FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
Rochester, NY – April 25, 2011 – Rochester based Philrose Productions is taking a unique approach to raising money for its creature feature, Mind Rip. Writer/director John Vincent and producer Mike Boas are presenting their fundraising in the style of a PBS pledge drive, which can be seen online at http://www.mindripmovie.com
For Mind Rip, John Vincent is drawing from his experience as a model maker and animator to create “old school” (but high quality) creatures and effects. This means raising some funds to pay for materials and sets. In recent months, many independent artists have begun using crowdfunding sites like Kickstarter and IndieGoGo to reach an audience of potential supporters. With Kickstarter, this means people make donations towards a fixed goal. That money only changes hands if and when the goal is reached.
The Philrose team looked at other Kickstarter videos to see what was being done. “While many were personal and informative, none really went all out with the ‘pledge drive’ aspect,” says Boas. So when it came time to shoot a video for Mind Rip, Boas and Vincent set the stage and prepared some tongue-in-cheek humor.
Their piece begins with a clip of actual Mind Rip footage, then cuts to a Public Television style pledge break. Boas begins his plea for funds: “Unfortunately, movies such as this aren’t free.” Vincent continues: “We can’t do it without YOUR help. We’ve got operators standing by to take your pledges.”
Throughout the video, Boas and Vincent explain their professional approach to filmmaking, but do it while demonstrating television fundraising cliches. Project backers are offered fun items like Mind Rip Tote Bags (a PBS favorite), novelty Spectre-Vision glasses, onscreen credits in the final film, signed posters and screenplays, invitations to the film wrap party, and even an opportunity to be a featured zombie in the film.
“We’re totally serious about making this movie, but there’s no reason we can’t be entertaining with our Kickstarter video,” says Vincent. The jokes here reflect Vincent’s own sense of humor, which also crops up in the Mind Rip script.
“What I find remarkable in what we’ve shot so far is how much personality our actors have brought to their roles. John Cocca and Chris Nakis are hysterical as the sheriff and deputy,” says Boas. For instance, the film’s trailer contains a scene in which the sheriff has a deadpan conversation about a pot of soup that contains a severed head. “The line ‘No, you don’t want the soup’ gets a laugh every time I show the trailer. The audience at the Buffalo Screams Film Fest loved it.” Boas took the trailer to Buffalo last fall, and it was also one a few independent trailers selected to play at the New York City Horror Film Festival.
“There’s humor in the film, but not at the expense of the horror elements,” explains Vincent. “Although the monsters are born out of horror comic books, they represent a true threat to the characters.”
Mind Rip’s plot concerns a town overrun by nightmare creatures. The main character, David Endicott, struggles to solve the mystery of these creatures and discover their connection to his brother Jack, who died years earlier. Mind Rip takes its inspiration from horror movies of the 70s and 80s like Phantasm, Re-Animator, and Evil Dead 2. Comic books like Tales From the Crypt and The Vault of Horror are also a big influence.
Vincent emphasizes that although the movie is being shot locally on a low budget, it can still look like a high quality production. “We’re shooting on HD video with professional lighting. That makes a huge difference in how a movie can feel.” Vincent’s background working for David Allen productions also comes into play. In the 1990s, he contributed to films such as Dr. Mordrid, Freaked, and Robot Wars. “We’re reaching out to a horror fans who are tired of seeing computer generated monsters in their movies. To me, movies done with practical effects have more character. They have a better feel to them, and that’s what we’re trying to do with Mind Rip.”
According to their Kickstarter deadline, Philrose Productions has until Thursday, May 26, to reach its fundraising goal of $7500. Vincent and Boas have been telling everyone they can think of to take a look at the video, pick a pledge level, and give generously.
Remember, they can’t do it with out the support of “viewers like you.”
LINKS
Mind Rip FX on Kickstarter
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/mindrip/mindripfx
Mind Rip official site
http://mindripmovie.com
Mind Rip on Facebook
http://facebook.com/mindrip
John David Vincent credits on the Internet Movie Database
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0898681
Mike Boas credits on the Internet Movie Database
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm1711376
John Vincent and Mike Boas are available for interview by phone, email, or Skype.
CONTACT:
http://maddogmovies.com/contact
It’s film festival season again in Rochester, and this year’s 360 | 365 George Eastman House Film Festival looks pretty promising.
I’ve been involved behind the scenes — I manage the website and I was on the short film panel — but there’s a ton of features I haven’t seen yet.
I encourage all film fans to check the schedule and come out to support the festival!
Here are some recommended events:
AMERICAN GRINDHOUSE
Thursday, May 06, 2010 9:45 PM
Dryden Theater
and
Saturday, May 08, 2010 7:30 PM
Little Theatre – Little 5
A history of exploitation films in America. I’ve been captivated by this genre for the last several years, which is why I jumped at the chance to provide some animated titles for the doc. Director Elijah Drenner will be in attendance.
