If you could see my face at this moment, you would see a rarity among rarities. A look of shame has actually crossed the normally shameless Son of Celluloid's visage. Yep, I screwed up. Way back before my hiatus, I had a giveaway for a copy of James Balsamo's flicks Hack Job and I Spill Your Guts courtesy of Acid Bath Productions Wild Eye Films. Well, today I went to look in the "stuff to give away" box and noticed those DVDs still sitting there. I never announced the winner. Sorry about that Cellmates. Without any further delay, congratulations to the randomly selected winner... Nicole Gould! Thank you to everyone entered, and keep your eyes peeled, 'cause I've got some killer stuff to give away soon. While we're talking about Mr. Balsamo and Acid Bath, he recently sent me the details of his newest project called Catch of the Day. He's gonna be bringing his trademark "chock full of cameos" horror comedy style to us again in November. Follow the flick on facebook HERE to stay up to the minute on the production. Wanna know what it's about? Read on... BALSAMO IS OFF THE HOOK IN A BRAND NEW FLICK, “CATCH OF THE DAY” NEW YORK, NY – Acid Bath Productions, the makers of “Hack Job”, “I Spill Your Guts” and “Cool As Hell,” announce the official anticipated release date of November 19, 2013 for a brand new Horror Comedy, “Catch of the Day.” Directed by James Balsamo, this buddy- cop masterpiece with splashes of mutant fish monsters and tons of splaststick fun is bound to get you excited. Officer Rod Davis becomes embedded undercover when a cartel starts brining drugs into the city through shipments of fish. He soon finds himself and his city under siege when a scientist accidently creates mutant fish people with a poisonous bite. It's up to the rookie cop and a sexy lab assistant to find the drug stash and destroy the crime lord controlling the mutant monsters, but it turns personal when Rod's sister is kidnapped. Are they fighting giant mutant fish monsters just for the halibut? See the badge, bass, and ass in a horror-comedy that you won't want to throw back... because it's the "Catch of the Day." The film features Tuesday Knight, Jake ‘The Snake’ Roberts, Debbie Rochon, Johnny Legend, Jennifer Banko, Irwin Keyes, Carmine Capobianco and lead singer of Suffocation Frank Mullen. The laugh-out-loud comedy adventure also features music by MxPx, Less Than Jake, Something To Do and many, many more. The flick is already available for pre-order online through the Acid Bath Productions site at www.acidbathproductions.com/store. The trailer is available online HERE.
It's time for another giveaway. I do so love spreading the horror wealth to you Cellmates. I feel like a blood soaked demented Santa Claus or a mutant cannibalistic Bob Barker or something. Anyway, this one comes to us courtesy of Wild Eye Releasing (get both of these flicks and check out all of the other indie horror goodness they've got to offer HERE), Acid Bath Productions, and James Balsamo. Balsamo's new flick, Cool As Hell, hit store shelves everywhere yesterday, and I'll be reviewing it on Friday, but before you go pick up your copy you've got the chance to win DVD copies of his first two movies, Hack Job (REVIEW) and I Spill Your Guts (REVIEW). That's more low budget gore, laughs, chills, monsters, wacky horror and metal cameos, great music, and gratuitous tits than you can shake a stick at. So here's what you have to do...
This is a video of my chat with James at Days of the Dead Atlanta. In this clip, we give you a secret password. Watch the video, then come back. Oh come on, it's only, like, 3 and a half minutes. These are good flicks. I gotta make you work for it a little bit. Fun Fact - This was at the tail end of four days of heavy partying and no sleep, so I barely even remember doing this interview.
Now that you've got the password, follow these 3 easy steps to enter...
1. If you haven't already, go like the Son of Celluloid facebook page HERE.
2. If you haven't already, go like the Acid Bath Productions facebook page HERE.
3. Send an email to fromhell13@aol.com with "Cool As Hell" as the subject. Make sure it contains your name, your address, and the secret password.
The deadline is March 6th, so get cracking and win some cool flicks.And always remember the Son of Celluloid battle cry...Support Independent Horror!
