):
comes out ahead at the end of the day.

Speaker 2 (51:26):
Yeah, yeah, And I know with Walton Street, you know,
we were very very blessed. I know you mentioned like
the the image and stuff like that. That was that's
my cousin. Aaron pangnano Is is my cousin. It's one
of my favorite little humans in the world. And Aaron
is fantastic, has a wonderful I and is just you know,

(51:47):
they're they're an amazing writer, director, and their their own
you know space as well, and we kind of do
back and forth stuff for each other, like for Aaron's
new film, like I did some VFX and I did
some they needed some kind of snuffy looking footage that
was real rough, and I was like, yeah, yeah, our
team will do that, Well, we'll do that. So we

(52:07):
do that back and forth. So you know, Erin was awesome.
Aaron came out here, we worked together on the gear
and it was the first time I'd ever had like
a DP that wasn't myself, and it was such a
beautiful experience because like suddenly I had time to talk
more with my actors or.

Speaker 3 (52:25):
You had someone to bounce ideas with too. Like that's
a huge part of it where I have said, like,
if I don't have to edit, I will never edit again,
because you still get to edit. You just don't have
to press the buttons if you have another edit, if
you have an editor working on it, and there's nothing
better than like with Little Lucha and the Big Deal. Yeah,
me Wanta edited it and I was like, just take it,

(52:46):
take the footage and you take it. I don't want
to know what you're gonna do with it. Just go.
And then he sat back a version and I was like, oh,
those are some bold choices like and it made me
think more, you know, stuff I never would have thought of.
And I love that, like I love having a second
set of eyes on everything.

Speaker 2 (53:04):
And it was really important and it was you know,
and because one of the things Athena, my wife and
I set out with Walton Street was like we knew
with like the initial shooting budget was seven K, and
we knew we were going to have to done more
in a post as far as like song licensing and
stuff like that. But like we were, we wanted to
prove that you could do like seven K and at
least make it look like one hundred thousand or you know,

(53:25):
whatever amount that was. I wanted people to be confused
when they watched it, going like, I know this costs
no money, but like there's some cool stuff in here
that's rallying against that in some way. I really wanted
people to walk away going I have no freaking clue
what that cost, because it shouldn't be about what your
movie costs, but there is a certain level of like

(53:46):
I also wanted to say, like, you can make us
like professional looking thing without destroying your savings.

Speaker 3 (53:53):
And so with The Good Exorcist, I knew everyone would
know it was a seven thousand dollars movie because the show,
Oh it was just that was built into the movie.
So whenever they'd allow me to do a Q and
A or a like B at the theater as it
was playing. I would always ask if I could go
up before the movie, and I would say, before the movie,

(54:15):
I'm like, when you start watching the movie, take every
shot and start adding it up. How much it costs?
How much do you think this shot costs? How much
do you think this shot costs? How much do you
think this Like if you need to do that through
the movie, because it's a seven thousand dollars movie, do that.
And when you get to seven thousand dollars, stop thinking
about the budget. And I can't tell you how many

(54:36):
people were, Like I made it three scenes into the
movie and I was like, all right, I'm done thinking
about the budget, because it's like, yeah, it just we
can get so much production value out of what we
can do these days that it's like I can make
the first scene look like it costs two thousand dollars,
like it just that's what people think. And then all
of a sudden, you're like, wow, that was already two
thousand dollars, and I'm only three minutes into the movie, okay,

(54:57):
And they just give up and they just watch the
movie as is. And that's kind of how I felt
about Walton Street was It's just like I didn't think
about the but I don't think about the budget at all,
because it's just you just want to watch the movie
because it looks nice from the beginning.

Speaker 2 (55:11):
Thank you, thank you.

Speaker 3 (55:11):
It just looks nice. It's got good perform everything is
like it has good performances and things that make you
get lost. And that's what I hope happens with my
movies as well. And I think it's something that ye
indie filmmakers strive for, is just to be able to
go like forget, forget the budget, and we talk about
the budget, we throw it out there, but we're also
like the dream is that we someday don't have to

(55:34):
even talk about it. That people just go like it
doesn't matter what the budget was because it just looks
nice and I'm into the story.

