My Rambo Review

GDMF on Atombomb.tv

Finally! There is a new short film on Atombomb.tv. Sorry for the delay, but after "Death by Powerpoint" in September my day job producing commercials got hectic yo. So after a nice Holiday break we got back on track with this great short from Fort Worth filmmaker and master vegan chief James M. Johnston. I saw GDMF a year ago at the Dallas Video Festival and became a fan of James style. GDMF is a film that challenges you and makes you pay attention. I've always been a big fan of improv filmmaking. If its done bad, it comes off as pretentious, but GDMF works. James worked to give the actors a story and the crew a sense of the scene, paying attention to all the details while letting the story shape on its own through its characters.

I hate to compare films to each other but I can't help to compare this to John Cassavetes films. When I first walked out of the screening last year Cassavetes and "Buffalo '66" popped into my mind. Sometimes a writer can't capture a moment in time. Good dialog is great and all, but does not always work in certain situations. I think James film is great example of improv filmmaking and I look forward to his next film, "Merrily, Merrily".

So head on back over to the Atombomb.tv site HERE and check out GDMF. Be warned that the film is for adults, so prolly not a good idea to watch it at work. Oh and check out all the extra bonus features below on the film page. James did commentary, articles, and all sorts of fun stuff. New film next month I promise!!!!

Diary of the Dead trailer!

Diary of the Dead - Exclusive Trailer

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R.I.P. HD-DVD... January 4th, 2008

Just when I was having fun buying cheap hd-dvd's. Oh well, it was fun while it lasted. HD-DVD: The Look and Sound of "Almost" Perfect is hanging by a thread. All hail the mighty BLU.

Click HERE to read the sad news for HD-DVD devotees.

The Possibility of Hope

I finally got the chance to see "Children of Men", and enjoyed it very much. There is a documentary on the hd-dvd called "The Possibility of Hope" which kind of gives you an overview of our world and how we F it up and continue to do so. I found it to be very scary yet fascinating. Check it out in 3 parts:

Hellboy II: The Golden Army

This makes me smile...

When Hitchcock Meets Scorsese...

Yummy Japanese Pizza!

Mayonnaise and Shrimp filled crust. Awesome.

The Forbiddon Kingdom trailer

If this had come out about 10 or 15 years ago I would spoiled my pants. Jackie Chan and Jet Li in the same kung-fu epic! Still this looks fun.

Rambo 4 trailer

It's on bitches...



nostalgia goosebumps!

The Format War Rages On !

Hola. It has been a while since I have been blogging. Work has been quite steady at the old Immotion Studios. I finished my two rough cuts this week on our two big videos this month, go great feedback and high praise for the work, and today I find myself completely burned to a crisp creatively... Hopefully over the next month or so I should be blogging about more crazy films, and even some good news from the filmmaking front here in Funkytown.

I have seen a few films recently... 28 Weeks Later was a lot of fun to watch. I really hope they make one more to complete a really sweet trilogy. Also watched Mr. Brooks, a serial killer movie with Kevin Costner. I thought it was decent, but could have explored the inner self more than getting caught up in the procedural side of things.

I have been really into the high def dvd market for a while now. It has been almost 2 years now since both hd-dvd and blu-ray came out, and blu-ray still is kicking arse it seems. However as much as I am a supporter of the Blu, a funny thing happened on the way to Wal Mart the other day. It seems that Toshiba (the only manufacturer of HD-DVD players) got super desperate the other week and decided to offer the old HD-DVD A2 player for 98 bux at Walmart and Best Buy. Granted there are many wonderful films that are only on HD-DVD that I am dying to peep in HD, that I can't get my blu-ray hands on, so i took the plunge, and picked one up and got 5 free hd-dvds to boot. So actually the player was free in one sense.

So now after reading all the articles about which one is better and so on, I had the chance to check it out with my own eyes. And the truth is, the difference is minimal as expected, but what i found on some heavy extras discs, there is not enough storage capicity to but everything on a single platter, so again like in normal dvd we are back to the flipper disc, or the double disc set. The image itself looks great on films, though this 98 buck player only outputs 1080i not p like the blu's do. But unless you have a highly trained eye, it won't matter too much to the average movie lover. Now the one thing I am totally digging about hd-dvd at the moment, is the "In Movie Experience" on some discs. What it is, is that you start your flick, and turn on this feature and boom while you are watching the movie, a little PIP window pops p and gives you insight into the making of the film. Wheter it be an interview with crew or cast, its really cool. Now this dvd player also has a ethernet pot to where you can take that experience even further and say you see a sweet ass car in Miami Vice and want to know more about that particular car, you can scroll over the car and it hooks up to the web during the movie and gives you info on that car as you are watching it. Pretty sweet! Apparantly blu-ray will have this next year.

