We're sunsetting PodQuest on 2025-07-28. Thank you for your support!
Export Podcast Subscriptions
cover of episode IFH 804: How I Made a Cult Zombie Movie for $75 and Took On Hollywood with Marc V. Price

IFH 804: How I Made a Cult Zombie Movie for $75 and Took On Hollywood with Marc V. Price

2025/5/27
logo of podcast Indie Film Hustle® - A Filmmaking Podcast

Indie Film Hustle® - A Filmmaking Podcast

AI Deep Dive AI Chapters Transcript
People
M
Marc V. Price
Topics
Marc V. Price: 我因为忙于完成电影而没时间去看电影。我很喜欢《最后的绝地武士》,但《Solo》这部电影太无聊了。汉·索罗在《星球大战》中并不是一个重要的角色,甚至没有一个主题曲。我从来没有讨厌过加·加·宾克斯。最初的三部《星球大战》电影是 universally loved。即使前传不完美,至少乔治·卢卡斯投入了爱。我和这些角色已经有了一个幸福的结局,我知道拍续集会毁掉它。我已经接受了《星球大战》电影,并且心态很好。我有一个关于 Max Rebo 乐队的《星球大战》衍生电影的想法,故事是关于他们在恩多战役期间试图逃离死星。如果在电影里放一棵圣诞树,就能让电影大卖。我对漫威电影也有想法。

Deep Dive

Chapters
Marc V. Price, a British filmmaker, made a cult zombie film called Colin for only $75. This episode discusses his journey into DIY filmmaking, his experiences with the film industry, and his unique approach to filmmaking.
  • Marc V. Price's film Colin was made for $75 and became a global festival darling.
  • His approach to filmmaking involves turning limited budgets into limitless creativity.
  • He emphasizes collaboration and giving young talent real responsibility on his sets.

Shownotes Transcript

Translations:
中文

If you're a lineman in charge of keeping the lights on, Grainger understands that you go to great lengths and sometimes heights to ensure the power is always flowing, which is why you can count on Grainger for professional-grade products and next-day delivery so you have everything you need to get the job done. Call 1-800-GRAINGER, click Grainger.com, or just stop by. Grainger, for the ones who get it done.

Step into the world of power, loyalty, and luck. I'm going to make him an offer he can't refuse. With family, cannolis, and spins mean everything. Now, you want to get mixed up in the family business. Introducing the Godfather at ChapaCasino.com.

Are you ready to awaken to your soul's highest path? On Next Level Soul TV, you'll discover a sacred space for transformation, truth, and deep inner awakening.

It's like Netflix and Audible for your soul, streaming content that feeds your spirit and elevates your consciousness. Explore next-level soul originals, soul-stirring films and series, and enlightening audiobooks from spiritual masters. Dive into masterclasses and courses that guide your growth, and join live events that connect you with the global community of seekers. Whether you're just beginning or deep on your path,

Everything here is designed to help you remember who you truly are. Just go to www.NextLevelSoul.tv Next Level Soul TV, where your soul goes to grow.

You are listening to the IFH Podcast Network. For more amazing filmmaking and screenwriting podcasts, just go to ifhpodcastnetwork.com. Welcome to the Indie Film Hustle Podcast, episode number 804. Cinema should make you forget you're sitting in a theater. Roman Polanski.

Broadcasting from the back alley in Hollywood, it's the Indie Film Hustle Podcast, where we show you how to survive and thrive as an indie filmmaker in the jungles of the film biz. And here's your host, Alex Ferrari. Welcome, welcome to another episode of the Indie Film Hustle Podcast. I am your humble host, Alex Ferrari. Today's show is sponsored by Rise of the Filmtrepreneur, how to turn your independent film into a profitable business.

It's harder today than ever before for independent filmmakers to make money with their films. From predatory film distributors ripping them off to huckster film aggregators who prey upon them, the odds are stacked against the indie filmmaker. The old distribution model of making money with your film is broken and there needs to be a change.

The future of independent filmmaking is the entrepreneurial filmmaker or the filmtrepreneur. In Rise of the Filmtrepreneur, I break down how to actually make money with your film projects and show you how to turn your indie film into a profitable business. With case studies examining successes and failures,

This book shows you the step-by-step method to turn your passion into a profitable career. If you're making a feature film, series, or any other kind of video content, the Filmtrepreneur Method will set you up for success. The book is available in paperback, ebook, and of course, audiobook.

If you want to order it, just head over to www.FilmBizBook.com. That's FilmBizBook.com. Enjoy today's episode with guest host, Dave Bullis. On this episode of the podcast, we have a returning guest who gained fame from making a $75 zombie film. It was actually a feature-length film. It cost $75 or 45 pounds, and it was an absolute...

independent film smash hit because it went to all the different festivals. We're not going to talk too much about that because we've already talked about that the first time he was here, but we kind of touched on it again. But now he's back with not one, but two movies, Night Shooters and A Fistful of Lead, which is actually going to be distributed by Sony. We're going to talk about that as well with guest Mark B. Price.

I haven't been to a cinema in ages. I can't go because I'm stuck finishing up this film. So I haven't had a chance to really get into an air-conditioned cinema and just hide from the sun. Well, see, that's a good problem to have, though. You can't watch movies because you're making movies. It is true, yeah. I think a lot of my friends are like, have you seen this? Have you seen this? And I'm like, oh, mate, I'd love to, but I ain't got time. I found the time to go and see Solo.

which is unfortunate, but hey, I did it. It's a thing. But yeah, it was a really empty cinema as well. It was like literally me. It was just me. I wandered in. This is a bank holiday in Streatham in London. So there's loads of kids around here who would just go to see anything just to talk. So I was like, oh man, I'm screwed. This is going to be a horrible experience. And although it was, it wasn't because of the audience. There was no one there. And I thought, wow, this film got the audience it deserved. It was absolutely atrocious.

But I feel bad hating it because, you know, I kind of want to be a little bit more supportive of films that I love. I kind of think that I'm lucky to have Star Wars movies. And I remember thinking when I was a kid and there wasn't even that much of a gap between them, how like starved I felt of Star Wars content. I never went to the expanded universe for anything. I never really interested me. It was the films I was interested in. And yeah, and all I had was two Ewok movies, which at the time I loved.

Like, but yeah, that's, that's me. Yeah, no, I, I completely understand, man. After the last Jedi, I, I am done with those star Wars movies. Um, I don't care anymore. I, I, I begrudgingly. Okay. So, I mean, just to give you a quick of the, of the past three star Wars films. Okay. Yeah. The force awakens the last Jedi and whatever the hell the other one was called. Um, yeah.

I don't even remember. That's how much I care. They all felt like the same movie. I had no clue what the hell was going on. And I'm just like, okay, well, it's over now. And I don't even know what this was supposed to do. I mean, is this supposed to set something up? No, because that didn't feel like that. Was this supposed to be a self-contained movie? No, didn't feel like that either. What the hell is going on? See, my whole thing was,

I mean, I, I, I, the whole thing was Snoke, Snokey. Oh, so yeah, I gotta say, I absolutely loved the last Jedi. That was the one I loved. The rest of them, I was like, oh, they're all right. So that, but that was the one I love. But yeah, Snoke with his crazy Sesame Street name, Mr. Snoke-a-luffagus. And I was like, what the fuck's he called? Yeah.

They normally have names like Mr. Bastard or something that's definitely evil. But Snoke, I was like, oh, he's going to teach you how to say the letter F. I was going to say he actually was a cool character because, okay, he can control, he can read people's minds. Okay, now you got a really, really tough villain here. And he was defeated so easily. And I go, well, that was so anticlimactic.

Oh, I honestly, it was the complete opposite. I think this is the disparity between Star Wars movies, I think, at the moment, particularly with this one, because it seems to really be pulling people in different directions. I was like, I was watching it going, okay, Emperor shit, we're going to see him in the next one. And then I suppose he'll probably get killed before Kylo Ren is like, I'm sorry, I killed my dad, you know, or some shit like that. And instead, I got this scene that wiped him out in a way that I thoroughly was like, fuck.

like fuck yeah this is awesome and now i have a character i have no idea where carlo ren is going in the next film so i'm really interested now i'm really i'm really i'm like i'm in i want to know what they're doing with him he's not evil enough to want to be killed he's not a good guy by any stretch of the imagination he's a really interesting conflicted character i don't know what the story is going to do with him so i'm kind of curious i'm in a position where i don't really know what's going to happen with this character and he is the most compelling character in in the movies and so i

I'm kind of in. I'm on board. And I'm curious to see what JJ Abrams can do

when he ends something for a change. He normally starts stuff, which is why all of his stuff has these mysteries that he doesn't give a fuck about and there's no plan to end them. Now he has to, and I'm kind of curious to see what he's going to do with it, to be honest. But I don't love it enough to... I mean, I love it a lot, but I'm fascinated with the debates. I love listening to them. I love looking on YouTube and seeing all the angry...

angry ace i'm like oh this is really interesting and uh i love how chris mcquarrie although he's got nothing to do with it and ryan johnson is not like dealing with it on twitter like this is fascinating it's just amazing to watch it's like i love trashy tv and it's like trashy tv it's these these bickering arguments i'm like oh this is amazing it's just a movie it's okay if you didn't like it i thought rogue one was fine and i kind of know the guy who made it it's like it's you know it's it's fine

Yeah, it was boring as fuck. But it was, you know, the end battle was great. I know one of the X-Wing pilots, you know, the one who could act. You know, so it was fine. It was a decent... It was an experience. They're all an experience. I just think that with Solo...

I was by myself and so bored. I was so bored. I was just sitting there going, I could text my girlfriend right now and I'm not going to be irritating anyone in the cinema. But the downside is if she replies and I get into a conversation with her and this film suddenly gets interesting for about 20 minutes, I'm fucked. So I was a very good boy. I behaved myself. I watched the film and I was just so bored.