In my mind, it almost feels like James
Balsamo's Acid Bath Productions and Son of Celluloid have grown up
together. His filmmaking career started around the same time the blog
did, and he was one of the first filmmakers to contact me about reviewing his
flicks. He's a good friend of the blog, and I look forward to meeting him
in person at Days of the Dead Atlanta, where he's gonna be a guest. See,
there's yet another reason to go HERE and enter the contest for passes to the
convention. He's gonna be a guest at Texas Frightmare Weekend in May (details
HERE) too. I got in on James's work at the ground floor with Hack Job,
then watched his progression in I Spill Your Guts, and now, as the release of
his third feature Cool As Hell approaches, I invited James to talk to the
Cellmates about nudity, old school movie novelizations, filmmaking, Troma, and
Oderus Urungus's Ed Wood moment. Check it out...
SOC: When was the first time you remember watching
a horror movie and thinking “THAT’S what I wanna do with my life!”
JB: I was eight years old and watching Friday the 13th
Part III with my father – I was loving every minute of it (until they
showed Jason's mother's severed rotting head...that scared the crap out of me).
Soon after, my own mother (with a head on her shoulders) asked me if I wanted
to join an acting school. That's when it hit me! I could be that guy behind the
mask. I'm not a sports fan or a horticulture enthusiast; I eat sleep and
breathe horror films, so it was clear from a young age I wanted to live and
work among the monsters and madmen of cinema universe.
SOC: You were an intern at Troma for a while. What
did you learn about filmmaking and the film business during your time there?
JB: Troma was a great learning
experience. I missed working on set for Poultrygeist. I started
working there after they had wrapped Night of the Chicken Dead, and
left Troma way before they started their new venture, Return to Nuke
‘Em High. So, I ended up learning the ropes of the business side of film
making, and it is a business. Becoming CEO of my own company was no easy task.
Troma helped me lay the ground work by teaching me the ropes and making me take
out the trash and sweep. I recently returned to Troma to tell Lloyd Kaufman and
Michael Herz that my films were sold all over the world. Lloyd and Michael
shook my hand and said that I went from errand boy to respected film maker. I
couldn't have done it without the help of Troma, but now Acid Bath Productions
is making a name for itself.
SOC: Your movies are always packed with cameos
(Dave Brockie, Lynn Lowry, Tim Ritter, Joel Reed, Andrew W.K., Debbie Rochon,
Carmine Capobianco). How do you go about getting all of these great people
involved?
JB: Acid Bath Productions is a growing company. Now that we have
worked with so many major artists, people contact us left and right to work
together. It's really an amazing thing - while making "Hack Job,” we
reached out to so many people in the horror community that we really made some
strong roots that have helped us branch out to so many new notables.
SOC: If you could pick anyone you haven’t worked
with yet to be in one of your flicks, who would it be?
JB: Dick Miller. I'm a big fan of his work. One of my favorite
Miller films is "Demon Knight". I was honored to recently be asked to
be a guest with Dick Miller at Days of the Dead convention in Atlanta. So, I’m
looking forward to meeting him in person.
SOC: Considering some of the real life characters
you’ve worked with, I bet you have some pretty funny on-set stories. Care to
share one with us?
JB: Filming is always an adventure.
Working with some of the industry's top notables is really the icing on the
cake. There are really some great stories on set, like when filming "Hack
Job," Dave Brockie dressed as Oderus kept screaming that this was his Bela
Lugosi moment, as if I was Ed Wood making "Plan 9". We filmed with
Lynn Lowry at her house and she has cats...I'm allergic to cats. She starts
rubbing my face out of nowhere in the scene, so I had to take a break to have
an allergic reaction coughing fit on her front lawn. There are so many stories
on set I think one day I'll write a book about my adventures so I don't want to
give too much away.
SOC: Your films
also feature lots of gratuitous nudity, which is becoming a rarity. Why do you
think horror movies these days generally shy away from nudity?