So am i traitor for this act of home video treason? Nah, I just wanted to see Batman Begins in HD! If you really stand back and look at this current format war, its kind of sad that Toshiba is having to basically give players away to stay in the game, but hey for home entertainment geeks like myself it gives me the chance to get a few movies i really love and see them in a better light. And after its all said and done, thats what its really all about, is seeing movies the best way possible and to enjoy them the best way you can. In the immortal words of the Highlander, there can be only one. I think that will be Blu-ray when the holiday wars settle. It's a more robust and advanced technology that came out too quick to try and get in there before hd-dvd took over. And by the way, "2001" on blu-ray is un freaking real.

I'll try and write up some hd-dvd/blu-ray reviews on vacation. There are a bunch of titles waiting for me at home to spin, like Close Encounters, Oldboy, Children of Men, etc. To keep up with the mighty small war, i would go to this site called HighDef Digest. Click HERE

Slso a good article on the war is over at dvdfile.com:

Click HERE for that one.

D-Harp

Was watching the pre-game show for the Mavs/Blazers game on Saturday night. Found this to be most interesting....

Congrats to the Draganic's!!!

My partner in crime at Immotion Studios, Marjia had her baby this Monday in the front seat of a car on the way to the hospital. (and if you know her, this makes total sense) Fox 4 was there!

Darth Vader Fun Time!

Blood on the Highway trailer

Good friend, Barak has a trailer up for his new feature, "Blood on the Highway". Check the website HERE or peep the trailer below.

The Season begins again...

Well the basketball gods were quite cruel to the Mavs and the Rockets last May. Only the Spares (I mean Spurs) were lucky enough to win the prize. With the new season on the horizon on Halloween, here are some HSO's on both the Mavs and Rockets...

The Dallas Mavericks:

This is without a doubt the best team in the NBA. Even with the fizzle in the Finals and last years total breakdown in Round 1, they still have better chemistry and talent than any other team in the league. They can beat the Spurs without even thinking about it. The problem is the one team out of every other team in the NBA that the Mavs can't beat is the Warriors. Hopefully the tweaks of Eddie Jones, Trenton Hassell, and Brandon Bass will be enough to knock that little problem child off this year. They looked great in Pre-Season when all the starters played. Devin looks improved as a leader much like Tony Parker did earlier in his career. The question marks are in the Center position. With Damp still hurt till December, and his usual long comebacks, will the Mavs have any depth at all in the center position. Diop can't play the entire game, and putting Dirk in there, only hurts our offense in stretches. The other big question mark for me is the starting shooting guard. It looks as if the greatness of JET will be on the bench this season. And a rotating starter of Stack, Jones, and maybe even Hassell will be back court with Devin. The Mavs need to concentrate on winning but not winning every game they can to the point of exhaustion by the end of the year. The Spurs will remain the lurking snake in the grass they always are. Other than them and the Rockets and Warriors, it seems pretty smooth sailing. PHX could always be a problem, but as the Spurs did so wonderfully last year in the playoffs, and expose them as the one-trick pony show they really are, i don't fear them in a series much, just on a per game basis.

The Houston Rockets



Many people say this could be the year for the Rockets. So was last year and the year before that. However this is the most loaded this team has been in a while. New couch Rick Adelman will cast out a lot of van gundy's defensive mind numbing play style for a more up tempo old school Kings offense. McGrady now has plenty of ball handlers, which frees him to be T-Mac and not a point guard. The Spurs may have made the biggest blunder in the draft by giving Luis Scolia to the Rockets for Jackie Butler? Scolia went on to be the MVP of the FIBA games this year and is impressive. He will prolly end up being a starting forward once he adjusts to the NBA. He's a rookie, but has played for along time overseas and has kicked many a NBA player ass int he Olympics. He's tough minded with no fear and is a younger stronger Ginobli. Spurs, what were you thinking? I would have waived Finley for him. The other thing that concerns me is Yao in Adelman's offense. Can he keep pace up and down running. We all know this is Yao's weakest spot. He gets winded and is always last one down the floor. I only saw on pre-season game so I don't know how this will play out but ESPN has them in front of the Mavs and Spurs for the year in terms of records. And finally Mike James and my beloved Stevie Francis is back on the team. Great to see those guys back. Especially since both have played with Yao before and know where he likes the ball sent to in the post. Looking forward to wearing my old Francis jerseys to a Rockets game!