Speaker 2 (55:40):
Yeah, And you know, I I grew when I was
growing up, I was I was a punker. I was
a punk kid. You know, I was a grungeer. I
was all those like. I was, you know, huge alt kid,
and sometimes I like the rough edges.

Speaker 3 (55:52):
Yeah I still do.

Speaker 2 (55:55):
And with Walton Street, I really wanted to like just
come out swing and saying like this is a movie
that very me and you know, for better or for worse,
and if you jive with that, that is so freaking cool.
If it doesn't, then that's cool too. You know. We
really tad to take that attitude when we started the

(56:16):
follow up then, which was fiber Burn, which is now
like a sci fi horror cyberpunk sort of very I
was really inspired by Richard Stanley's hardware and a lot
of like the Tank Girl and that kind of stuff.
And I was huge into the old Battle Angel like
comics on the manga. So I loved seeing the movie

(56:38):
So We, which is totally different, and it's also very
inspired by like the new French extremity movement, which is
totally the opposite of everything Walton Street was. Walton Street
was very much like, you know, almost like a Dimension
era you know, kind of Pop nine War a flick
with a lot of the Quippi dialogue. It's very Kevin
Williamson esque. Because Scream changed my life right for sure.

(57:04):
But you know when we went into the next one
then it was it was like, okay, cool, well we
did that with the first one. We set a standard
for ourselves. Now how to want to we want to
prove you know, we up the budget. But now we
wanted to say, okay, well cool, we have X amount now,
but now it has to look like it costs even
more than that. And then the one we're doing after,

(57:25):
which is Spooky Madison's first feature that they wrote, I'm
directing that one's a little bit bigger, and then we're like, okay,
well that has to look double that budget. So it's
just been a But there's a point where you got
to start to like, you don't want to I don't know,
you want to get to the point where you're spending
so much money that you start to lose sight of

(57:47):
sometimes the ingenuity that's bred from not having enough resources.
I think that's almost the most important part of making
indie film is having restrictions.

Speaker 3 (57:58):
Yeah, and I totally agree that you can't instantly are
trying to go like up your game that it. You know,
if this one looks was fourteen thousand, and it looks
like it's one hundred thousand, and we're doing the next
one for fifty thousand, it has to look like two
hundred thousand, you get in this like mindset of that versus.
I do think that there's a certain point where you
just like kind of forget. You just go like, who

(58:20):
gives a fuck, We're just gonna make the best thing
we have with what we have, and let's just do
this thing. And I do think that at a certain
point people don't care, like they don't think about it.
I mean, I think we as filmmakers really do and
it's impossible for us not to. Like, again, I hate
to keep going back to substance, but it's just this

(58:40):
fucking it's burned in my skull now. But I spent
the whole time just like doing the same thing, thinking
about the budget, thinking about like, oh my god, how
did they do this and this and this and this
and this and this and this, and yeah, that game
is something we naturally play. But I can tell you
I was the only one in the theater doing that.
There were thirty other people watching the movie with me
who are just going like, what the fuck am I watching?

(59:02):
And that's the point that you want to get to,
where you just want to be in the theater with people.
I Mean. One of my favorite stories as of recent
that has been kind of my my go to is
I showed Little Luca and the Big Deal at Thanksgiving
last year and it ended and everyone was like, oh
my god, this was so so great, and because it's cute,

(59:22):
it's fair, it's not it's me and Scarlet made it together,
and it's not really like, it's not exactly just me. Yeah,
there are elements of me, but it's not quite as
pushing the boundaries as what I like. It's not as
fucked up or weird, so it's more accessible to like
average moviegoers. And it ended and my a family member

(59:43):
was like, well that was a lot better than the
one with the evil Telephone, and my mother in law
was just like, oh no, that was my favorite one,
and it was like it just proved the polar opposites
of like my mother in law, who doesn't like grindhouse stuff,
doesn't have any interest. She loved The Good Exorcist, like
there's something about that to her is just yeah, it's

(01:00:04):
just so fun and enjoyable. And she's like Christians, so
there's an element of that movie that I think she like, yeah,
still pulls these little concepts that she thinks is interesting
from whereas like the other person was just like fuck
that stupid movie. He wouldn't like Pee Wee's Playhouse or
or you know, Evil Dead either, So like he's just

(01:00:25):
it wasn't made for someone like him, and that's great,
but it's just it just proves like you're just kind
of trying to find whatever audience you can at this
low budget range and hope that someone out there likes
it and digs it and there always will be.