JB: I really don't know why horror movies shy away from
gratuitous nudity now, but Acid Bath Productions is picking up the slack. We
are jam packing our films with all the bare skin you can shake a fist up and
down to. Nudity is a primal desire, and we’ve picked up a motto that anyone
that tells you they don't enjoy nudity is too afraid to admit it. We don't make
porn; we just know how to make our audience happy. Filming it isn't a bad perk
either, but it is always a professional atmosphere for the cast and crew on set
when we have nude shoots.
SOC: There seems to have been a big resurgence in
anthologies on the indie horror scene lately, with Hack Job being near the
beginning of the wave. What made you decide on an anthology for your first
flick as opposed to a regular feature?
JB: "Hack Job" really spear
headed the comeback of anthologies. In fact I had self-distributed "Hack
Job" months before "Chillerama" hit stores. I had always wanted
my first film to be an anthology. I started out making short films, and an
anthology is essentially short films sewn together with one overlying story.
Needless to say, this is a great format for starting film makers. I grew up on
films like "CreepShow", and "Tales From The Darkside.” It was a
great starting point to pay homage to those films.
SOC: The Bloodsucking Zombies From Outer Space,
who did the theme song from Hack Job, are one of my favorite bands of all time.
How did that collaboration come about?
JB: I was a big fan of BZFOS myself,
before we worked together. I told them about "Hack Job" and they
loved the concept of collaboration. I sent them the lyrics I had in my mind and
they wrote an amazing song around it. We have become such good friends since
"Hack Job," we decided to work together again and they did the theme
song for my new film "Cool As Hell".
SOC: With the war veteran motif of I Spill Your
Guts, were you going for social commentary or was it just a good backdrop for
the blood and tits?
JB: The military was a great backdrop
for revenge and mutilation. I'm not a preachy filmmaker and I don't use my
films as a soap box to stand on. I have my own views on the world and I just
try to play devil's advocate and show both sides of the bayonet, so to speak.
SOC: A novelization of I
Spill Your Guts is a cool idea. Very old school. Did you always envision ISYG
as a book and movie, or did the book idea come later?
JB: The novel idea was not something
originally planned from the start, but now that the film has been adapted I
couldn't be happier with it. Nick Kisella did an amazing job and he really
makes the blood run right off the pages. You should go get a copy!
SOC:
A lot of the time, the book and movie
will have plot differences. How closely does the book follow the flick?
JB: More or less, the plot is the same, but some of the kills
have been modified. There is also a ton of character development. The novel
really portrays Dennis (the killer) as the victim and you take his side of the
story. As most horror movie fans know the killer is star of the show, and the
novel really keeps The American Executioner burning bright as he hacks and
slashes his way into our hearts.
SOC:
Speaking of Old School ideas, I Spill Your Guts just got a limited edition VHS
release. What are your thoughts on the whole collector’s VHS market that has
sprung up all of a sudden?
JB: Let’s just say there is a VCR in
my soul and when Matt from Horror Boobs Video contacted me about doing a
release on VHS, I had to "tape" him up on his offer. Is that enough
with the VHS puns or do I have to be kind and rewind? Zinger!
SOC:What has
it been like working with Wild Eye Releasing? They seem to have been on a roll
lately, putting out some great indie horror flicks, including Hack Job and I
Spill Your Guts.
JB: Working with Wild Eye has been great. "Hack Job"
really sparked the wave of awesome titles they released. Wild Eye and Acid Bath
Productions will be working together again to release "Cool As Hell".
SOC: Your next flick, Cool as Hell, is coming out
in February. Tell us about it.
JB:
Rich wasn't always a samurai sword wielding zombie slayer! He was your average
comic book store employee, until he met a demon named Az. When Az came from
Hell, he left the portal open and a soul hungry beast escaped. Rich and his
roommate Benny used to have girl troubles, but that's the least of their
worries now. They have to stop the creature and the living dead that have
crawled out of Hell. Who would have thought Rich would have to save the world
just to get laid?
SOC: After Cool as Hell, what’s next from you and
Acid Bath?
JB: Acid Bath Productions has yet to officially announce its
next project, but I can tell you that you will see the American Executioner
kill again.