And finally I leave with this piece of uncomfortable journalism. A young reporter who may be dead now, tries to interview one of my fav players of all time, Sam Cassell. Sam is the point guard for the LA Clippers, and this is one of the most cringe inducing interviews of all time.

My Wife's Dreams are like this....

Is This Necessary? And Will I Watch? Of Course.

Zu:The Cat Warrior from Magic Mountain ?

One of my co-workers today found this cat with 4 legs and only 3 paws. We are taking him in for a while.

I have named him Zu.

The Jacques Tati Experience

Well I must admit that this weekend I did get on a bit of a foreign film fetish. My former boss and close friend, Bobbie introduced to me the works of French auteur Jacques Tati. I was not all that familiar with his work until Bobbie had a screening at the Modern of one of his films, called Mr. Hulot's Holiday. I really enjoyed the film and set out to see some of his other films, particularly those featuring his alter ego Mr. Hulot. Tati stars and directs his films that are at times on par with Chaplin and Keaton. His alter ego Hulot is a bit of a mix of Seller's Clouseau and a tad of Mr Bean for those looking for something to describe him as. He's a French klutz that means well but usually his honesty and good nature bring him nothing but trouble. Tati started as a mime and his films continue this theme as the films work on a silent level, with pretty much minimal dialog and lotsa sound/fx for all the sight gags. He wears his trademark raincoat, umbrella as a cane, and pipe. In Mr. Hulot's Holiday (1953) he takes a vacation to a resort that results in a series of misunderstandings and physical gags that have such genuine charm it makes you love the character of Mr. Hulot so much, you hate to see him leave.



I started my new Tati journeys with the follow-up to "Mr. Hulot's Holiday", "Mon Oncle" (1958). In Oncle Hulot lives in a small town near his nephew whom he seems to be closer to in age than the adults in the town. His sister and husband live in a super-duper state of the art home with automatic gates, robot kitchens and the best gag of all the Fish statue that spits water out whenever someone comes in the gate. Although the funny thing about that particular gag is that it's Hulot's sister that has to turn the fountain on b4 anyone can come into the gate of the home. This theme is what is at the heart of Mon Oncle to me. Tati has a series of failed attempts at working in a factory, and a disastrous attempt at a romantic hookup at a dinner party by his sister, but alas the theme of this movie all goes back to that Fish. Tati to me at least is saying look at how silly we are that we worship gadgets, technology, and appearances. Tati does a good job here in balancing the comedy with satire. My only complaint was that it felt maybe about 20-30 minutes too long. Other than that I had a lot of fun with Mon Oncle, and I would welcome another view sometime.



The next one I popped in was called Playtime from 1967. It took Tati 3 or 4 years to film it, and after watching it you can see why. It's attention to detail is amazing. most scenes are played all in long shots with tons of extras and gags all going on at once. The film takes place in Paris mainly in a modern state of the art skyscraper as Tati's Mr' Hulot attempts to track down a busy executive to finish running an erand. the scenes with Hulot are great, but tend to drag at points. And where the film lost me is Tati's obsession with technology. Like a bad hangover from Mon Oncle's house he dwells on this for way too long. There are points where Hulot disappears from stretches of the film for what seems like half an hour. At over two hours the film is overlong. The best genius in this film is that as Hulot is tracking this guy down there is a secondary story of a female tourist dying to see Paris, when all she does is tour this crazy skyscraper. Whenever she opens a door in this building there is a reflection of the Eiffel Tower and other great Paris locations. I thought that was a genius visual move on Tati's part and I think it gets his point across better than anything else in the film. What I loved about Hulot's holiday and even mostly in Oncle is Hulot's humanity in this crazy world. In Playtime the character of Hulot gets lost in Tati's huge message canvas. It's technically a sight to behold as a filmmaker you can feel him growing as you go along, but at the same time I felt I signed up for a Hulot film, and although I was enlightened I was somewhat disappointed.

