If you recall my previous article on this website, penned a few months back, I wrote in harsh detail my desire to give up making films as well as my despondent, rather nihilistic views on my life at that time. Not wanting to go into much detail or spend the majority of this piece explaining myself, I will say that I meant every word of it. At the time of writing it, I lived life at a thousand miles per hour, and that was on the slow days. With multiple deaths in the family, destroyed relationships and a substance abuse […]

Preface: Tuesday, July 28th – 3:21 am Sleepless nights since going cold turkey from all substances I have been addicted to for the past ten years or more. This is day three, and the cold sweats and shakes have nearly crippled me. I find myself weeping for no reason and feel completely useless and creatively blank. I love everyone else except for myself. I think this is how it is supposed to be. At least for now. Substance abuse has been a large part of my life. I have never considered it a dark or negative thing, since I have […]

From the very start, it seemed that people believed in the project. The screenplay received positive feedback from everyone who read it, the cast was set and eager to begin shooting, and handfuls of friends offered to jump in as the crew. Since we’ve never worked on a budget before, and have been able to turn out schlock-titles such as The Sinful Bitches and Killer Unicorn successfully, we should keep costs low and in our ballpark. Somewhere in the rough estimation of $400, which would include wardrobe, equipment costs, and maybe even enough for booze at the end of each […]

I always felt that being a starving artist has many overlooked benefits. Think about it. Keeping a nice rail-thin frame like those models in magazines. Cultivating that cool ’70s junky look you aspired for when you would watch Joe Dallesandro films as a kid. Saving the change in your pocket for “artistic supplies” instead of junk foods. Seriously, alcohol and drugs are so much funner than slamming down a few Mama Celeste pizzas or handfuls of tater tots. And making a film, painting on a canvas, playing music and writing are all so much rewarding than dollar-meal burger and fries. […]

Is it weird that I get excited when I spot a boom mic in a film? Is it strange that I feel a huge rush of excitement when I notice that cameraman’s reflection in a scene? When an actor fumbles his lines or when I catch an extra staring directly at the camera during a shot makes me feel warm and fuzzy on the inside? These moments are usually not intended by the filmmakers, but it is heartwarming to capture such mistakes on celluloid. Which brings me to my point. Don’t hide your flaws! This is the true magic of […]

As the clock struck twelve on New Years Eve, the blood ran cold through my veins. My stomach tightened into a knot so tense that I could barely finish my glass of six dollar champagne without feeling like I would spew vomit all over my girlfriend. It was New Year’s Eve, and we had decided to get drunk alone out of exhaustion of going to parties and our shared social anxiety issues. Interestingly enough, it wasn’t the fact that another year had been set upon us to painfully endure that made me nauseous, nor was it the disgustingly sweet champagne […]

I have never made a New Year’s resolution in my life and am not about to start now. I guess I always figured that things would just fall into place on their own; that my weak, frail and sickly looking body would magically morph into a more healthy and muscular build overnight, that I would stop spending most of my savings on cheap booze, drugs and cigarettes on a whim or perhaps try to be nicer to those I dislike. Maybe I felt that I would just grow tired of my own lifestyle and change things up. Maybe I was […]

The summer was nearing its end, fall was nearby, but the kitchen was still hotter than we’d ever experienced throughout the previous few months. I was just completing my final level at the French Culinary Institute, working the Saucier station in the kitchen of ‘L’ecole,’ sweating under my chef whites. burning my hands on the hot pots and pans, slicing the tips of my fingers with my blade, and rushing to get each dish out on time before having my ear chewed off by one of my angry instructors. After each service came to an end, there was a sense […]

UPDATE, August 4, 2012: Courtney Sell just informed us by email that a week after this post his title has appeared in the Amazon catalog. Congrats, Courtney! You’ve secured solid distribution for your film, you’ve obtained a mountain of press (good and bad), you’ve alerted everyone you know of its release date, have worked endlessly with your marketing team to make sure it will be carried in as many stores as possible, and produced posters and advertising materials, and now you anxiously await viewing the number of units pushed in the books. Beads of sweat drip from your forehead, your […]

When, five years ago, I was first approached by my own father, who was struggling through his final stages of hospice care, to document his “final days,” I was placed in an extremely difficult position; both as a documentary filmmaker and as his son. He only had a handful of days left and needed an immediate response as to whether or not I would be up for the job, or if he needed to find someone else to make his film. I had just completed my first feature-length documentary, which was based around the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, and needless […]