SOC: What quality is more important for an indie
horror filmmaker to possess, technical skill or passion for the genre?
JB: As an indie filmmaker I believe
it's important to have both. Technical skill is essential because as an indie
filmmaker, you are competing with the best and you have to hold some ground in
the industry. Horror fans have something most other genre viewers don’t -
suspension of disbelief - they accept the fact that a monster could roam the
streets or that a hockey masked zombie could come back again and again after
"dying" at the end of sequel after sequel. That takes passion and I
think that is what really makes a great indie filmmaker.
SOC: Any last words for the Cellmates (readers)?
JB: Be sure
to follow us on Twitter @acidbathproduct and don't forget to pick up your copy
of "Hack Job" at hackjobmovie.com and "I Spill Your
Guts" at ispillyourguts.com. Don’t forget that
"Cool As Hell" hits stores worldwide February 19, 2013. Also be sure
to check out the "I Spill Your Guts" the novel HERE.
In my early 20’s, I spent a lot of time, probably an unhealthy amount truth be told, in a place I like to call The Video Fringe.I got that term from a book called Video Trash & Treasures by L.A. Morse.That book changed my life.Anyway, The Video Fringe is a place on the far reaches of the cinematic world where Hollywood, and even respectable indie flicks, fear to tread.It’s where the cheap, obscure, home-made, self distributed, idiotic, bizarre, off beat, off the wall, deviant, eccentric and unnaturally entertaining flicks live.During my first three years of college, I worked at a chain video store, but I lived within driving distance of three independent stores.These were the kind of places that were far more concerned with their shelves being full than what they were full of, so they stocked anything and everything.Films that will never see a DVD release, films that were sold to the store by the filmmakers themselves, movies as far removed as possible from the mainstream, and films that blew my mind all resided in those dusty aisles.I would leave these stores, sometimes with 5 videos, sometimes with 10, sit in my dorm room, bong in hand, and slum it in The Video Fringe.I was like a drug addict shooting and snorting everything he can find in search of a new high.I was like a sex addict trolling progressively sleazier clubs in search of dirtier and more depraved action.These movies were terrible more often than not, but this was true independent cinema, and I loved it.Every time a movie made no sense, had bad effects and lighting, made me laugh at its stupidity, or was just plain freakin’ weird, I was a happy man.While I don’t know the guy, I would be willing to bet that James Balsamo, writer and director of Hack Job, has spent quite a bit of time slogging through The Video Fringe also.How do I know?I know because only another fringe flick junkie could make a flick that emulates that style so perfectly.
In Hack Job, Beelzebub himself gives a script to two wannabe film directors named James Argento and Mike Fulci (get it?).It contains a trilogy of stories.In the first, Nazi archeologists disturb a mummy’s tomb, awakening an ancient curse.In the second, an alien invades a small town, leading to a showdown at the Battle of the Bands.In the final story a man is…um…I’m not entirely sure what’s going on in the last part, but it has something to do with a guy who has blackouts going on a mission to kill a drug dealing televangelist.To tell you the truth, the synopsis really isn’t important.There is a framing device about the boys trying to get the film made, but the move is more like a series of skits with the 3 main stories being the longest.In addition to the stories and framing scenes, we get concert footage, fake commercials, real commercials, a cop show spoof starring Toxie and Kabukiman, a random shower scene, sock puppets, psychedelic interludes, and all kinds of other randomness.It reminded me a bit of movies like Amazon Women on the Moon or Kentucky Fried Movie that may have a loose narrative, but are really a series of barely related comedy vignettes.
Simply stated, this flick is a hell of a lot of fun.I’ve seen other reviews go on and on about how bad the movie is.They apparently missed the point.Of course it’s bad.It’s supposed to be.Traditional “quality filmmaking” isn’t the point here!It’s called Hack Job.Hello?The whole film is basically a love letter to Troma.Need proof?Lloyd Kaufman plays himself and Troma stalwart Debbie Rochon has a cameo.Need further proof?Appropriately, the scene with Kaufman, which takes place in the Troma offices by the way, quickly devolves into a long shit joke.See, the dude knows his Troma.In addition to Uncle Lloyd and the always beautiful Miss Rochon, Dave Brockie and Lynn Lowry add to the impressive cameo list.When Oderus Urungus from GWAR shows up to fight off a giant alien, you know things are about to get both awesome and ridiculous.If you’ve ever seen GWAR live, you’ll understand the ironic humor of the role reversal at the end of the scene.