There is one more Hulot adventure I have not seen called Trafic, where Hulot plays a automobile inventor on his way to an auto show in a tech loaded RV. That sounds really fun, and I can't wait to see it. i did some more research on Tati, and on the Playtime DVD from Criterion, there is a second disc of documentaries and interviews that shed some more light on this really genius and incredible influential comedian that has influenced Mr. Bean, Monty Python, Peter Sellers, and countless others. For first timers I would recommend Mr. Hulot's Holiday and Mon Oncle. And yes Amy there are dogs in outfits.

Here is a the official Tati website. Be warned its design is more complicated and confusing as Tati could have ever imagined! Also look below for the trailer to Mon Oncle..

Click HERE to enter Tativille.com

DVD Review: Born to Fight

This weekend I watched one of the most insane movies ever. It's a kung-fu flick called "Born to Fight" from Thailand that defies explanation. It's not a good movie per se, its just that the fighting scenes are so bizarre and over the top that you can't help but have a good time. The plot is simple, a rogue terrorist group takes over a small country village in Thailand and sets up a nuclear missile aimed at a big city, and unless the government hands over some $ the prisoners get it. And boy do they. This movie is harsh with its violence, but then a crazy dude with one leg shows up and kicks a gord off a tree and into the head of a terrorist with a gun. Then soccer balls are used to knock off a few dudes in tree houses. That one had me rolling.

This film stars Dan Chupong and amazingly he survived this insanity directed by the equally insane Prachya Pinkaew. Mr. Pinkaew made a few of the Tony Jaa Films, like Ong bak and The Protector (aka Tom Yum Goong) Then there are the stunts which are all totally real and not CG. I mean some of them are downright painful to watch. In fact I've seen every Jackie Chan movie ever made and there were stunts in this movie that i have never even imagined were possible. Jackie would never be insane enough to do some of these. I'll be honest with you the mid section of the movie is a little drawn out, but then the ending action sequence happens. It's at least 45 mins long, and is the most insane thing you have ever seen. It really is almost too much to take in one viewing. I wanted to explain it to my wife, but I didn't know where to start. ( a dude gets toasted at short range with a missile launcher!) Like I said, this is not fine cinema, its not even a good movie, but the action is so over the top it ascends to some other form of cinema greatness of which I have not seen since the 80's films of JC.

But more than anything this film brings back the lost 80's art of Gymkata. Oh yes, the greatness! This film is without logic, and it could care less. Go rent it now!!!

Check out a fight megamix video that someone made:

Lone Star International Film Festival trailer

Howdy yo. Have a somewhat kind of premiere blog movie here. Sorta. See, my friend Barak Epstein directed a Grindhouse-esque trailer http://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.giffor the Grindhouse movie earlier this year which I greatly admired and showed here on the blog. I was approached by the Lone Star Film Society to do a trailer for the 1st Lone Star Film Festival in Fort Worth on November 7-11.

I didn't really have time or money to shoot anything totally original, but one morning I thought about Barak's trailer if re-cut would be perfect for what they were looking for. So I hit up the Barak, and he said cool, so I cut a demo for them. They bit on it hard, and here we are. Barak and I re-cut the original a few weeks back, and this whack ass trailer should be hitting Rave Theater cinema chains, local bars, schools, and T.V. screens near you real soon...

Download it in Quicktime HERE.




Local hommie, James M Johnston also did a trailer featuring my favorite horror movie characters, Zombies. Check it here:

City of Violence

I know its been a while since I blogged anything, but right after Atombomb.tv went up, my dayjob as commercial maker got real nuts, so much so that I really have not had much free time. But last night I watched this crazy Korean kung-fu flick called "City of Violence". It's crazy wicked and the ending fight sequence is worth the price of rental alone. It's lke taking a time machine back to all the great 80's and 90's Jackie Chan flicks, just more bloody! Here is a trailer from youtube. It's available here in the states on the Dragon Dynasty video label. Kick it.

3000 viewings of Powerpoint and counting!

This morning "Death by Powerpoint" hit over 3000 viewings that we know of for just yesterday alone. Thanks to everyone in the cast and crew and all the viewers out there for making this first Atombomb production a great success!