Speaker 2 (01:00:39):
Well, I like what you mentioned there about you know,
like bringing in you know, because you did that film,
you know, in collaboration, so you're bringing in a different sensibility,
and like Spook and I do all kinds of stuff together.
I met on fire or burn, I cast them. We
just like vibed on set. We have a joke that
we share with one brain cell and so. But you know,

(01:01:01):
so we're doing you know, this vampire film next year
called What's Wrong Wendy, and they wrote it. They're a
director writer on their own right, but there's so much
of their sensibility now that they're bringing in. And it's
my first opportunity to really ever direct somebody else's script.

Speaker 3 (01:01:17):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:01:17):
I always write my stuff, and it's so freaking exciting
to think, like, Okay, cool, I get to I get
to collaborate on this story and figure out, Okay, well,
how do I get you know, their sensibilities best represented
and also get those those pieces of me that that
I always like to have in my stuff. And I
think that kind of collaboration can be really creatively just freeing, because.

Speaker 3 (01:01:42):
Yeah, it's so necessary, and we see it happen all
the time with people who like make it in the
industry that they you know, produce other people's stuff. They
start to work on other projects in a different ways.
They do that because it's creatively engaging, like it it
makes you think out of your box or think outside
of your norm to be able to Like I've been

(01:02:03):
working on this project called band aid Face for forever. Yeah,
it's just it's been an ongoing thing. It all started
because my wife hates band aids. So it became this
character that I was like, this is the movie that
I'm gonna make. That's terrifying because it's going to be
a character as band aids on its face and every
time I say band aid face, she cringes. And it's
just become an ongoing thing. But then I started writing

(01:02:24):
the script that became an extremely personal movie about like, yeah,
night terrors and my like fear of like I have
night terrors, I have sleep paralysis, and it became this
like way of me kind of putting that into horror
terms that was sort of like Nightmare on Elm Street,
but my, yeah, what it really feels like the reason

(01:02:44):
why I like Nightmare on Elm Street as a kid,
and why that stood out to me, how do I
explain that same thing to people now in my own way?
And so I started writing this band aid phase character.
And as I started, as I finished the script and
finished the first draft, I was like, I don't know
if this movie it's very personal, but I don't know
if it's my story to tell visually and in a

(01:03:06):
certain way. So I've actually been talking talking to Scarlett
about directing it because I'm like, I want to know
what you cause it's there's a very feminine side of
the movie that I'm just like, I pulled from concepts
I kind of understand, but I don't know if I
fully understand it, and I would like to see someone
else's perspective on it. And so Scarlet and I started

(01:03:27):
talking about this script because it was just like, I
think you have something that you could add that I don't.
I don't know if I have it to say, And
I yeah, and I think we have to be honest
with ourselves sometimes, Like we were talking about earlier, you
you don't want to exploit people in your movies. And
I had something that I started to say that I
realized like, oh, this isn't necessarily mine to say, but

(01:03:49):
I said what I needed to say in the first draft.
Now maybe you take it and you find something to
put into it. And I guarantee that that collaboration, if
it happens, it'll make the movie so much better just
because it is creatively engaging two people. And Scarlet and
I do have a similar sensibility, so I think she'll
read it or and she's like, I know what you're

(01:04:10):
trying to say. Here, you can say it. Don't be
scared to say this thing. And so like those are
the things that I think she'd pull out of it
from me. And similar with Little Luca in the Big Deal,
there was a lot of that coming out of both
of us, where it was like she had something to
say and then I had something to say, and we
go back and forth and it came together into a
very sweet personal project for both of us.