Hack Job has everything you could ask for in a low budget cheese and sleaze fest B movie.The acting achieves the cornball quality that it aspires to.The humor ranges from the truly funny to the downright silly.The gore effects are all practical, and they’re all done pretty well.Some of the deaths are pretty creative.I mean, have you ever seen vertebrae torn out through an eye socket?Didn’t think so.We are also treated to lots of gratuitous nudity.The proceedings never go on for very long without showing us some boobs, which is always a good thing.So we have juvenile humor, blood, tits, monsters, a wacky all-over-the place story, and cameos from B movie icons.In other words, Hack Job is a movie that truly knows its audience.
The other aspect of this flick that I loved was the music.What a soundtrack!The Bloodsucking Zombies From Outer Space, one of my personal favorite bands, contributes an original theme song.That in and of itself is enough to win my horror punk heart.In addition, The Creepshow (another personal favorite), Calabrese, The Brains, The Koffin Kats, Psychocharger, and plenty of others contribute songs.I’m used to being the only person who has heard of some of these bands, so hearing them in a movie was cool.This is probably the best horror movie soundtrack (not score, soundtrack) since Demon Knight.
I do have two issues with this flick.The first is the unevenness of the audio mix.There are times when you can barely hear what’s being said, then it will return to normal just about the time you crank the volume.It appears that a few different camera types were used throughout the film, so that might have something to do with it, but a little more tweaking of the audio levels would have been nice.Considering that the flick was made very cheaply (60 grand according to imdb), I can forgive some technical issues.
My other issue, however, is unforgivable.I cannot turn a blind eye to it, no matter how much I liked the movie.As many of you know, I am a bit of a Grammar Nazi.True, I don’t always use the best grammar on the blog, but that’s because I want the blog to read the way I speak.The misuse of homophones, however, is my favorite pet peeve.You know, like the difference between their/there/and they’re.That kind of stuff.During the credits, there is a “follow the bouncing skull” sing along.The line “If your a gore geek, then you should take a peek” scrolls across the screen.Yes, it’s spelled YOUR in the movie.YOU’RE is the correct word.They used the wrong f’n you’re in a finished, commercially available movie!My head nearly exploded.For the love of all things unholy, get someone to proofread your text before you put the movie out! We all learned the difference between your and you’re in second damn grade!Why do people do this to me? Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaagh!Ok, breathe Nathan, breathe…ok, I’m cool now.
RANDOM THOUGHT: Hack Job drinking game: drink every time an actor or actress momentarily can’t maintain a straight face and looks like they’re about to burst out laughing.
RANDOM THOUGHT 2:How could you not love a flick that uses a brutal Balls Mahoney chairshot in its promotional videos?Danny Danger, you are either an idiot or a braver man than I.Probably both.
I’ve said many times that the two things an independent horror filmmaker has to have to make a successful movie are a passion for the film they’re making and love of the genre.It’s obvious that the makers of Hack Job have both.In truth, aside from the celebrity cameos, there’s not a whole lot here that you couldn’t do yourself with some of your horror geek friends.I love that aspect of low budget DIY filmmaking. You COULD, I COULD, but few ever DO.James Balsamo and crew DID and I, for one, am damn glad they did.Hack Job is not for everyone.Some people need big budget gloss to enjoy a flick.If you're one of those horror fans, Hack Job doesn't give half-a-damn what you think of it. It wasn't made for you. If you have a taste for cheese and a movie that celebrates “Video Fringe” flicks by capturing their essence sounds good to you, then you’ll dig it as much as I did. One and a half severed thumbs up. Nathan says check it out.
BALSAMO IS OFF THE HOOK IN A BRAND NEW FLICK, “CATCH OF THE DAY”