Oh, God, that robot, that fucking robot was the worst things. Worse than Jar Jar Binks. Much worse than Jar Jar Binks. Did you see it? Sorry, I shouldn't. No, no, no. I haven't seen it yet because after The Last Jedi, I'm officially just I don't want to say I'm protesting new Star Wars movies. I'm just I'm going out of my way not to watch them. Let's just say that.

I mean, I'm not saying, like, you know, just download it without any money going back. Although I think they've learned a lesson of some sort. I don't really know what that lesson is. Maybe don't make movies about characters no one gives a shit about. It's like, Han Solo is such a non-character in Star Wars. I like, I think Han Solo is cool as fuck and I love Han Solo in those movies. But, you know, as an adult watching Return of the Jedi, he contributes literally nothing to that story. Like, he doesn't do anything. He just stands there and pulls derpy faces and doesn't do anything. And I'm just like, I'm really kind of,

as an adult and watching it going it's amazing how everything sort of swished around for me as a kid watching Return of the Jedi the stuff with the Emperor and Darth Vader was always the boring bits as an adult the stuff with Darth Vader and the Emperor and Luke are the best bits and there aren't enough of those moments in that film for me so it's it's nice to see a film that's grown but yeah Harrison Ford's a character there's nothing there he doesn't even have a theme the fucking Millennium Falcon has a theme

Han Solo doesn't have a theme in a movie. The score that's peppered with le motifs is there's not even a theme for Han Solo. It's fucking... So they made a movie out of it. It's like, shit, they didn't even come up with one for that. It's just... Yeah, it was not a film I liked much. I wouldn't recommend it, but...

But also, yeah, definitely watch it to have a good old... Because there's plenty in there to hate. It definitely makes for a more fun conversation. But yeah, there's a robot in it that's worse than Jar Jar Binks. I actually quite... I never hated Jar Jar Binks. I thought he was shit as he was. At least he had a really cool... Like at the end, at the end battle in Phantom Menace, I kind of thought, yeah, he works. He's making me laugh. He's tripping over droids and accidentally killing things. That's fine. I'm all right with this. But...

But yeah, I think the rest that, yeah, this droid clearly played by another posh British actor who's never heard the fucking word droid before. You know what I mean? It's like, it's weird. We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor. And now back to the show.

I don't know why they keep picking actors who don't give a shit about the thing they're in when there's a legacy of actors who chose to be actors because of Star Wars, who you could find who would love to do it, would bring a lot to that character. Does that make sense? Yeah, that makes perfect sense. Weird. The word droid, I know it's an interesting word.

Well, it turns out that Luke Skywalker is something of a slave owner now because that's how they paint the picture of droids in Solo. And I was like, oh, shit. That's weird. Do they want to go down this road? It's, you know...

It's like, oh, yeah. I mean, yeah, those R2D2 and all those guys get a little bit shit on. But, you know, it's because, I don't know. I've had to think about it now. I've had to think, fuck, what is this? It's maybe Luke and no one understood that these things feel, even though they yell and scream and they panic and they express fear. So you might get a lightsaber then and have a lightsaber fucking bottle opener. Yeah.

Yeah. I clearly have a love for Star Wars. Yeah, I know. The last, the original three, four, five, and six are just, you know, I think they're universally loved

I actually, one, two, and three, I mean, they're not perfect. At least there was some love. I think George Lucas actually put some love into them. He did like making them, and you could tell, even though some moments were like, what the hell is going on here? And you could tell there were some moments where it made no sense. Like, for instance, in The Phantom Menace,

When young Anakin jumps into that fighter pilot... Sorry, into that fighter plane. And there's a perfect-sized helmet just for him. And I'm like, wait a minute. Why would there be a children-sized helmet in a plane meant for grown men or clones or what have you? Or robots, whatever the hell they were using. So then...

What I've always loved about things like that is that, like, those aren't accidents. Like, someone would have had to have designed that. And I think George Lucas is like, yeah, no, they'll never get it.

It is not cool. I always love those things, those moments. I always try to do... I throw a lot of those moments to myself and say, right, let's see if we can get away with this. But I think it's kind of gone a weird way where if people spot things, they resent them. They're like, you tried to trick me, you son of a bitch. It's like, no, no, no, it was meant to be all part of the fun and games. Come on, guys.

But I like the prequels. I don't hate them. I can see where the problems are, obviously. But I kind of, you know, I think, didn't James Cameron say something really interesting where he felt that those films took big steps. They took risks and they were huge steps. And, you know, collectively in many ways they failed. But in other ways they were, you know, you've got to, I'd rather have a film that take risks like that instead of The Force Awakens, which I thoroughly enjoy the first two thirds of.

But then it just becomes a bit of a nostalgia thing with Han Solo and Princess Leia. I'm like, look, none of these people want to be here. Like, I had a happily ever after with these characters that I knew was going to be destroyed by making a sequel.

You know, at least George Lucas was smart enough to go, you know what, you go back. There's a happily ever after there. We're not going to come back to this. So we'll go to a prequel and we'll go to where this all started and see if we can tell a darker story. And I was like, OK, you can't you can't fault that like that understanding of the story that's told up to a point. And yeah, and I think that like so the second hand solo comes back. I'm like, well, my happily ever and happily ever after ending is gone.

So everyone's hatred of what Luke had become. I'm like, well, what the fuck do you expect? Like Han Solo wasn't Han Solo in the Force Awakens by any stretch of the imagination. He was more Indiana Jones in the last one that nobody liked that he was Han Solo in Force Awakens, which everyone seemed to love. And so I'm kind of like, well, I think, you know, this is not necessarily, the characters aren't going to be the characters. They're going to be sort of like the actors playing different versions of the characters. It's, you know, it happens, I guess. It's, uh,

I've accepted it and I'm in a good place now. So however this next film is, I'll be excited for it. It'll come out. I'll be underwhelmed or I'll love it. I don't know. We'll see. But, you know, I'd like to see more, you know, so yeah, I just wonder what direction. I just want them to be special. You know, I don't want one a year. That doesn't seem to be working very well.

Yeah, it's I think the next one, whatever that is, I heard that they're just going to go right to VOD with it. No theater, which which honestly is probably a good idea for them right now with all these movies. But I mentioned last time that my idea for one, I got a spin off one, right? So go with this is going to be fucking classic Max Rebo band, right?

starts in Jabba's palace, they survive that explosion. They're like, fuck this, Max, fuck you, I'm out of here. They'll say, you know, Gleebof or whatever, you know, alien language. So they're essentially saying, fuck you, you blue elephant cunt. But they'll say it in their own alien language so we can have it in a kid's film. And then they'll split up, right? And then...

Max will be asked by the Emperor, like, I've got this plan. I'm going to destroy the fucking rebels on Endor. It's going to be amazing. I want a big party afterwards. So the Max Rebo band is asked to reform. It's like the Blues Brothers where he's going around trying to get the band to reform. They reform. They go on to Death Star. Shit starts going down. It's about them trying to get off to Death Star during the Battle of Endor. And they end up thinking they booked a really cool gig. And they're the cunts that end up playing Yub Nub. Yeah.

There you go. That's it. That's going to be the story. Low stakes, high octane, Max Rebo Benz, Blues Brothers, the Blue Brother we'll call him because he's a blue elephant, I suppose. There you go. That's my Max Rebo story. That's my pitch.

How long? Do you think they'll kick me out of the room really quick or something? No, no. I think they'll green light that at this point. They might give you like a mil, maybe two mil range. Make a gritty independent film on the long line of the Blues Brothers. I think you got it, man.

And in fact, you know what? They're going to say, keep all that language in there. So it's going to be completely different. It'll be so foul. Like the sexiest Star Wars movie ever. And they'll be like, they're not in the Jabba scene. We'll put all these little references to the, uh,

to the special editions where that blue fuzzy thing starts singing and then someone's like, who's this asshole? Was he always here? Was he always in the band? Since when did this singer get so much dexterity? She used to just be a little potato on toothpicks and now she's running around going up to cameras and blowing her lips. What the fuck? What's going on in here? We used to be a band, goddammit.

If you pitch this to Kathleen Kennedy, I think she's going to say, here's what would happen. Okay, she'd say, everyone, can you leave the room and just leave Mark and I by ourselves? And everyone's going to go, oh, shit. So they're all going to get up and slink out of the room, and they close the door, right? And she looks at you and she says, Mark, I'm glad that finally somebody has had the balls to come in here and tell me what it's really like.

And she's like, I love this thing. We're going to give you the X millions to make this. And she goes, it's going to be Star Wars for a whole new generation. It's going to be a punch to the gut. And if anyone doesn't like it, they can fuck off. I'll tell you this as well. We're going to put a Christmas tree in it, right? That makes it Christmas. It means that every fucking Christmas is on. I'll have a lifetime's worth of residuals. It's going to be great.

It's going to be perfect. I've got my Star Wars sequel planned. And any of that shit will translate to a Marvel movie as well. So if they want me to make Stiltman, I'm like, yep, got it. Here's my idea. Stiltman as a band. Boom. It'll take off. It's going to be fine. I'm sorry, buddy. I'm waffling. I should let you... I'm already sucking you away from your 4th of July celebrations too much, so I'll be good and stay on target. Yeah.

All I'm going to do is work. So the only thing, there is no 4th of July celebrations for me today. I have way, way too much work to get done. But I'm a workaholic. I'm one of those guys, Mark, that'll be on my deathbed just wishing I worked more. Be like, I wish I had worked just that one extra hour. And then they'll finally just throw my body in the trash. But, you know, it was great talking about those Star Wars movies. I could just imagine you

at the bar or the pub later on that night and you're telling all your friends, you're like, listen, they actually bought that pitch. Now you're like, I don't know what else to do now. I have to actually make this thing. Don't worry. Don't worry. We got you covered. And then it's just, you know, it can become a hit. It could just be the new Star Wars type. You know, take somebody from the background and make them the star of the next film. Yeah.

Exactly. It's going to go on like that. So they all work though. It's fine. Oh, man. Yes. So cool, Mark. It's been a while since – I mean I'm just going to keep rolling with this if you're happy with it. Of course, of course. Because I mean honestly I think this is hilarious so far. So the last time we talked, I mean you made Colin, which was – That's right. You made it for 75 pounds, right?