Speaker 2 (01:04:33):
That's lovely, and you know, sometimes it's amazing to me,
like when I was writing fiber Burne. I got about
halfway through the script and I started to latch into
what I was doing because there was a lot of
discourse at that time, you know, gender stuff out there,
and that stuff is still ongoing, and I'm very passionate
about it, and I started to realize what was happening.

(01:04:54):
I was putting all of like my fears, my frustrations.
I was just pouring that energy. And I started to
read it back like after I did like my Vomit draft,
and I was like, oh boy, this is the single
most personal thing I've ever written. And then so it
became very important to me. Then it's like, okay, well,
I really got to lock down this cast. I really

(01:05:16):
have to find, you know, a director of photography that
will understand this, which we found amazing director of photography
that was able to really like hone into you know,
what that world look like and make it look just
so raw and just grungy. But then working with some

(01:05:37):
of the performers, it was like, oh, I have to
let go with these characters a little now, you know.
And I worked with people like you know, Spooky and
Alex beachkow Angel and Chadwick and suddenly I was like,
these characters now are theirs, and they're doing their own thing,
and you have to like unmarry yourself from your own
material at some point and let trust your perform because

(01:06:00):
I see a lot of people not trusting their performers
and that actors are you know, and hear like the
typical like cliche thing like directors like actors they're so hard,
and I'm like, no, they're not. They're lovely. I freaking
love working with actors. It's my favorite part of being
on set.

Speaker 3 (01:06:19):
Oh yeah, I mean, oh yeah, I love it. And
but you see it all the time. I mean I
don't know. I I see it all the time doing
like behind the scenes shooting and stuff like that, where
I'm just like, oh you it's not that the actor
is challenging. It's that you don't understand what's happening. And
it's hard to have that out of body experience for
some people where they're like able to watch the performance happen.

(01:06:41):
I think I'm the opposite. I love working with actors
so much and I just don't I don't have an
ego about my projects. I'm always just like, what can
you bring? Because I'm I don't know the answers to
every single moment. You've thought about that character, probably more
than I have, yes, because I've thought about the story,
the visual, the sound, the everything. If you have something

(01:07:03):
to bring to me, bring it because I want to
hear everything. And that's my I mean, one of my
favorite characters in any of my projects is Stanley and
The Good Exorcist, and he was written completely different than
what I got, and that's just because I was like, Avery,
just do stuff like you are funny, be funny, and
I will I'm gonna film it. And he was like

(01:07:24):
constantly ready to be hilarious and made for one of
my favorite characters just because he went for it all
the time. I hate to say that we have to
wrap this up, that it's already been an hour. This
is crazy. So I'm I know we'll have to do
this again for sure, and with Fiberburn and What's Wrong

(01:07:46):
Wendy coming out, you know in the future you gotta
come back like this is gonna have to happen. We're
gonna have to talk about those love it and you'll
have to tell me more stories. But because this this
was just fantastic. Where can people see the projects you've
you've worked on, the things you've made, and follow along
with you in the future.

Speaker 2 (01:08:06):
Yeah. Actually a Beasta Walton ste Stee Jesus Basta Walton
Street drops in November from Screen Team Releasing, which I
can second with some other folks have said on this podcast.
They've treated us great, they've been hands on, highly recommend
and then after you know it does its physical release run,

(01:08:27):
it'll kind of move into streaming and that kind of stuff.
Fiberburn fingers crossed, we're hoping to get that starting to
do the festival circuit and the next year then what's wrong,
Wendy starts shooting in June and then you know that'll
also we're kind of hoping that Fiberburn and Wendy can
be like a one two punch sort of release release.

Speaker 3 (01:08:50):
That's awesome and it's such a I mean, I love
moves like that when you can see because one of
the biggest pet peeves with low budget filmmakers is the
fact that it's so much work that I only get
to see one of their movies every three years, four years.
It just takes forever. That's how it goes. I'man literally
that's me right now where I'm just like trying to
take the next project out because they're just so challenging

(01:09:11):
to get finished. This has been absolutely fantastic. Thank you
so much for coming on the show, Josh.

Speaker 2 (01:09:18):
I appreciate you so much, and I look forward to
hearing the rest of the season and next time, I
want to talk about Greywood Spot, okay, because I have questions, Man,
I have questions.

