One Third of the Way

OK, it is a third of the way through 2014 and where am I at on these movie things?

DRIFTER is basically done. Planning to reshoot one scene that will add clarity to the story. Working to schedule for next week. Hoping to have news in the next few weeks about a world premiere for this one.

SECRET PROJECT is about 98% done: shot, edited together, music and sound effects done, opening and ending credits done. Trailer is cut together. Just have a few insert shots to do and drop in and then will announce to the world.

Got http://www.skullfaceastronaut.com set up. More to come…

BLOOD CREEK WOODSMAN is so close to being done done done. Post-production guy had a bit of surgery and a few other delays.

Helping produce a horror feature. More news later.

Tim Shrum is pulling together another horror short for me down in Oklahoma. Tim directed the "Crazed" segment on the TRULY DREADFUL TALES anthology.

Will have a booth at the CHERRY CITY COMIC CON at the beginning of May.

Looking forward to attending another CRYPTICON SEATTLE at the end of May.

Not bad, but plenty of stuff still to do!!!

PHANTASM: RAVAGER

I got excited today when a million horror news sites posted a teaser poster for Phantasm: Ravager…

 Last spring, I wrote a post all about my hopes that creator Don Coscarelli would make a Phantasm 5: http://fandcproductions.blogspot.com/2013/04/phantasm-5.html

I was so excited to read that not only was a new Phantasm coming out, but that it was already all shot and they'd managed to shoot it over the last several years and keep it a secret. Plus several of the regular actors were included in it.

Later in the day, it was revealed that Don did not direct this. A guy named David Hartman did, "under the supervision of Coscarelli." Turns out Don co-wrote it, and has expressed how excited he is about it, so I am still looking forward to it.

But the AMAZING thing was in poking around looking for info about this today, I found a post on a bulletin board from LAST YEAR, where someone had pointed out that one of the fake DVD covers that was in a shot in Don's JOHN DIES AT THE END movie, was in fact for "Phantasm Ravager!"

Mind blown!!!!

I first saw JOHN DIES AT THE END when Don himself introduced it at the Seattle International Film Festival in 2012. So for YEARS, the title of the next Phantasm movie has been right there!!!

I grabbed a screen shot someone had posted and lightened it up a lot to better see the spine of the DVD box. Sure enough…there it is:

Space-Based Fare

Just about 4 years ago to the day, I wrote a blog post called, "Cooking, Party Planners, Feng Shui, Magic and a Docusoap. Really? REALLY?!?!?!" that was about SyFy's announcement of their latest slate of shows and their declaration that the channel's genre was now "imagination-based entertainment" which in my mind was a cover-your-ass way of saying they were going to be able to put on whatever they thought would expand the audience so they could charge more for advertising and not have to worry about it being science fiction anymore.

Given that the cooking, party planner, Feng Shui, magician and psychic mom shows were short-lived, I am not sure if their plan was successful. They did launch Face-Off as a part of that group and that continues to this day. And of course there is that old science-fiction standard: wrestling.

Anyway...

In July of 2010, Syfy President Dave Howe told Forbes that Syfy felt that for the 18-to-34 demographic, "the traditional trappings of science-fiction don’t appeal to that audience. And by that I mean the science-based, technology-based, space-based [fare]."

So I did find it ironic that yesterday, Syfy president Dave Howe talked to The Hollywood Reporter about the network’s beefed-up slate of "space-set sci-fi series and harder sci-fi projects."

Did what that coveted demographic want change in the last four years? Maybe. Certainly networks like TNT, NBC, CW, ABC, HBO and others are showing more sci-fi and fantasy stuff than in years past. The Hollywood Reporter article even positions this as SyFy "getting back" an audience that is finding their sci-fi fix on some of those other networks.

As a fan of space-set sci-fi and such, it will be interesting to see what programming pops up.

Meanwhile I am anxious to check this thing out once it gets done at SXSW and ends up in a local theater or DVD: https://www.facebook.com/SpaceStation76