Iron Pan

Ever since I saw the myspace page for Snakes on a Train I think about how that movie got off the ground. I bet it was something like, "let's do that shit" Which is how I feel everything should go. And if the idea is good the person you're talking to should say, "Seriously? Somebody is gonna pay for that?"

That brings me to Iron Pan. Well, almost.

Mark Wynns had posted something about mockbusters that he read in the NY Times and I got to thinking about 'ol Snakes on a Train again and laughing. I think I read that and the next day Tony Holley and I were driving from Houston to Austin and I was on only a couple of hours sleep so I was idiot o'clock and I bounced around and ranted and we come up with Iron Pan.

In May Iron Man will be released. Will it be good? I doubt it but you never know, maybe someone won't fuck up a huge budget superhero movie. (yeah and maybe Pimento Cheese will taste good) so first watch the Iron Man trailer.

Now let me give you the pitch on Iron Pan. (I really should just be making this instead of blogging it but its 4:30am and I can't sleep so you get the chance to steal it from me)
it is about a cocky, alcoholic Iron Chef type guy. Well, he's a big shot and then some terrorists snatch him up and try to force him to make a dessert to kill the President. But he doesn't. He makes a frying pan. that's it, it is just a regular iron skillet. It looks like a regular skillet. He bonks people on the head with it, fights Mongols and ninjas and vikings, blocks bullets and all kinds of other dumber, dumb ass shit. But it's just a drunk with a pan. I'm just gonna shoot a trailer because really, I'm gonna need someone to shell out some cash to jam out a retarded feature about a drunk chef with a pan that has an adventure.

But if you saw that Iron Man trailer, Iron Pan could rock ass for about 124 seconds as a trailer. If you wanna help me get this monkey on a stick, gather up some funny shit and some ninja outfits and let's go.
A horse would be good too- for the Mongols. Just imagine someone saying the line, "I AM IRON PAN!" over and over and over and over

The $2,000 Nachos

That's Blood Car on the same Marquee as a Godard movie. That's pretty sweet company, eh?

My girlfriend and I walk everywhere we can, we live in a great area for it and driving a couple hundred yards is for assholes. So we're walking and I meet eyes with some random guy- I look at everyone- and he says "You want to buy a computer?" I think that its probably gonna be something stupid (I'm mac only) and I'll just walk away. So this guy pulls out a brand new 17-inch macbook pro. He asks for $100. $100!! I KNEW he had to have stolen it so I go ehhhhh and start to hand it back. He says, "Will you give me less?" and I say $50 and he says $60, so I buy it. Then as Katie and I are walking down the street she decides that if we find the owner and give them their computer we can probably restore someone's faith in humanity. So I found the owner's contact info in his address book, called him and told him I bought his macbook for $63 (the $3 was my ATM charge)
Here is a picture of him with his computer.

He was happy.

After he gave me the money I spent, his girlfriend bought us some nachos. I call them the $2,000 nachos. We didn't take a picture, we just ate them and watched the Indians play some more cruddy baseball against the Red Sox. I don't know who at MLB decided that fucking Dane Cook should be doing baseball promos, but he shouldn't be anywhere near them. Get that guy on a bus with that Albatross Kenny Lofton (he's more cursed than Wrigley Field) and drive it right up Barry Bonds ass and that will be a start to fixing baseball. You fix baseball and just watch everything else start to get in line. Give our national pastime back its dignity (from strike to juicing- things have been better) and then you'll see all these other problems fix themselves. I promise.

Saw Gone Baby Gone. Some great stuff, some shitty stuff but Ben Affleck should get to do another movie. Casey Affleck was, of course, great. I liked the movie because C Affleck plays a character that reminds me of Hammett. Always finishing the job he was hired to do, even though no one wants him too. I like the part of a detective story when everything seems wrapped up and then one small thing starts everything unravelling. 'something doesn't sit right with the gumshoe so he stirs up a bunch of shit that ruins everything for everyone, even him.

I also got this hammock up - safely now. I did have it tied to some crap and it fell on me several times but I got t fixed now.It is one bad ass hammock. It makes not having a job ok. not really ok, but not as bad.

The Assassination Of Jesse James

Holy shit this movie is great. I watched Chopper that night. Really interesting to see what this filmmaker like to focus on. After Adam Pinney saw the movie he said we shoulfdshoot a Beardman titled The Assassination of Adam Pinney by the Coward Beardman. I said ok- let's see if we do it. Our last effort at a short- Smelly Couch, was abandoned by me because it had funny parts, from Amber Nash, Katie Rowlett and Adam- basically everyone but me) but wasn't totally funny as a whole. Maybe it is, i don't know anymore. I also just saw Vanaja. Not really worth catching. Although I get the social side of the film, the person pulling the strings- Rajnesh Domalpalli- didn't really do it for me.

