INTERVIEW: Chris Stuckmann

WEBVTT

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This October, ONI Press and Spectrevision are proud to present High Strangeness, a startling five-part experiment storytelling.

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Inspired by firsthand accounts of real paranormal encounters within the dimly lit borderlands of human experience, each 40-page prestige format chapter of High Strangeness will interrogate overlapping phenomena like UFOs, hauntings, cryptic sightings, and inexplicable synchronicities that together seem to indicate a higher unseen order of reality.

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television co-founder and real life experiencer Daniel Noah with other worldly cast of talents.

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including Christopher Cantwell.

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Russell Castellucci, good friend to the show Christian Warhol and more, Strangers Book 1 arrives on October 8th investigate the 2007 encounter with the Superstar Writers Chris Ringo Award-winning artist Dave Chisholm, and cover artist Jock.

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Look for High Strangers Book 1 on shelves October 8th at a local comic shop near you.

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Only from Oni Press.

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Hey, this is Chris Stuckman, the writer and director of Shelby Oaks, and you are listening to the Oblivion Bar podcast.

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you Welcome to the Oblivion podcast with your host, Chris Aaron Norris.

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Joining me today is a pioneer in the world of film criticism over on YouTube.

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For many years and especially now, his bottomless amount of passion for the world of cinema has led him to become one of the leading voices in the world of film discourse.

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He's here today to discuss his debut film, Shelby Oaks, a supernatural horror that began as a record breaking Kickstarter project and now has found a national theatrical distribution through neon.

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It is my pleasure to welcome Chris Stuckman onto the Oblivion Bar podcast.

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man, thank you so much for that very humbling intro.

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It's always, um it's so fun to hear the reaction of the guests when they hear sort of their entire, we talked to a lot of comic creators here on the, on the oblivion bar.

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To hear like basically their entire filmography or bibliography or whatever their work is sort of laid out in front of them.

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They generally don't know how to react.

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So I'm glad you found a little bit of enjoyment in that.

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that's great.

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Thank you.

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And also your background's amazing, by the way.

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Yeah.

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yeah.

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Well, here's the thing.

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uh I'm a uh long time Stuckman fan and I am also of the army of physical media.

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And I have a question about that here in just a moment.

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So I'm going to save that for now because we're definitely going to get into that.

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And then before we even get to Shelby Oaks, which I'm very excited to chat with you about, I need to talk to you about something that's been burning inside of me over the last couple of years.

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And I think it's a topic that um I can't really make my mind up on and I think you might be able to help me with that's okay.

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Sure, sure, sure.

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Like you, the theater is my temple and it's something about that.

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There's something about that experience that just like tickles my brain or releases that chemical that I cannot recreate in any other way.

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Every movie we talk about here on the show on the Oblivion Bar, I kind of have to see in that environment in the theater with, you know, other folks or, you know, whatever.

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So again, this is sort of my long winded way of I'm spinning my wheels here, but I have to ask you the first question here is When thinking about feelings versus critical analysis in sort of film discourse, or I guess said in another way, how a movie made you feel versus how looking at a movie strictly as an art object, are you Chris Duckman able to separate the two and sort of make up your mind what was put up on screen?

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Or do you find yourself sort of letting the movie wash over you and allow that euphoria to play into how you view that film going forward?

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I think it is almost exclusively about the end of the day for me, it is about how I'm feeling and the vibes that I'm getting from something.

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you can see, and I think that's how like really scrappy films get successful that were made for low budgets that you could tell that there was this real passion to get the film made.

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And you're not looking at it thinking like, oh, well, this isn't as refined as some of the bigger budget films I see or whatever.

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You're just thinking like, I can really tell the person who made this movie was like putting their heart and soul into it.

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And when that comes through on screen, for me, it doesn't necessarily even matter.

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um Some of the things that I might normally have not maybe liked, because I can tell that this was not made to make money.

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This was not made to get a paycheck.

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This was not, you know, this was like someone who had to tell stories.

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And like I just saw a film recently that shower made a name that I didn't really like necessarily.

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the vibes of the movie were so so good.

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was such a cozy movie that felt so warm and inviting that I actually watched it a second time because I just liked that world that the filmmaker had created.