I think it was $70 was the line. And then £45 was the UK line. There was some conversion that went on there. And yeah, so that was... But to be honest, if it cost that, I mean, it was a whole movie made during a time when I was living up on overdraft. We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor. And now back to the show.

much younger and had more ingenuity and so we just sort of made that movie without spending any money really because it was a zombie movie. The nature of the zombie movie allowed us to incorporate anything we could find and say, isn't this a cool weapon? Brilliant, let's use that. So it just sort of evolved really and

the improvisational nature of how I like to make things anyway, kind of carried forward. And, uh, yeah. And then we just made that movie and, uh, yeah, it somehow got released, which is still crazy to me. Um,

Yeah.

Of the past 10 years that are worth anything. One is Colin. Yeah. And do you know what the other one is? Do you want to take a guess? I want to say Zombieland because that was great. I love that. But I imagine it's probably something cooler. But I should know. So it's the movie called The Battery. Oh, shit. I don't know that.

So Colin and the Battery, two zombie films, and they're the only zombie films of the past like 10 years, maybe even since the remake of Dawn of the Dead, that are actually worth anything. I did not like Zombieland too much, by the way. Ah, cool. Hey, I'm looking at the Battery now. Oh, shit, man. Okay, that looks pretty sweet. Right, there we go. That's on the list. That's the future, isn't it? You can make this how this could go. Note how I didn't play this. I didn't say, oh, yeah, the Battery, and then you just hear the sort of...

typing of the keyboard i was like i was honest i think oh yeah the battery the the the personalities are two former trivia all the canfus heenish shit i read the synopsis i read the crop version but um oh no this looks great um i think i wonder if good bad flicks covered this actually do you know there's a there's a youtube channel called good bad flicks i'm really into

Great guy. He's got this back catalogue of really obscure movies that he always showcases. And although it's called good bad flicks, he's not like he doesn't present them as, oh, it's so bad. They're good. He just says, I love this film because and it's nice to see such in depth, you know, not pretending they're anything other than the films they are, but honest people.

sort of reviews of these really interesting movies that this, you know, the guy who runs it, I think his name is Cecil, just loves, you know, their films are really personal to me, grew up watching. And some of them are ones that I caught as well. So it's great. I highly recommend the channel if you don't, if you haven't subscribed already.

I'll put that in the link in the show notes. I haven't actually checked out that channel, but I definitely will. Because I'm glad you clarified that too, by the way. Because sometimes when I see channel names, I kind of go, well, I could take this a number of different ways. Because language isn't perfect. And English, as we both know, has so much slang in it that sometimes you're like, when they say bad, does that mean good? Yeah, yeah.

Well, that's the point, actually. Were you rolling when I was slinging very insensitive swear words around? I apologize. I'm going to try to hold back on some of the C words. But, you know, my best friends are Cockney and an Irishman. So, you know, it's like saying shit to me now. The impact's gone. Yeah. Yeah.

Oh, I see. Yeah, I see what you mean. Yeah, I mean, honestly, the podcast is uncensored, you know, and the British are known for their sense of humor. In fact, you know what, let me just rephrase that. The entire United Kingdom is more known for their sense of humor. Yes, of course, yes. Well, British is good because I guess I fall into that, you know, that we couldn't make the escape that you guys could that you're celebrating today. No, the Welsh were...

We're all under the English. I mean, I believe we tried. And then we just like, hey, look, guys, what's the divide really? And then I think we all just got along. Although we have our own government now.

It's we're still part UK. So it's yeah. Yeah. You know, the Scottish, the Scottish, the Scottish, the Scottish, the Scottish, the Scottish, the Northern Ireland, Northern Irish, the, you know, the Welsh and the British, you know, all know for their sense of humor. So it's all good. So that's why I think people would understand. But are you impressed that I actually knew what the UK was?

Well, I would have been, but you told me this morning that your mother was Welsh, so now I expect you to know everything about how the UK has altified it up. It was my grandmother. She's actually Welsh. Oh, it's your grandmother. Sorry, sorry. Yeah, she actually came over directly. She came over when... I don't know how old she was, but yeah, she...

came over directly from, from Wales and came over and, uh, you know, started a whole life here. And, uh, if you ever saw me, by the way, I, you know, people ask me what my genetic makeup is. And when I tell them like, no, it's no, don't, don't even try it. Cause I'm actually like 15%, uh, Cherokee Indian, uh, Cherokee Native American, but I don't look like it at all. I look, I look, I look exactly like you do. Uh, you know, like some, some, some, just a ginger Welsh guy, you know, it's a,

Well, not that you're ginger, but you know what I mean. I'm not. I'm not. I have a nephew who is. It's shit. This makes me look like a terrible uncle. I think he is. I mean, he looks ginger. He looks ginger when I generally cast my eye over there in the room and I'm like, what's that noise? Oh, yeah, you're there. Okay. You know, here's some matches. Play with those. Your uncle's awesome. Is he around here somewhere? I don't know. No, it's... Yeah. Yeah.

Sorry, this is only funny to me. This is not funny to anyone. No one knows who I'm related to. This is a terrible angle to try and get a laugh. I think it's hilarious. Gingers don't have souls, so you can't give them matches because, you know, God only knows what they're going to get into.

Exactly. There's only one way to find out. Like I keep saying, when I get really, really sick, like terminal sick, these are the guys that are going to have to be pumping me full of heroin on my last few days just so it doesn't, you know, itch or whatever cancer does. You know, so...

I was wrong with it. Like, this is how I'm choosing to face the death that, you know, made Creeper on the corner at any point. To laugh, to laugh in the face of death. You have to, Mark. And also, they could have like, you know, great new designer drugs. And you're going to be like, no, no, no, I want the heroin. Just give it to me.

Yeah, I mean, it's the future diseases I'm going to die from, the ones that turn us into zombies. Like, that would suck, man, to have some semblance of consciousness as I'm running around, like, snarling and spewing blood all over some, you know, attractive, young fucking person who survives this sort of shit. You know, I've got zombie written all over me. In a post-apocalypse, I'm fucked. Yeah.

I can contribute nothing. I'm going to have to align myself with the strongest and try and do something to try and make sure that I'm not too lowly. Like I said, on raids, I have to fight mutants in the desert. I'm not used to deserts. I imagine the desert is going to be everywhere because that's how apocalypses work and I'll be stuck

Yeah, I'm not a hero in a zombie movie. I'm definitely a zombie and a shit one too. And I'm just such a throwaway kill. I'm not even a memorable kill. I'm not a screwdriver in the ear or anything like that. I'm just a sort of like, bam, kill, dead, moving on. You know? God, shit.

Yeah, it's like when the horde of zombies comes in one of those movies and you've gotten the hero has like a Gatling gun and just goes, you're one of those guys. And just like for a split second, I think that was Mark. I can't tell. All right, moving on. Everyone's looking at my digital arm that got blown off. Yeah, that's what everyone's looking at. No one's even looking at me.

I don't even have good makeup. Like, I don't have season fucking eight whatever seasons. We're on Walking Dead level makeup. I've got, like, season two ran out of money. Only two or three complicated ones. The rest of them are just dude shambling makeup. That's what I'll have. Yeah, I had a friend of mine who just shot a zombie film, and he had that. He had the tears. So he said, if you're in the foreground, you're an A zombie, and you get the most makeup. If you're a B zombie, you get, like, a...

somewhat good makeup and then if you're a sea zombie he said somebody just comes by and throws blood on you and they call it a day we we had a similar system on colin and uh and anything else with them with zombies where we have um gold zombies which now means they get some prosthetic work uh we have uh silver zombies which are your standard like you know heavy latex stuff uh

bronze zombies which are just like the one you described then we have lead zombies which is just someone further back nothing on them just shambling and making a shape for their body so like uh and then i never necessarily even keep them in the right order so they're mixed up all over the place so it's just a mess which you might have seen in the clip i sent uh actually that was the last zombie thing we did um

which is the film within a film for night shooters, which I thought would be a really fun way to open the movie. And so we do. We open with a big violent zombie action sequence. We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor. And now back to the show.

Well, you know, I was going to ask about that because I was saying to myself, you know, I know what the synopsis of the film is. And I was like, wow, you know, maybe something happens, but it's good you mentioned that. And so let's start talking about, you know, before we talk about Night Shooters, actually, let's just finish that thought about Colin. When you actually released Colin, you know, did that open any more doors for you? Were you just like, you know, inundated with like different people approaching you about projects and such?

um yeah i mean i think a lot of work's not happened after that and then i think from that point i think i was a little bit nervous to quit the day job really so i i sort of because i had a really lovely uh sort of like um late at night evening job where it was just me and one other guy and we were running uh this sort of courier company and then they're a car service as well like a prestige car service so i was in the office there so that's where i was sort of just doing everything really and it was um

I was just a little bit nervous to leave because that was a lovely job and everyone there was really supportive and really, you know, I was able to just do whatever I wanted to do, provided, you know, I answered the phones when they rang. And yeah, so but when I eventually did sort of leave, that was the scariest part because I was essentially going freelance. And yeah, but from then, there was always some work involved.

It's just it took a lot of getting used to that that work isn't always there. So you have to sometimes go a little bit of a period where there isn't much. But that's when you are able to live off the last job you did. There's also a little bit of work there, really. But I tended to do a lot more stuff that was in development. And I was really content. I mean, none of it got made. And I think after about I think after about three years, I started to go, oh, Jesus, I should probably make something.

Because, you know, you've got to sort of try and keep the fires burning, if that makes any sense. And so that was the thing that I was always... I started to get a little bit worried about. And then, yeah, we just started making things. So I made a low-budget film called Magpie. And then...

And I mean, that did okay. It did fine. We got a little US release for that. A very small release, but a very nice release. And after that, I got stuck into another film, which we won't talk about because I got fired from that movie. And I don't want to give them any undue press attention. But I got kicked off that movie. And then once I was running around trying to get another one made, which turned out to be Night Shooters.

