NONHUMAN RESOURCES

This is a strange case of accidental symmetry. Last year, when we made six shorts in six months (as part of Group101), we made a five-minute short called Nonhuman Resources. It starred Stephen Brophy, Jenna Fischer, and Rachel Kann. It was a documentary-style comedy about Grimm Brothers, a corporation that places storybook characters (witches, elves, fairies, the three little pigs) in appropriate jobs. I hadn't yet seen the BBC's The Office (though I had heard about it and it sounded great), but my impression was that we were doing something similar. In our short, the jokes were played very, very realistically, and the acting was really incredible. Afterward, I watched The Office and completely loved it. What we did with Nonhuman Resources was, indeed, very similar to the BBC's The Office.

NBC was going to remake The Office (set in America), and Jenna had auditioned for it. She actually got the call while we were shooting that yes, she was probably going to get a "series regular" role on NBC's remake. Now it's official. NBC's The Office premieres this month, and Jenna Fisher is a regular cast member, alongside Steve Carrell (Anchorman, The Daily Show) and Rainn Wilson (he was the amazing Arthur on Six Feet Under). Jenna also shot an upcoming Six Feet Under episode. Hopefully, Nonhuman Resources will start showing up at festivals this summer or fall. Or I may break down and just post it here much sooner than that. Not sure.

As for The Black Lodge, a few promising things have not materialized and now there's little chance we'll shoot the feature in Texas this summer. I may actually shoot a horror short in California (as a way to keep away the Non-Shootin' Blues) instead. I've made two horror shorts so far, but both were made quickly and sloppily, and neither one is especially good. Group101 is a great learning tool, but I found that most of my output from that hectic program is more valuable to me as a lesson than as a finished work. It could really help The Black Lodge move forward faster if I had a concrete (and directly-related) example of what kind of movie it's going to be. I haven't decided much about the short so far -- other than the fact that I need and want to do it -- so I'll have to post here again once the details are a little more solid.

The Black Lodge poster image

Here's an early poster idea for The Black Lodge. Thanks to photographer Jack Zeman for setting up the photo shoot and for doing such a great job. Thanks also to Robert Choate for doing special effects makeup.

Also, Indefinitely will be showing at the Filmstock Debrecen Film Festival in Hungary the week of April 1 -7th, at the Apollo Cinema. This is an offshoot of the UK-based Filmstock Film Fest. Thanks to Justin and Neil for the invite.

Welcome to the Blog!

This is our new temporary home. Software (and time) issues have kept me from updating the Bare Ruined Films site for a few months now, so I've shifted to Blogger.com and have put BareRuinedFilms.com on temporary hiatus. We actually have a really cool new site designed by Eric Palmerlee of NYC's Lost Property Information, but have some content hurdles we're still dealing with. Hopefully we'll get the new site online in the first quarter of 2005. It's probably a good idea to strip the site down to its essentials, anyway, as I wonder how much information on the old site was barely ever viewed by anybody.

First, old business. Last September (17-19) I had a blast going to Lexington, Virigina to the Worldfest Lexington Film Festival. They only invited about 15 films, so it was a great honor to be flown out there and to be able to show Indefinitely to the fine folks at Washington & Lee University. Thanks to Hunter Todd and his main supporter in this endeavor, John Dean. A good time was had by all.

Also, last November 11th I was asked to show both Indefinitely and Night Dawn Day for film students at the University of Nevada at Las Vegas. I've never shown both films (which are, thematically, two halves of the same whole) together, so it was a unique experience among film screenings. Actresses Alaina Kalanj and Lisa Carnahan were able to make the trip with me, so it was great having them on hand to answer questions afterward and just hang out.

Here's a blast from the past: our 1999 music video for the Vigilantes of Love's "Resplendent" (featuring Emmylou Harris) is now available on the 2 DVD / 1 CD set, Vigilantes of Love: Fade to Black. You can order it from Fundamental Records and learn more about it at BillandVOL.com. I haven't seen a copy yet, but I know one DVD is a complete live show and the other DVD has the music video and a ton of special features. They're only making 1000 of these puppies.

Now, the future: Our main objective for 2005 is to make The Black Lodge, a brutal low-budget horror movie. Much of the same crew I've worked with in the past is on board -- DP Bill Schwarz, editor Jack Waldrip, actress Alaina Kalanj and line producer Cathy King. The movie will be scored by Kevin Manthei of Invader Zim fame. We are moving forward with the project and hope to shoot it this summer in Texas. We're very excited.