Welcome to Atombomb.tv

Hope all of you are doing well. I wanted to let all of you know that starting today my new short film site, www.atombomb.tv is live and ready to roll. What is Atombomb.tv? For years I have wanted my short films to have a life beyond the tiny film festivals. They usually sit in my closet for the rest of their lives. So I have created a web page to show not only my own short films but other filmmakers in the DFW area. Think of it as an internet television station if you will. Now I have a place to show these short films the way I would like them to be shown. You can watch it on the page, or download a Quicktime, ipod, or if you have a lot of patience, Quicktime High Definition format.

The goal is to show a new short film every month. Some will be original programs produced for atombomb.tv. And others will be those made outside of the site, but ones worthy of being seen. Once you land on the page, you can enter and watch a short film on the page. If you want a copy of it, there are many options for downloading. If you want to email it to a friend or even embed it on your website or blog, you can do that as well. There are also bonus features like filmmaker commentary, photos from the set, and sometimes even some bloopers. There is an even a blog where the filmmakers will write articles about the film's production. Or maybe even an article written by the actors about how cruel the director was. You can leave comments and interact with the cast and crew as well. There is also a store coming that you can buy atombomb.tv merchandise. All the procedes to this go into our next films budget. So by buying stuff in the store you kind of become a co-producer!

And this brings us to our debut film, "Death by Powerpoint". (in fact it's our only short on the site right now, but just wait...) We filmed it in June , and it is a comedy starring Tom Zembrod and Matt Tindall. This film follows a ordinary business man trying to get out of an accounting presentation on Friday afternoon. It's written and directed by myself. Produced by Jason Todd Hampton, Erik Clapp, and Amy Clapp. With Music by Paul Unger and special visual effects by Kevin Flach.

This site is designed to showcase some of the great talented filmmakers in the DFW area. I hope everyone enjoys the new site. Check back often and please email all your friends to check it out and please put the shorts on your own sites and blogs!!!

CLICK on the link BELOW TO GO TO THE SITE!

http://www.atombomb.tv/

"Death by Powerpoint" can also be seen on:

youtube, funnyordie.com, break.com, googlevideo, yahoovideo, ifilm.com, spike.com, and stupidvideos.com.

peace out,
erik clapp

Highlander: The Source

They made a Highlander 5 movie a few years ago, and has been sitting on a shelf for quite a while now. By accident, I discovered that tonight it premieres not at the movies, not on DVD, but on the Sci-Fi Channel. Sci-fi Channel? My, how the mighty Highlanders have fallen. Oh well I was a fan of the movies, good and bad, and the TV show was actually really good. I didn't see seasons 5, 6, or 7, but i heard they were very good. Adrian Paul is back as the Highlander, Duncan. No Conner storyline this time with Christopher Lambert. (he he he) So tonight Highlander 5: The Source premieres. It's not a good indication that it's debut is on the Sci-Fi channel, but we will give it go...there can be more than one.

UPDATE: This is without a doubt one of the worst movies I have ever seen. It is jaw droppingly bad. A disgrace to all things Highlander. The movie makes Highlander 2 seem like a masterpiece... I am in shock.

Blood on the Highway

More shout outs in store for my man, Barak Epstein. Barak just wrapped yesterday on his second feature film, Blood on the Highway, a crazy vampire comedy. Knowing Barak, it should be a shit load of fun. You can go to the website by clicking HERE.

To see a trailer for Barak's first film, "Prison A Go-Go" look below:

Merrily, Merrily trailer

Shout out to James M. Johnston, my fellow FW filmmaker and vegan chief extreme on finishing his newest short opus, Merrily, Merrily. This is the first part of a trilogy according to JMJ. Good work my friend, and all of you should check out his trailer on his official blog HERE. Word.

Diary of the Dead's first review from Toronto!!

Found a Toronto Film Fest blog that posted the first ever review of George A. Romero's Diary of the Dead, the fifth film in the Romero zombie cannon. According to this reviewer it sounds as if the social commentary is stronger than ever and that the zombie kills are just as potent. I'll be there opening day.

Click HERE to read the review. I'm sure there will be others popping up by Monday morning.

Click HERE for a review of Diary and the new Coen Bros. flick, "No Country for Old Men".