Austin is a good town

I went to the Austin Film Festival with my film Blood Car and saw some movies and i'll tell you what I think of them and my trip and the town without ruining the movies or going on and on:

First the movies

Chicago 10: I hate this movie. If I was 17 I would say "Hell Yeah" and hold my fist in the air and protest and be politically charged. But I wasn't feeling like a kid at this screening and the filmmaking in this "docu-drama" is really appalling. (I think docu-drama is what you call someone lying to you in documentary form) basically the sound is punched up for dramatic effect and serious liberties are taken with the performance of the court transcripts. But the film parades as a Doc because of the subject matter and archival footage (tons stolen from a movie with real balls- Medium Cool)the music choices are very MTV with even Eminem and they are really loud-so loud I was unable to hear dialogue. I was angry after the screening and felt the film was manipulative when it had all the material to be Hearts and Minds. I'm for the cause, just not this film.

Juno Great film. At first I thought, awww another Rushmore rip off. The editing is quirky the main character is too smart to be in high school and so on. But its not that at all. the first scene just gives you a feeling that the film is going the wrong way, it has Rainn Wilson (that weird guy from the American Office) in it as a cashier and he shouldn't be in the film. It is a great film. It is so god that Jennifer Garner made me shed a tear. Really funny and sweet and great characters. Better than Thank You For Smoking which is the director's previous work. I think the film will do very well with a wide audience.

Control i didn't know anything about Joy Division (nor have I seen 24 Hour Party People) and I LOVED this movie. It is really hard to believe that its the first feature from a music video director because it is not style over substance. Just see it. I'm probably in the minority on people who aren't into Joy Division liking it but I think its great. And so wonderfully shot (except for the 360 dolly shot, why is that in every director's first feature?)

The Living Wake It's the most original comedy I have ever seen. Seriously. These guys jump head first into such an absurd world and character and really pull it off. it runs a little long at 90 minutes but it doesn't matter because when the lead in this film is on, he's on fire. I don't know when you're gonna get a chance to see this, but if you do, watch it. Its another movie made with Original Media. They did The Squid and the Whale, Half Nelson and the horrible reality show I worked on Miami Ink. They're great people and they make great films, keep it up.

Yeti in the City you'll never get to see this movie. fucking crazy is all I can say. If you get your hands on it, take drugs and then maybe it will pull it all together. This film has really amazing moments, like a Yeti break dancing and cops with dog heads (like mcgruff), talking flies, French monkeys, random animated sequences (yes the previous things were not animated) and a ton of reflexive elements and the filmmakers purposefully muck up the plot and story just to....well I don't know why but its really experimental and i'd even watch it again just to see someone else's reaction. And to take the drugs.


Gimme Green this is a short about lawns. It is awesome. Check out its site HERE the movie played everywhere on the festival circuit and rightly should. It is wonderful. Really funny and addresses what no one thinks is a serious problem. Grass. its about more than that but basically grass. You can see it on the Sundance Channel real soon, check the gimme green site for times. I saw some other short docs but forgot them after I saw this.

I also missed a few movies. 2 of them I will see this week and post about, STREET TEAM MASSACRE and BEYOND THE PALE. I missed LARS AND THE REAL GIRL and I heard it sucks shit from everyone who I listen to. RANDY AND THE MOB was there but I'd rather chew glass than watch that turd again. I had to leave before THE DIVING BELL AND THE BUTTERFLY and I wanna see that. I saw Born on the 4th of July and saw Oliver Stone talk after. I don't really like Born on the 4th of July. I can just watch BEST YEARS OF OUR LIVES which is infinitely better. I just don't like the acting or editing or script or choices in music, so I pretty much just don't like it. Oh, I don't like the sound design either. Honestly, i laughed at the acting in the family breakdown scene. But I saw an Oliver Stone Q&A and I even got him fired up with a question about satire. And he and John Milius talked about war films for 90 minutes at another thing. That was cool. I also saw a ton of other great panels that i'll put in my blog.

All in all, Austin is a great town with what looks like 3 great film festivals. I hung out with folks from the Ann Arbor Film Festival (that needs your help, click here to learn more) the guys at Bside and bunches of random filmmakers and folks.