Yeah, there's just always work in between. So there was commercial work and, you know, little pilots here and there that was asked to direct. So it's always, it's been work, but it's, you know, it's a scary bit of work. It's not the sort of work that makes you go, ah, great, I can relax now. It's the sort of work that makes you go, oh God, I hope there's something after this. I'm going to make rent next month. So things like that, really. Yeah.

So, so the, the, I mean, I know we, we, you don't want to mention that the movie title, but what happens though? Well, I just, you know, just out of my own curiosity and also just to, as a learning experience, I mean, whenever you get fired from something like that, you know what I mean? Like, you know, two things. I mean, did you, I don't want to say, well, did they give you a reason as to why they were, why they were letting you go? Oh yeah. It was, um,

It was definitely a politics thing. So to talk around it whilst talking about it, because it's gossip and it's fun, isn't it? What happened was I was asked to... I agreed to edit the film. My fee was very, very low.

And I said, look, I'll just do this. And if you pay me that fee, I'll edit it. I'm the best person to edit it. And, you know, I was given a good amount of time to edit it. But, you know, and I got it done. And, you know, we needed a lot of pickups. There were a lot of things that the production company failed to come through on that we asked for that was sort of minimum requirements. So you're making a film without some of those things. And I'm not the sort of person to complain. So I don't even really know if they were that aware of how much of a problem that was. It didn't really come up. But they were fine with me shooting pickups.

Which is where we're going to make up for some of that stuff. So it was all fine. But I think that... I didn't voice for my fee to edit because I was very careful about...

you know, not taking work so I can concentrate on that. I said, look, I need to invoice for this now. And although it wasn't part of the agreement, you know, the comeback was, oh, you know, we pay you when you finish the film. And I said, well, no, that wasn't the agreement. The agreement was this. Okay, fine. Well, we'll pay you now if. And then there were a bunch of new terms that were conditioned to that payment. And I said, well, I'm not going to agree to any new terms as conditioned to payment for work that I've already done.

But I'm happy to have these conversations, but they have to be a separate conversation because there were things I think that were left out of the contract. I don't think a delivery date was in a contract, for example, and it was something they wanted in, which is fair enough. But I just wasn't going to have that unconditioned of something. And also there were little things like I think their visual effects company had not given me anything. Their sound department had not given me anything. And I'm not responsible for those departments. So if the film isn't delivered because those departments –

were pretty unresponsive. Well, I'm kind of like, well, hang on. I mean, I'm in trouble then. And I don't really, so I'm not going to sign anything that means I'm responsible for that when that's not even my company. So yeah, so I, so that was my reason. I said, look,

these new terms i'm not gonna i'm not gonna agree to anything as a condition of payment but i'm happy to discuss it in another way and the response was there will be no discussion services no longer required i thought oh surely that's surely they don't mean that because it's going to cost a lot of money to finish this film now because you know the pickups weren't going to cost anything um and uh but no that that stuck and i was like oh interesting i

And so I just thought, shit, I need to get another film made. Mainly just because, you know, I put a lot of heart and soul into that film. I got a great cast together. We made some really nice stuff. I think some of the best directing I've done is in that film. And I just kind of felt like, shit, I need to make something else. So I was in a bit of a mad panic to get Night Shoes done. And so Night Shoes...

that landed at the same time as this western fistful led um and and i saw i spoke to my producer who is amazing i said i think i think we can do these i think i can do both of these i can we'll do this one and then i'll be deep in post on that and then we'll start shooting the other one and then it'll all be fine and and it has been fine uh i finished night shooters uh this week um

We just got to sort of find out where we're going to get the DCP made for it. And then that's it. I sort of take it over and say, here you go. Make a movie out of this and we're done. And then I spend the next few weeks now finishing up Fistful of Lead. Then I get that to the colorist and we're working on the sounds and we're going to get the visual effects done. Yeah, it should all come together quite nicely. So by the end of this month, I should have two features under my belt, which is fun. It's tiring, but it's fun.

So, you know, I was going to say either you're not sleeping or you're either like a raging alcoholic at this point, Mark. So it's like one of the other. I'm drinking cider right now. It's not 10 a.m. here, incidentally. But, you know, that. Yeah. Yeah. But yeah, I don't know if I'm an alcoholic yet, but it does seem very appealing.

But yeah, it's just been very busy. But I mean, the interesting thing about when you're doing a film as quickly as doing Nightshade is you look at that and you haven't had time to watch the film as a whole. So I'm so busy working all the minutiae, you know, and all the little teeny bits and the connective tissue and all those things that come together. And I think I saw it for the first time from beginning to end a couple of weeks ago.

And it was, it was, it was, it was a really fun experience for me because, you know, you know, coming back to the alcoholism and I'd made sure I'd had a couple of beers first. And, uh, and I was, I was watching with my girlfriend who worked on the film. She's, um, sort of the atmospherics and, and, uh, special effects department. And, uh,

I just really enjoyed the film we made. I was like, oh, Jesus, I thought I hated this. Because you do. You fall out of love with these things. You see all the holes. And then to see it flow like that, I was surprised at how...

how everything seemed to slot into place in the way that you hope and you work towards. And we watched it again on Sunday because I had what was close to the final sound mix. So I had some friends around to watch it. And it was great watching their reactions to it because you see their faces screw up at the right moments and then they laugh at the right moments. And it's really nice just to see them reacting to

exactly how you hope people will react when those moments occur. And from a filmmaking perspective, I mean, that's all I can do. That's all I can do is, is, is, is make the audience react a certain way at a certain moment. And then after that, whether they liked it or not, that's beyond my control. There's nothing I can do about that. So I, I, you know, but, but if I can at least make them in that moment go or yes, or, you know, there's, there's, there's something.

So that's all I can really work towards. So that's all I'm really concentrated on. So it's really nice to see, even though it was a small room, just a few people to see that, that reaction. It was lovely. Yeah. And that's what you're always hoping for. Because somebody once said there's, there's two ways you want someone to like to take your movie, either they love it or they hate it because the worst thing you can do is they, they're just completely benign to the whole thing. And he said that that's the worst spot to be in no matter what.

You know what? I was speaking to another filmmaker. We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor. And now, back to the show. Because what we do on our films, we have a lot of young people work on them. I think it's really important to get young people working on films. Because, I mean, coming from Swansea, I didn't really feel that there was – there were lovely people in Swansea who did encourage me. But there were a lot of people who – the general reaction was –

what, what do you want to do that for? Why do you get a real job and, and work really hard and get up early and then go to bed early and, and live for the weekend and then have a family? Why, why didn't you just, why do you want to do this ambitious thing? You're considered a little bit strange for wanting something that's a little bit different to the norm. And, you know, not to knock any of those things. I kind of think, you know, like raising a family is a very admirable thing because it's something that, you know, that,

that I'm not doing, you know, but I see my brother doing it and it's incredible. And I know that my parents, you know, I was part of that and it was fantastic. So, you know, it's just this really, you know, it's something I admire, but I've chosen the more selfish life of making films. And, you know, so it's a really interesting thing back in Swansea where I kind of find that

There wasn't much support for making films. And so I think it's really important when there's young filmmakers to say, look, it's worth exploring to its fullest before you move on from this. So we always, you know, as part of work experience, we get a lot of young people working on the film and we give them proper roles. They're not making tea or coffee for us. They're script supervising or they're camera assistants and first ACs as well. They're not...

you know, a runner for the camera department. So it's, we do a lot for those guys. And yeah, I think that it's, you know, to me, that's one of the most important aspects of making these movies. And I've always, is making sure that the people who are working for you feel like they're part of the film because what happens then is that everyone throws in and you end up with a really,

it's like, it's like a community where everyone wants the film to work. Uh, everyone's all on the same team. It's, um, like I, I love that, that feeling of making a film. I think I've gone on a tangent here and I forgot where I was going with it, but, uh, sorry, David. No,

No, no, it's all good, Mark. Believe me. I know what you mean, man. I actually do both. I actually work the day job like I was telling you before. And I get up every day at 4 a.m. Regardless, I get up at 4 a.m. I got up at 4 a.m. today and I was off today just so I could try to get some extra work. I get work in before I go to work.

And then when I'm at the... Then I come home and I start doing the other work again. Trying to keep both ends burning at the same time. Yeah. But the whole family thing, I don't know how people do it. When you add that equation in there, I couldn't even fathom how some people do it. Because that's burning at three ends then. Oh, it's amazing. I think I know what tired is working on these movies. My brother's...

He's like, oh, you don't know what tight is. You each have two kids. I was like, okay. But I see a really happy family and it's amazing. I was like, oh, wow. It's exciting. I just think that me and my brother have gone in different directions in terms of what we're trying to get out of life. I find what my brother's doing far more admirable than what I'm doing. Like I said, I'm playing. I play games. That's my job. My job is to play games in a way where

people look at that and instead of going, aren't you a bit old to play games? They look at that and go, oh man, that's cool. You make movies. And it's like, well, yeah, okay. I don't know. That was never the plan. I was just like, oh, I just want to do this. This seems like fun and I enjoy doing it. I want to be better and you learn and you grow and all those things come together, I think.

Yeah. Yeah. And, and, you know, I wanted to talk more about nice shooters too. So could you just give a brief synopsis of the film? The film's about a group of low budget filmmakers who are shooting pickups. They've broken into a building that turns out that it's rigged for demolition. So they've snuck in and the director, well,

Well, the term is gaslighting now. The director kind of gaslights a bunch of his crew with just working in a building that's rigged for demolition. And whilst working on their movie, shooting their pickups, they witness a murder in the building opposite.

The murder is being committed by a gangster who owns the demolition company that's leveling the buildings. The idea is you kill people in the buildings, the buildings collapse on them and the bodies are buried. And oh, there were people in here is the idea. So they have to use their filmmaking skills as weapons to survive the constant onslaught from gangsters who are trying to eradicate any witnesses.

make sure they're dead, and then leave them in the buildings to get demolished. So, yeah, it's...