MADE IN ROCHESTER
Little Theatre – Little 1
Thursday, May 06, 2010 6:45 PM
Here’s your chance to see the best films from the 360 | 365 Shorts Contest, plus films from Michelle Cardulla, Stan Main, Dave Marshall, and last but not least… Mike Russo’s VIRGIN FANG, starring yours truly as Draculess the timid vampire.
ADULT SHORTS: Hidden Worlds
Little Theatre – Little 1
Thursday, May 06, 2010 9:00 PM
ADULT SHORTS: Private Lives
Little Theatre – Little 5
Saturday, May 08, 2010 5:00 PM
These are the two shorts blocks I helped curate.
We watched about 130 entries, then chose the 15 we loved. Trust me, these are some great films.
WE CAN SHINE: FROM INSTITUTIONS TO INDEPENDENCE
Curtis Theatre
Sunday, May 09, 2010 3:00 PM
My student, Adrian Esposito, has completed his third documentary feature, and this is the best one to date. In We Can Shine, he shares the dark history of institutions for the disabled and how improvements have been made in recent years.
FREE PANELS
Local filmmakers should take advantage of the panel events at the festival, including the following:
Demo: RED CAMERA
The Austin Connection
Screenwriter’s Panel
Screenplay Live!
MUCH MUCH MORE
As if that’s not enough, I want to take in the following as well:
THE S FROM HELL
GONE WITH THE POPE
WAKE IN FRIGHT
THE SECRET OF KELLS
IT CAME FROM KUCHAR
CELL 211
HARRY BROWN
A CONVERSATION WITH THELMA SCHOONMAKER
THE RED SHOES
See you at the fest! Visit http://film360365.com for schedule and ticket information.
The last two years, I’ve taken part in the Rochester Movie Makers Summer Shorts Challenge. Two summers ago, I helped with a film called X-Girlfriend, and last year worked on The Wingman and Virgin Fang.
This year will be my first time directing a summer short, one called “The Interrogation” written by yours truly. In the writing phase, I decided to keep my characters and locations to a minimum to make it easier — especially since one of my characters is ANIMATED.
I’ve been wanting to try a live action / animation combo project for a while now. The process will be similar to how films like Who Framed Roger Rabbit or The Phantom Menace were shot. I’ll have an actor on set playing the cartoon character, and we’ll shoot his scenes two ways. One version with the actor, one without. That way I’ll have a performance to mimic in the animation phase, but I’ll also have a clean shot to use when I want to composite the character in. (No, I won’t be doing motion capture. That’s overkill for what I have in mind.)
It was a fun script to read to an audience, which is what went down at the March meeting of Rochester Movie Makers. We read 15 (!) screenplays that night. When everyone voted and the dust cleared, it turned out I was the winner of our script competition. It doesn’t mean the movie itself will be the best, but it’s nice to be loved.
Soon I’ll be finalizing the cast, crew, and picking some dates to shoot this thing. At the same time, I’m working on designing props and the cartoon character known as Mad Monster.
If you’ve been following my Facebook feed ( http://facebook.com/mikeboas ) you’ve probably seen some cryptic messages about croquet in the last week.
It all came about because writer Mike Russo and myself headed up a team for the Rochester Movie Makers 72 Hour Mind 2 Movie Challenge. As you can imagine, this involved writing, rehearsing, shooting, and editing a complete short film in 72 hours. At the start of this event, our team (dubbed TEAM AWESOME) was assigned a line of dialogue, a character, and a prop.
The line: “We are not the doctors. We are the disease.”
The character: Uncle Billy from Utica — a secret drinker.
The prop: A CROQUET MALLET.
Naturally, this suggested the title, “Croquet The Musical.” How could we go wrong?
I’ll be posting a trailer soon. In the meantime, enjoy the following absurd pictures.
I am a man of many projects, a spinner of many plates, a weaver of many websites. In addition to my work at Animatus Studio, I work with writer/director John Vincent on developing his horror feature scripts.
Today, we launched new Philrose Productions website, online at philrosefilms.com . I’ve been eager to leave behind the old Flash navigation for a while now, plus I wanted to incorporate the news blog into the main site. You may notice the design uses a similar sliding menu as the one here on Mad Dog Movies — both templates are based on ones designed by Wayne Connor.
This redesign goes hand in hand with the reveal of our new Mind Rip trailer. What’s Mind Rip? It’s an ode to drive-in horror — with a mad scientist, monsters, and zombies. We’ve produced the trailer as a proof of concept, with the idea of shooting a complete feature down the road.
Find out more about Mind Rip here
Mind Rip Trailer from Mike Boas on Vimeo.
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