Speaker 3 (01:09:30):
Awesome, Oh, wasn't that great. I really enjoyed that conversation.
Not only was it an ego boost, because Dusty was
just so fantastic too. You know, pat my ego a
little bit about my projects. It's so fun to talk
to someone with a unique, different perspective, and she was

(01:09:52):
just fantastic. I I am in the middle of reading
a book speaking of interesting, fascinating perspectives. I'm going to
do a book recommendation, even though I haven't finished the book,
so maybe it gets really really bad. But I just
finished Cinema Speculation, or I'm not to finish. Jesus Christ,
I just finished a book called Start with Why is

(01:10:17):
the name of the book, and this is not This
is not the recommendation, although I do recommend it. It was
a really good book. And really got me thinking about
why I make movies, what my reason is for creating,
and why I struggle with certain parts of the process. Specifically,
here's the thing I mean. I talked about it a
little bit in recent podcasts, but I may have found

(01:10:41):
realizations about myself in independent filmmaking and why I like
independent filmmaking, specifically the collaboration. I love the collaborative process
with people. It's why Scumbag has been so hard to finish.
I love being on set, I love being around people.
I love creative energy. I love talking things through people.
That's my why of filmmaking. So I started this book

(01:11:03):
called Cinema Speculation with quent Or by Quentin Tarantino, and
I'm about halfway through it and I absolutely love it.
And the reason I specifically love it is having finished
this book, I was able to kind of dissect why
Tarantino makes movies like he does, the way he produces them,
and the way he thinks about movies in general, based

(01:11:28):
on especially based on the first chapter where he talks
about his youth. But you know, the way he breaks
down movies and his love of movies is his way
of impressing people, his way of communicating with people, and
I find the book absolutely fascinating. So that's my recommendation
is Cinema Speculation by Quentin Tarantino. He goes through specific

(01:11:48):
movies and breaks down what works and what doesn't work
for him, but also like dives deep into the history
of the movie, where movies were at at the time.
And if you like that sort of retrospective look at
films and if you're into older films, because that's a
big part of what it is. It's movies from the
seven a lot of movies from the seventies and so far,

(01:12:11):
and then now like a break down of the change
in film at the time of the seventies. But then
I think as the book progresses, it gets into other
stuff and you know, hearing a filmmaker that I respect
talk about movies some of which I've seen, some of
which I haven't. It's just it's really a change of

(01:12:33):
pace from being told specifically, like a lot of the
books are like this was the history, my history. You
get some of Tarantino's history, but you get a lot
more depth into why and his reasons and his love
of film. So that is something that I think is
inspirational or can be inspirational for a lot of filmmakers.
If you have a book recommendation or something you think

(01:12:54):
I should read or talk about, or if you read
Quentin Tarantina's Tarantina Jesus Christ, Quentin Tarantino Cinema Speculation, drop
me a line, tell me what you thought of it
at speakpipe dot com slash Low Budget Rebels and you
can leave a voicemail there for me and I'll play
on the show. So if you have a book recommendation

(01:13:17):
you'd like to review or talk about, head over there
speakpipe dot com slash Low Budget Rebels. All right, until
next time. I am a stuttering Stanley this morning, dude.
I've had such a long weekend. We finally got the
house in order, the studio setup. I met with Sean
and we went over like specifics of what we're going
to do to get this movie, get that Dick made.

(01:13:39):
And my brain's a little fried. So that's why I
am stuttering like crazy and stammering. But I am so
I was so honored to have Dulstie on the show.
This was such a great episode. And if you have
any guests that you would like me to have on
season six when that starts up. Feel free to send
me those messages. Let me know I love hearing from you.
All all right, until next time, Stay rebellious, keep making

(01:14:02):
the movies you're making, keep making the art you want
to make, keep kicking ass, and don't let you meet
low folks. Low Budget Rebels is brought to you by
the indie film Hustle Network, Recorded at Flush Studios headquarters
in tropical Atlanta, Produced by the film daddy Josh Stifter,
Ba ba ba boo,