It's fun. The stunt guy is a martial artist. The special effects lady takes the plastic explosives from the rigged building to create more dangerous explosives using her squibs. The sound guy is leaving radio mics everywhere so we can hear when the bad guys are coming. The cinematographer knows the layout of the buildings perfectly because she has kind of studied them for all the best angles. Yeah, little things like that. It's sort of a fun concept. It's as much of a love letter to...

filmmaking as it is films themselves and uh even in the sound design we were able to throw in a couple of familiar sound effects uh that people might clock and go ah the world they live in now has these sound effects from films not the wilhelm scream though we didn't do that one the wilhelm scream that's like a uh a staple that's like a staple of so many movies in fact i think it was in uh the last should i

It better have been. I think it's in all the Star Wars movies. It should be. It's in all of the Lucasfilm movies, I think. It's in Willow a couple of times. It's in all the Indiana Jones movies. Yeah, it's one I've always loved. It used to terrify me as a kid because it sounded so anguished and pained. But as an adult, it's the funniest thing ever. Yeah.

Yeah, it's always something that always makes me laugh whenever I hear it. I know it's in a lot of Tarantino films too. But I'm going to link that into the show notes, everybody, for everyone who doesn't know what the Wilhelm scream is. But for Night Shooters, how did you go about putting this all together? I mean, did you go with the team to sort of find an abandoned building that you could actually shoot in or even semi-abandoned or, well, hell, one that was actually fully operational? So how did you go about starting to put all this together? Yeah.

We actually found a building that was due to be demolished in our third week of shooting. So we said, yeah, we'll take it. And my amazing producer worked really, really hard to try and convince them to let us stay there. Because the building doesn't just get destroyed. It gets, you know, there's a degree of tidying up, electronics come out, all that sort of thing. And that's when, you know,

So there's about two weeks worth of that that would have happened before we would have needed to get out of there. So we were trying to sort of talk ourselves and talk our way into it, which she did actually. And we managed to get the full three weeks there.

The only problem we had was on the last day it snowed, so we had to shoot some stuff in January. But yeah, it was great because the building was going to be demolished. I was like, can I just trash this place? And they went, yeah, if you sign something that says we're not responsible, if someone hurts themselves, you can do whatever you want. And we're like, great. So yeah, we wrecked the place. There was one room we shot in and then we thought, look, this is a good room. The lights are here. Let's smash down this wall.

And now it's suddenly, I put the cameras over here and now it's suddenly a new set, right? And we're like, yep, great. So we spent like 10 minutes throwing ourselves into walls to try and tear the place apart. And it worked quite well. It was a good way to get some frustration out of our systems. It was day five, I think at that point, we were like, we were shooting actual nights. I remember saying to everyone, oh, it'll be great. We'll just adjust and then we'll be fine and we'll shoot. And I think on night three,

I turned to the special effects department, who are also my girlfriend, and just said, I fucked up. I fucked up so bad. This is really hard. I don't know how the fuck I'm going to do this for another two and a half weeks. But we did, and it was fine. Of course, I couldn't say that to anyone else because that would have been poor leadership. But my God, I...

I remembered working night salons in my early 20s and thought, yeah, you just get used to it. It's fine. Oh, man, it's different when you're nearly 40. It's a much different experience. So, I mean, do you find that sometimes, I mean, you know, really, does anybody ever really get used to those long days?

I've kind of gotten used to them in a way. But some days when you're on set for 14, 16, 18 hours, you're like, I thought I'd be used to this by now after doing it for five, 10 years. But it's like, you know what I mean? It just kind of never really sinks. You know what I mean? Yeah. I mean, the thing is from where I am, because you're always fighting a schedule that's really difficult, the days always seem quite short from my perspective. I was like, we never seem to have enough time. And only when...

Life is like that. Do you go, ah, ah? And so the nights would fly by pretty quickly for me. I think there was only one day, and this is when we switched, because on Saturdays, because it was a part of a complex, a business complex, so we had to shoot at night just for the noise, really, and because, you know, to block out the windows on some of these buildings was a huge ordeal. So we would just shoot at night. We could just move around, go to wherever we wanted at any point, and we didn't have to spend...

40 minutes each set up blocking out lights. So it was, it was, it was, it did make sense to shoot at night. It wasn't just for the sake of it. And we'll be right back after a word from our sponsor and now back to the show. But yeah, it was on Saturday on this. We had two Saturdays where we worked during the days or they were later days.

And one of those was the hardest. I was, I think I just didn't get much sleep the sort of day before. So I, yeah, I think I, I said to my producer and my script supervisor said, guys, I need you guys to drive time today because I can't, I am just so tired. I'm going to concentrate on what I'm doing and I'll make sure that works. And then we're going to move on to the next thing. I don't really want to think too

about time or any of those things. So you guys come to me and tell me that we need to get a move on. Otherwise, I'm just going to assume we're fine and just keep going. And that day worked really well. It was fine. I kind of got through that one. Slept very quickly when I got home. But that was the hardest one. That was the hardest day. Because it was a day, ironically. If it was another night, I think I would have been fine.

But it's in those moments, man, that's when you need to have that team. You know what I mean? Like, you kind of want, you know what I mean? Like, that's when a team can actually come together. And that's when you're like, man, I'm glad I've always been, you know, tried to be a good guy, whatever, because now I'm just going to have to count on the team a lot right now. And that's, you know what I mean? And it's in those times where you're like, thank God I wasn't a freaking tyrant. Or maybe you were, Mark. I don't know. Maybe you still are.

They might have been like, oh, he's all right, except for this making us work night shit. But they were like, these guys, actually, they were amazing. They were all really great for me. One of the things I tend to notice is that, I mean, I don't think I get, you know, there's always a moment where pressure and time and all those things sort of compress. And what you end up with is...

What I end up with is more of an urgency to get things done. So I think whereas my normal approach is to be kind of like very excited and happy and, you know, like a child, basically, when it comes to those moments, I tend to get more, I think, focused. So I tend to sometimes I'll just... Sometimes it doesn't come across as like I'm having a good time. And I think that when those moments do crop up, I notice that everyone...

really, really... Everyone really works anyway, but I do notice a change in that everyone works to try to get me excited again, if that makes any sense. And the way I've always interpreted that is that I'm obviously doing something where they like me being happy and enjoying what we're getting. I think that there's something there, and then what they're trying to do is get that back. I think that's just how I've interpreted it, because... To me, that feels lovely. That feels like...

I've got a group of people who aren't just helping me make a film or, or to tell a story, but you know, they want me to enjoy myself as I'm doing it. And like I said, a lot of these guys are really young. Some of them are more experienced, um,

And it's just really great when that group of people come together because they see that I'm frustrated or disappointed because something isn't working and they find a way to make it work or they're offering solutions. And if you think about it like this, if I was like a complete, like vicious asshole during a shoot,

A young person isn't going to make a suggestion to me that can save the day. They're going to think, oh, he's a bit grumpy. I don't want him snapping at me. So they keep quiet, but they don't. When I'm stuck for a problem, I've got people throwing ideas at me. And that's great. That's what I need. I need solutions to problems, not...

you know, a bunch of people scared to speak up because they're having a tantrum and because I'm in a building where I can actually literally smash a wall. I'm not smashing a wall, you know, which psychologically isn't healthy, by the way, if you do take out your rage by breaking things or damaging things, what you do is you condition yourself. So it needs to do that whenever you're in a moment of heightened stress and that's not healthy. I don't know. I've read that a while ago. I'm not sure if that's true anymore. You know, it's like with psychological, you know,

It's always changing. And, but, um, I did hear that, but I thought, well, nevertheless, it's a very unpleasant thing to see. So, so I, so I, I don't do it, but, um, but yeah, it's really lovely that I think everyone sort of comes, comes through and, you know, everything, we had a really great team on this one. We had a really good cast. Everything was, um, like exceeded expectations so much. Um,

um anyway it was a tough shoot but I think what we got is a fun film that you know seems to make sense and the action is really good fun and the characters are great um I really love uh

I love tonal shifts. So there's lots of those in the movie. So yeah, it's a weird one. It's kind of one of the first times I've talked about it. It's just weird because I've been making it for so long. And people have been interacting with a part of that or that people have been sending clips to all along who've read the script. And this is the first time I've kind of spoken about it. So without anyone having that frame of reference or context. So I hope it's making sense. If it's not, you just get me. Let me know.

And with your permission, Mark, I'm going to post a link to the trailer if it's up yet, or maybe in the still if it's not up yet, just so there's a frame of reference. So people aren't like, what the hell? Yeah, I'll give you a still because this is going to be, oh, this is an awkward one. There is a trailer. But I, it's, yeah, it's, oh God. This happens all the time, right? Directors don't like trailers they see for their films.

like surely that happens all the time this is i've heard it discussed a lot of times um i i don't think the trailer represents the film very well um uh you know it's interesting because like i did because you know i'm being as diplomatic as i can be the guys who make the film obviously want the film to do really well and they care a lot about the film um the guys who have sort of like been financing it but also they're distributing it and they they know their audience they know the audience they want to capture and that's fine i can understand i can get behind it but um

And I know they worked hard in the trailer to achieve what they want to achieve. It's just that it's just... It's just not... I just... It's not one that I'm particularly keen on. I don't think... I think it undersells the film criminally. And yeah, and I am really...

made any secret about it. I mean, I wasn't really involved in the construction of the trailer at all. And even from a technical perspective, the way I shot that film to specifically be graded, no one asked me about that either. But this is the difference from the film that I guess I was kicked off. And this film is that for this film, we made sure that all the things were in place so that it was like we own the film

and we're giving it to distributors. So we, it's our film to make really. It's just been financed. Um, so that's kind of where it is really. Um, yeah, I'm trying not to be a dick because like, you know, these guys, these guys helped me make a film, you know, it's like, I, I've got nothing but like appreciation for, for what they've done. It's just that, uh,

I do also, you know, have an idea of how the thing should be marketed and their idea of how it should be marketed and mine are very, very different. And that's all. It's just basically it's a pull in two different directions. There's nothing but sort of support and love for the film. And, you know, I think these guys, I'll be forever in debt with them because I've been able to make a film that's really close to my heart and really personal out of it.

But I just want people to see it, you know? That's where the marketing comes in. Yeah, yeah. That's the big thing nowadays is, you know, how do you actually get people to see your movie? You know, things have gotten, you know, I don't want to say easier, but let's just say more accessible to filmmakers. And, you know, now it's like, well...

we've made the thing. Now, how do we people to see the thing? Uh, and, and, you know, is it VODs at theaters? Uh, do we slap it on YouTube and call it a day? Um, you know, and that's where this distribution, you know, that's why it's so important now more than ever. And the movie has to be able to stand out. The, the marketing has to be able to stand out. Uh, because I mean, now it's,

I think things have gotten It's more like you have to market Instead of trying to do it like the old days Where you have to market to everybody And say okay and then the chips will fall where they may Now you have to market specifically To that group of people who are going to see it And that's where all this big data comes in That's where the changing paradigms Of social media come in And then you know Basically now you can either create that market For yourself or you can pay to have access To that market you know what I mean

Yeah, yeah, exactly. That's the thing. It's about, you know, it's, I mean, the thing with the marketing is, you know, there are elements in the film and like, you know, you saw Colin and I should have sent you a link for Magpie really. Magpie is probably the best example of what some of this stuff can be like that I make where I really play with tone, not to a point where it's incongruous. Like you're not laughing at a scene you shouldn't be laughing at or you're not forced to laugh when you've just had, like,

a terrible time or the other way around. It's tonal shifts. It's what Hitchcock did perfectly. It's what Spielberg does perfectly. It's that idea of taking all this on. So what happens is when you sell a film,

or distributor has a film, they find an angle in there that they find most appealing that they then think will help sell the film. So, you know, action being a great one. It's not an action film. We've got a lot of action in it, but it's, you know, it's a character ensemble, really. The action is a small part of the film. I think if people went into this expecting to see the raid, they'd be pretty pissed off because, you know, the raid is 40 minutes of awesome fighting and

We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor. And now back to the show. We really don't have that long that much. So it's about sort of like I think from my perspective as an audience, I'm always thinking about measuring expectations. I default to what the marketing team do. For Fistful of Lead, for example, Sony know exactly how they want to market that.

And, you know, this isn't one of their big budget films. This is a completely different thing to Ghostbusters. You know what I mean? So we're not going to fall into the same traps that Ghostbusters fell into. They've said to me, would you like to cut a trailer? And I said, absolutely, love to. And they said, okay, we've got one request. Can you make it longer than you'd normally make a trailer so that we have all of what you think are the best trailer moments and then we'll whittle it down? I was like, well, that sounds great. Yeah, of course, I'll do that. So, you know, I kind of like... They've got a very...

uh, like director driven approach to how the film can get out there, uh, which we did on Colin and it worked really well for Colin. You know, I was, I was, you know, very specific about what I think we should market film towards. Um, and, and so, you know, it, and it helped him to help the sales. So, you know, so I think that's how I feel with night shoes. Um, is I just, I want to, I want the film to be seen for what it's going to be. And, um,

You know, like, you know, I'd like to send you the trailer that I cut for the film because, you know, I'm proud of it. I love watching people watch it. But I think what we're going to do is because I think it's fair that I don't interfere with the marketing that they've put money into. You know, I think we should. I think I should leave it.

do its thing. And then when the film's released, then we're in a different territory. Then we can sort of, then we can release the trailer. Although I guess, I don't know, I suppose maybe I could put the, cause, cause you're the U S this is a UK distributor. The U S is a completely different market. We haven't sold the film to the U S yet. I'm sure I could give you my trailer and say, well, here's my trailer. You know, it's, and I think regionally speaking, um,

no one can do you know i don't think it's a problem i'd have to check but but like what's the harm gonna be if someone from the uk sees our trailer and go whoa that looks amazing you know what's the problem you know but um i don't know it'd be great if we could um hey it's great you can tell by just scrolling down right now if it's there it was fine if it's not it wasn't yeah so

We're in the past right now, Dave. Everyone listening to this is in the future. Exactly. I know. We would think we're in the present, but we're not. We're actually, you know, it's amazing. After we're done with this interview, I'll look at it and I'll tell you my thoughts. I'll give you the thumbs up and say, hey, you know what? I think I'm going to post this everywhere now, Mark.

And be like distributors be damned. But, but you, you know, I'm going to be clear with it. They mean, well, that's the thing. It's not, they're not, they're not like, they're not bad people. They mean, well, they want the film to succeed. It's just that they have their very specific ideas in the same way as I have my specific ideas. It doesn't make me right. My trailer could suck, but,

But, you know, this is the push and pull. And that's the thing with the creative industry is that you're always talking about... I always try to break it down to technicalities. I don't look at it on an emotional basis, say, emotionally, I like this. Emotionally, I don't like this. I look at it and I break it down technically and say, right, what is this achieving? Is this story point clear? Is this story point clear? Here's a joke. Is that joke established well enough early in the trailer for it to work well?

at this point in the trailer? If the answer is no, well, we might have a problem. So what I try to do with my trailers is try to make sure that all those components are in place so that

we're telling a story and we have that emotional weight to it. So people do watch it and laugh. People are thrilled. That's, that's what you're trying to do. And it's the same thing as making a film. You know, I was trusted with the money to make film and tell that story. Why not trust me to do the mini version of that? You know, I'm not exactly the director who says you can't put this in. It'll spoil it. I say, fuck it, spoil the whole thing. The audience may never, this is the thing that most people are going to see this trailer. So you have to do it in a way that gets them in. And if the film's good enough, then,

they will forget all of these little clips because these clips out of context don't mean anything. It's just flashbang and cool. But in the context of the story of the film, people will forget that they know what's coming and they'll just enjoy it. Like, do you remember Return of the King? Did you, did you, did you, because I love the Lord of the Rings movies. In Return of the King, there was that amazing end to the trailer with the, you know, the Felby sort of comes in and roars a Gandalf on the horse. And I had, I think I,

And someone pointed out that that wasn't in the film. And I went, oh, shit, yeah, that isn't in the film. I was so into the movie that I forgot that the coolest part of that trailer wasn't in the film. And I didn't even think to ask where it was. I mean, I just loved the film that much. So you can do what you want in the trailer. It's fine. It's, you know, it's, yeah.

I started thinking of bad trailers and they give the whole thing away. That Terminator Genesis trailer. Well, yeah, I remember the poster gave that away too. I actually have an idea for a movie. Yes. A movie trailer. And it's just called Bait and Switch. Like literally it's going to be a trailer for a movie that doesn't exist, which features scenes from a movie that if you were to go to it, it doesn't exist either. So what I mean by that is,

it's like imagine a trailer that showcases a movie that nothing, it has nothing to do with the movie. They're trying to even sell. It's just random, random like scenes and stuff from others from, you know what I mean? That are all just made up. So if you went to see that movie, if it actually existed, it would, it wouldn't, none of that would be in there anyway. That,

That's great. I said that they should do... I was up for doing a Groundhog Day sequel. But what you do is you just release Groundhog Day. You just change the title card. You say, oh, this is Groundhog Day. But you change the title card and you just release Groundhog Day. And people will go, oh, I get it. That's great. We got to see Groundhog Day in the cinema. And then there'll be other people that go, goddammit, I hated this. This is terrible. So, you know, the...

The Rian Johnson approach. You can rage as much as you endear.

So, you know, just, I know we were talking for about an hour, you know, Mark, just in closing, I wanted to ask about Fistful of Lead. You know, how did you come across, you know, that opportunity to make that film? You know, with, you know, because I don't know how much I'm allowed to say, but, you know, how did you get the opportunity to sort of start making this film? And, you know, because that'll be the second film that you're going to have released by the end of this month. Yeah, we'll have it finished there in the month. I think it's coming out in December. Yeah.

Because I guess the difference between the two is that I'll finish it and the thing's going to be released in the UK virtually straight away. But Sony want to spend more time building up the marketing and then looking at what they can do to really push it. So even though our release is far away, our deadline is...

is roughly the same. But what happened there was we were looking for money for night shooters and we were speaking to an investor that there's a filmmaker. He's absolutely incredible. He's worth looking at. He's a Welsh Roger Corman. And I met him through an interview, a guy called Andrew Jones. And I met him during this interview. And in this interview, he was talking about how he'd, you know, he took the IP for Night of the Living Dead, made a film called Night of the Living Dead Requiem.

And he was the first to admit, he said, look, the film's not that great, but I just love making movies, so I made this movie. And he made this film like Living Dead Requiem because he knew that that would sell. And then he did an Amityville one, and he knew that would sell. And he just started doing all these really smart choices, and he started building up investors. And the guy makes something like six movies a year. And they all sell. And Sony US, I think, have released all of them.

And I was just in awe of this guy's ability to his business model.

It's like a very low budget Blumhouse, right? So I said to him, I asked him, I said, look, I'm looking for money to do night shows. And he put me in touch with his investors and his investors we got along with very well. It's a very generous thing for a filmmaker to do, by the way, to put you in touch with their investors. It's not a done thing. Directors don't even ask. It's terrible. It's like asking to sleep with a family member. It's wrong. You worked to get those investors. You shouldn't

You know, you shouldn't really get involved. You shouldn't say, oh, can I have some of your pie? Because that's money off his table. It's money away from his films. But he was very generous. So my producer spoke to these guys and they were trying to get money for Night Shooters. And it was a bit of a sort of like, oh, if it could be this, we could do it. If it could be this, we could do it. But then, you know, another company sort of stepped in and said, oh, we'd like to make Night Shooters.

And so we thought, oh, there's a dilemma. Do we keep working on it so that these guys can make it? Or do we just say yes to these other guys who are offering a very good deal, make night shows with them, and then just stay in touch with the other investor? The other investor said, if you've got someone willing to put money in, definitely do it. Don't worry about that. However, if you are able to, we'd love you to make this Western. And so I just said, fuck it. Yeah, let's do it. If we can shoot at this date,

we'll be able to do both. Michelle Parkin, my producer, said, are you sure? That's a lot of work. I said, it's a lot of work for me. I think I can do it. Do you think you could do it? She went and she said, I don't think this is entirely true, but she said, oh, it's less work for me. It's more work for you because you've got now two feature films to shoot, direct, write and edit.

Not in that order, obviously. And so I thought, hey, now let's do it. And yeah, so that's how that one sort of fell together. But it's really interesting because we were able to look at what we did in Light Shooters, which was very ambitious. And then we looked at the planning that we sort of put into Fistful of Lead. We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor. And now back to the show. Comparatively...

Maybe it's because we shot for nights for three weeks. When we shot Fistful of Lead in two weeks, that was somehow the goddamn easiest film shoot I've ever done in my entire life. It was a breeze. There were two hard days on it. And that was just because we were dealing with weather a lot because it was a huge snow storm that hit the UK and we shot it.

And that just meant that our film looked amazing because it looked very expensive because we had huge expanses of land with snow, which you don't get very often in the UK. So when you see it in films like Django or The Hateful Eight,

there's a quality to having it set a Western set in snow. And although I didn't initially want that, cause I thought that was Tarantino territory. When I saw it, I was like, Oh, this is great. We've also got a spray blood in this. This looks, it looks amazing. So, so yeah, so we just sort of shopped that and we did them back to back and it was, it's really interesting. It's really interesting working with both companies on films that have similar budgets just because it's,

It's interesting to see how the two different investors managed it, really. And I think for Michelle, who's... I think these are the first... She's produced a lot of television before, so she's very familiar with what I can do and what I need and when to tell me no. I think that these are our first two feature films together. And, yeah, I think I've...

the collaboration has been incredible. It's amazing. I think if anything, Michelle is as much a psychologist for me as she is a producer. And she keeps me very well protected from things that like,

you're not going to be very good at dealing with this. So you go over there, you leave it to me and I'll deal with this. And I'm like, I'm happy to get involved in the conversation. I'll get him. And she's like, no, no, no. I don't want you there. Fuck off over there. Behave yourself. So yeah, she keeps me in check. She's excellent. She's the only person, I think, who can say, don't do that. And I'll be like, okay, fine. You know, she's...

And it's not from any sort of... It doesn't come from any position of authority or anything. It's all to do with just absolute respect. I've got so much respect for her and how we work together. And it's so rare to find a producer you can have this sort of relationship with.

That like when she asks for something, I'm like, okay, fine. Like she can give me notes and is one of four people on the planet who can give me notes. And I don't go, what? You know, cause you know, this is, this is, this is the, the, the horrendous ego of a, of a, of a writer director, right?

It's that. That's when you become Mr. Bastard. Like we were talking about earlier. And you're like, God damn that Mark. He is such a bastard. But yeah, but with Michelle, she's like, this doesn't make any sense. You should fix that. I'm like, all right. Yeah.

it's like a little child just like rubbing his heels on the floor kicking the dirt you're fine I'll do it now then you know it's great it's it's I I it's um like I'm really excited of course we're we're about to produce another film for someone we're just waiting for all the um everything falling behind when it all falls in the line then we have ourselves uh a budget and we can do the Roger Coleman thing of of getting uh a filmmaker their first feature which I'm really excited about um

Because as a producer, I'm hands off. I'm there if they want me. If you get stuck, I've got a camera. I'll go shoot a scene. I can shoot second unit and do whatever you want.

or I'll stay here and just eat the catering and, and, and write the next one that I want to make. You know, I'm, I'm like, I'm not really interested in telling people how to make films. Like the, the idea is we go to filmmakers who make films themselves. And, and it's like, right, you use your team, you make your film your way. And you know, if this one all comes together, I'm not allowed to talk about it yet, which is rubbish. I'll tell you on Facebook. But like, it's, it's one of those things where it's, we, we just, you know, it, it's,

I'm really excited at what this director's pulled together with his resources. He's an infinitely better director than I am. You know, uh, if he wasn't my friend, that'd be a really bitter, jealous person. But, um, yeah, it's, uh, yeah, it's, it's, it's, it's, I'm really quite excited about what we're doing with our next season. So that would be, if that all works out as three films in a year. So we have written and directed two of them. Oh, I did call right fistful of lead. Phil Dias really is a writer friend. He stood up and really helped us out there. Um,

and then this third film will be one I'm just producing and if all goes well we might have another action film in November which I'm really hoping we do because I was meant to be doing something else but I think that's going to be pushed back so we're going to try so it'd be kind of in my head I'd be like ooh three films in a year that'd be nice I don't think I'm going to be able to do this for the rest of my life so I may as well do it whilst I have the youthful exuberance

Yeah, you got to get the momentum going. That's what I found. When I stopped for a while, honestly, Mark, it's so hard to get back. And actually, that's why I'm going to get back on the horse next month. And I'm going to shoot the first thing I've shot in probably five years, four years. You said this last time we spoke. What happened there? What happened there? You said you were going to say that we spoke about a year and a half ago, maybe.

I think. No idea. I have, I don't even know what we were talking about at that point. You said you're going to start making films again. I'm guessing, I'm guessing you didn't. My Facebook stalking didn't reveal anything. So like, I don't know. You should totally do it, dude. It's, I know it's, I know it's tough.

But like, I'd always recommend making a film. So even if you made a bad one, you're a better filmmaker having made that bad one. So, you know, so if you keep making bad ones, three bad films later, you're three times a better filmmaker. You know what I mean? So it's, it's, it's worth doing. Even if you're just making a short with two people sat around the table talking about a goldfish, you know, it's, it's something.

So I'd recommend it. But, you know, it's, you know, if you need any moral support, dude, I'm here. I'm always here. Just come and I'll happily talk you into it. That's what I love doing.

Well, I don't know what I was planning on doing at that point. It could have been one of two things. But what I'm doing with this one is I'm sort of taking the reins of more things myself, like I used to do, where it was basically, you know, I was wearing many hats. But the upside to it was I knew what was getting done and what wasn't, truthfully. And I've gotten – since –

I don't want to maybe a couple of years ago before I even started doing this podcast, I would get offers all the time and it would be like these ridiculous offers. Like, for instance, I got offered to be a part of this website, which was pretty big at the time. And at the time they were actually ready to partner with a nerdist.

And then all of a sudden they were like, oh, but you have to pay for everything and we're not going to pay you for this. You're just going to be exposure. And I'm like, okay, well, I can maybe make something out of this. And I'm thinking to myself, is it worth it? And then I'm like, you know what? So I emailed the guy back and I just told him my concerns. Never got back to me whatsoever. And I'm like, you know what? What, what, what,

what if I had actually done this? What if I actually went through, spent thousands or hundreds of dollars or whatever, making something, and then he just never got back to me anyway. And I'm what, what then? I mean, so with this, what I'm going to do is next month, I've already started to sit down. I storyboarded the whole thing out. I have somebody building an animatic right now. I've been actually telling people in the podcast, I've been saying, if you want to help me shoot me a fricking email. Um, but, um, yeah. How's it going? Is it going good?

The feedback part is are people willing to throw their hat in the ring and join in? Yeah, I actually have had a few...

people who have emailed, who have emailed me and you know, we, I've been talking with them. I've had a few people email me and basically they're trying to see what they, what I can do for them, which is kind of meaning that they're like, Hey, what's going on with this? Well, Hey, can you help me with my project? No, it's not. I, I, I'm clearly not in a position right now to, for you, for, for me to do that. So, um, you know, it's, it's,

I think I know what I was going to do. I think I was going to do something similar to what I'm going to do now when I mentioned it to you about a year and a half ago. I think I was going to do a trailer just to get some eyeballs on some stuff. Then things kind of went south for a number of different reasons. But I'm making a fake trailer. This is going to be fun. In fact, let me send you this stuff when I'm done. Yeah, absolutely. Do it. I think that...

there's a lot of people who adopt the attitude of, oh, you shouldn't do it. The time's not right. And I'm just like, look, the time never feels right. You know, whenever someone says, here's the money you asked for to make a film of this budget that you wrote specifically for this budget, we're shooting in a month. When that day shows up, I'm still like, shit, was the script good enough to do? Like, you constantly feel unprepared, no matter how prepared you are. So just embrace it and roll with it and,

make a shitty movie or make a great movie. Just make a movie. All you can do is do the best you can do at that particular moment in time. And sometimes we screw it up and we have to get a pick up of a hand picking things up. Or sometimes you get it right and we got the whole thing in a single shot. I would encourage constantly to just make movies. We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor. And now back to the show.

Yeah, I think that is the...

When people say it's got to be the right time, and I'm guilty of that too, you're right. It's never going to be the right time. And you know what I found that particularly true, by the way, is when writing a screenplay. I think sometimes people think that they have to have everything known before they start writing. And I'm like, you know what? The people that I all know who are the most successful screenwriters have all said that we don't really know everything before we start because, you know...

there's a lot of downside to that. And not only that, but it's really, it's kind of hard to actually grasp a screenplay because usually you get an idea and then you go, okay, well now I know the whole story about what this is. And then you start writing it and then you hit a bunch of dead ends or brick walls or obstacles, whatever. And you're like, oh shit. Now what do you want? No, now what do I do? Well, I'm going to start over again. And then you perpetually never, ever finish anything. Um, so I, I, I, I,

That's another thing to watch out for is those sort of obstacles. And see, that's why this podcast exists, Mark. So we get guys who are actually out there doing it like yourself and coming back here. And, you know, it's like, you know, it's just a chat and a laugh. Remember, you ever see the TV show Extras?

Yeah, I love extras. So remember the second season when... Maybe it's the first season, but anyways, remember when Ricky befriends that guy on that Samuel L. Jackson set? And he's a big guy, and he's like, oh, I found the Joker of the pack. He's like, it's just a chat and a laugh. That's what this is. It's a chat and a laugh. I don't know. Let's just bring it all the way back to Star Wars, to the Phantom Menace. That guy plays... He's a Welsh actor. A few of my mates know him. That guy plays the general of Jar Jar Binks' army.

Use the boom boom charger! That's that guy. There you go. We brought it full circle, dudes.

Well, there you go. I don't think there's anything left to talk about. I think we have officially just solved all the problems in the universe and we've exposed the crack in the Matrix. And also, we had a very mature conversation about The Last Jedi. Considering you hated it and I absolutely loved it, we had a very mature conversation about it. There was no name-calling or, you know, you didn't call me like a cuck and I didn't call you a sexist. It was great. It was great. Yeah.

Although in the UK, a good insult is a cock. You cock. So I would have assumed you meant that if you would have gone down that road, which of course you wouldn't. You're a decent human being. Yeah, yeah. I'm going to talk to you later on now. I have this friend of mine. He's a bastard. In fact, his name is Mr. Bastard. And he actually liked The Last Jedi. What a freaking cuck. Ha ha ha ha ha!

Oh, no, that'll learn me. You'll be like, I think someone in America is talking about me right now. And they'll be like, oh, come on, Mark. Who's talking about you in America right now? Oh, God, the stems of my snowflake are melting. I can tell. Yeah, but it's a very mature conversation. We did good, sir. Before we go, Mark, where can people find you at online?

I am on Twitter. I'm at at Mark underscore V underscore Price. I'm sorry. I was early to Twitter and I didn't really do anything with it. So I have one of those annoying underscore names. I'm also the same handle on Instagram as well, where I'm posting a lot of pictures about the films that we're doing as well. So there's a lot...

There's a lot on there. Instagram, I'm very active on Instagram, but I think Twitter, I'm working on not leaving Twitter out. My Twitter is, all I do is retweet shit that makes me laugh. So my Twitter feed is just Star Wars and, you know, shit like that. It's...

Well, I'm going to link to all that in the show notes, everybody. You can see all the things that make Mark laugh. And you can see me tweet about God knows what. I'm going to start using my other personal Twitter more because I kind of abandoned it, Mark, to just do the podcast Twitter because it was getting a lot more feedback, you know? And I was kind of like, well, what the hell is the point of using this one? And I was an early adopter of Twitter and I was very late and I still –

I'm sorry, I was late in changing my name, though, and I had to get Dave underscore Bullis, and I'm like, mother, god damn it. Because a guy who has Dave Bullis...

Yeah, actually blocked me because so many people were tweeting at him. And I said, listen, let's just switch usernames. And I said, I'll make it worth your while to also be like 20, 20, 20 bucks, whatever. And he and he blocked me. He actually blocked me. And I was like, well, there you go. So because we were tweeting at him and he's like, I'm not that Dave voice. It's this guy here. And I'm like, dude, just switch with me, for God's sakes.

There's a politician, Jon Favreau, spelt the same. The first thing he's got under it is, not that one. You know, right? He's like, I did not direct Iron Man. But yeah, Twitter is this. I love a bit of Twitter.

It's great. It's how I get my news. But that's how I get the gossip on my news. I'll see it on Twitter, then I'll try to verify it if I go to an actual news source. It's all the fake news and stuff. You kind of go, all right. It's like great white sharks spotted off Cornwall. Holy shit, that's cool. I mean, you know, I have friends who post stuff on Facebook and Twitter and this and that. And some of this stuff that I see them post, I go, guys, there's no way.

That could be true on any which way you slice that. I don't care. I don't care if you're whatever political party or whatever you're from. There's no way this could be true. There would literally be a mass uproar or there would literally be some kind of like government investigation one way or the other. There's just no way. Or maybe maybe I'm the idiot. And actually, if all the truth, I don't know.

I'm such a sucker. I'll watch anything and go, wow, that's cool. I'll check it out before just blindly believing it because I've learned from my mistakes. I was like, oh, wow. And I believe things for a brief moment before I find out they're not true. I'm like, ah, shit. But there was that one. Remember that meteor over Russia a few years back? Might have been about five years ago. And all those dash cams caught it. And I just went,

that's the fakest thing I've ever seen. That's bullshit. No, that's real. Yeah, that one was. So the one time I called out thinking, learn from your mistakes, Mark. Don't trust anything. That's bullshit. Yeah, it was real. And I was like, why the fuck are there so many dash cams in Russia? And then I found out, which I went down a wormhole of YouTube that day, man. It was,

Those are Russians throwing themselves in front of the cars for fake insurance scams. It was a great day. I think I was working on Magpie at the time. I remember just sitting there going, I'm having a day off today. I'm watching Russians try to run themselves over and meteors. That was my day. That was a great day. That was the life of a freelancer, man. It's ridiculous. It's ridiculous. I should be ashamed of myself.

It's all good, man. It's all good. It's because I actually always wanted that, too. And then I found out that there was so much insurance fraud over there that that's why everyone drives now with a dashboard camera. That's right. Yeah. And to clarify, incidentally, this might seem like, you know, like him lording it up, taking a day off because he just decided to. I was broke as fuck as well at that point. So it was really, really stupid. I was living with my parents.

So I was like, mom, I've got to stay here for a couple of months to just try and save some money. So that was one of the dark times before the freelancing really picked up. But my God, yes, it was still a day off. I remember it fondly back in the past. I'd love another one. Well, you know what would be funny? What if you got an idea? Watching all these scam artists, you're like, oh, I could fake a scam. I could fake a shit scam. I could do that for money. And your parents are like, no, Mark, you're not doing that.

I did think about getting the dog to do something really cute so I could film it and send it into a TV show and get 200 quid. But their FTP upload site was so frustrating. I was like, ah, fuck this. I didn't even film anything with the dog. I was just exploring the options. This is too time consuming. I can't do this. I'll carry on making the film I'm making. I hope that makes me money. Which it didn't. That's filmmaking for you.

So, but, but now you, are you, do you, I mean, just out of curiosity, like, do you live in like a flat with a bunch of other people now or? Yeah, I'm living in London now. So I've got, I'm living with. Oh Jesus, you're broke. I know you're broke now. Yeah. Yeah.

I'm working on it. I'm working with a friend of mine. Actually, they're very creative guys. So one of my flatmates works on a Game of Thrones show, Thronecast, which is like a British equivalent of, hey, we just watched an episode of Game of Thrones. So let's talk about it for an hour. So it's one of those shows. Make sure you tell them about this show.

Oh, yeah. Hell, yeah. I mean, do you know what's really cool, actually, about his little Game of Thrones thing? Because I was on a film shoot once and there was a guy on the camera department. One of those guys is... You just get the impression this guy is just a bit of a...

It's a bit of a tool. And he was, he was bragging about fucking, Oh, I saw battle of the bastards last night. And he wanted to just ruin the episode for people. I hadn't seen it. And I just went, mate, my flatmate works on throne cast. He's already seen the final episode next week. If you fuck this episode up for me, I'm going to tell you what happens the very last episode. Fuck your episode up. I could do that. Cause if you do that, you would have equivalent equivalent of ruined the whole damn series for me. So I'll just blow the last episode for you. So don't, don't test me, pal. Um,

And then, of course, the last episode came on. I had to work with him for another five days. That was tense. But to give him credit, he was all talk. He didn't actually blow it. And he didn't blow it for anyone. He was just teasing everyone very convincingly, which is a confusing way to joke. But hey, you know, whatever works. Whatever works for you. But yeah, it's a cool... It's really great. Because the Game of Thrones obsession in the flat is pretty intense. And...

We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor. And now back to the show. Uh, you know,

and I think a lot of the guys are in it somewhere like I'm behind Jamie Lannister there if you would have just moved to the left you'd see me as an extra shit like that so it's quite funny it's um you know one of my camera assistants like I'm one of those guys in the background I'm like which one the bald one I'm like there's fucking nine bald people back there dude like how the fuck am I supposed to know and they're all out of focus around fire I can't tell which one's you and he said I think I'm that one like

it's funny. It's, uh, it's, uh, yeah, it's, it's, we're in great times, aren't we? Where television is so rich and exciting. Um,

It's a, yeah, in many ways, I'm glad I don't have a career. Cause I'd probably love to direct the Game of Thrones episode and it would just ruin the whole series for me. You're like, it was great. It's all I got to direct it. It was all going great. Then, uh, you know, that, that one by, uh, Mark V. Price just kind of, the camera was just pointed around in places. He wouldn't look. He just was like, I'm pointing over there and have them do the lines over there. I'm not looking. Just tell me if it's in focus. Cool. Moving on.

Yeah, that would be me directing Game of Thrones, Boardwalk Empire, Backhaul Saul, any show that I like. That's just going to be, that is all it would be. It would be me just going like, ah, don't tell me. Just tell me it was in focus. It is. Did they sound like they meant it when they said the lines? Then great, moving on. That's generally how I direct anyway. I mean, I don't know if I'm very good at it.

That's your secret right there. We've just had it revealed. That is just kind of like, all right, was it in focus? All right, moving on. Did they sound like they meant it? Great. Moving on.

Yeah, I hope this has been entertaining. It's terrifying. We're just talking. I forget that we're doing this for your podcast. It's just a conversation. That's a good sign, though. Yeah, so cool. So, Mark, I appreciate you coming on, man. And this, by the way, you're next up. And I want to say thank you so much for coming on. And I'm going to link to everything we talked about in the show notes, everyone. Brilliant. Thank you very much, man.

I want to thank Dave so much for doing such a great job on this episode. If you want to get links to anything we spoke about in this episode, head over to the show notes at indiefilmhustle.com forward slash 804. And if you haven't already, please head over to filmmakingpodcast.com, subscribe and leave a good review for the show. It really helps us out a lot, guys. Thank you again so much for listening, guys. As always, keep that hustle going, keep that dream alive. Stay safe out there, and I'll talk to you soon.

Thanks for listening to the Indie Film Hustle podcast at IndieFilmHustle.com. That's I-N-D-I-E-F-I-L-M-H-U-S-T-L-E.com.