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And so I think it changes for every movie.

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I don't think we can ever watch any, you know, a film and feel always and interact with film the same way all the time.

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I think that's one of the things I love so much about movies is that I can watch a hundred different movies.

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and feel differently and interact with them differently because of the circumstances the movie was made or because the way the movie makes me feel or something the movie reminds me about from my life or something personal that I'm bringing to the table the filmmaker seems to also relate to.

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So I think it's tough to say like it's one or the other.

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I think it kind of changes between films.

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Yeah, that's a great response.

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I asked the question, obviously, because as I said earlier, it's this thing that I'm sort of toying with in my head as someone again, what we do here on the podcast on the Oblivion Bar is not, I don't think, criticism.

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It's really just Aaron and I, a couple of dopes talking about movies and things that we love.

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And I actually I have an example of this.

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And I know that like letterbox ranking is not really that important.

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And that's how a lot of us sort of categorize how the year went or just how we felt about a movie in that at that moment.

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And those can change, obviously.

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but I currently have Superman number four on my list for 2025.

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And I've got like black bag and caught stealing weapons warfare sort of behind it, which I think you could maybe make an argument that those films sort of do a lot of other things really well, like from a technical standpoint, I guess, if you want to say that.

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And I stand by that number four ranking, but it just sort of feels strange in my head.

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I'm just curious, like, you if you've ever had something like that happen to you as well.

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I mean, I think I've put way too much stress on myself over the years whenever I do my top 10 of the year list because, you feel like it's almost like you're etching it into a, into a stone or something.

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Like you're like, this is going to be, this is how I feel forever.

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And well, it's like, and it's really not that important.

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It's it's, you're just kind of telling people what you loved and, know, and so yes, there are times where, and also there comes a time where you realize Okay, so people actually do seem to care about my opinion.

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That means that I should try to spread awareness for movies that maybe aren't as known.

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so like, you know, I have the years where Top Gun Maverick is my favorite movie of the year.

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And yeah, everybody knows about that movie, but it's true.

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I love that movie and I saw it six times in theaters.

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um But, and you can't ignore that.

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It's like, that's a very real thing that you just experienced.

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But there are times like with the movie Mass was my favorite film of that year, which was just about a chamber piece where two families meet to talk about a tragedy.

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And it was so amazing.

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And so I think that if Superman is your number four, then that's how you feel.

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I really push back against this whole like our top 10 lists or our top 15 lists or whatever.

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They have to be these incredible Oscar-worthy achievements that are going to be talked about for forever.

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If you loved a movie, you loved it and sing it, sing its praises.

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Yeah, totally.

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I guess my only hang up really is that Superman is like this sort of popcorn and has heart.

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I sort of see it in my head as like this like popcorn brain candy.

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Right.

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But, you know, in reality, again, as you said, and as sort of the core of this silly question that I have here is like, it made me feel something very special that I haven't felt in the movie theater for a while.

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Maybe Top Gun Maverick is the last time that I felt like this sort of surge of dopamine, you know, in terms of like I've never been on like the verge of I can't believe admitting this to you here in our first 10 minutes of meeting each other, Chris, but like on the verge of tears just because of how it made me feel there in the theater.

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It's not a perfect movie, but it made me feel something that felt important to me whenever I ranked it.

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Yeah, for sure.

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No, absolutely.

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completely understand.

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One more quick aside before we get to Shelby Oaks.

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I have to ask you again.

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You are like a five star general in the physical media army.

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You know, I'm like a second lieutenant, maybe maybe a personal tenant.

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I might have gotten a rank here recently, but I had a couple recent pickups that I was sort of excited about.

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And I want to ask you, are there any recent physical media pickups that you've had that you're really excited about?

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I'm pretty excited about something coming up that'll be shipped to my house pretty soon.

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I was able to do an audio commentary for a Blu-ray release for Lake Mungo on Australian horror film.

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It's being put out by Umbrella Entertainment and they asked me if I want to do an audio commentary and it's my first time doing one for like a movie that isn't mine.

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I mean, I did one for Shelby as well that'll be on the Blu-ray but...

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That was a big honor.

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Like that movie means a lot to me.

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And I've been a big supporter of it over the years.

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And I really am excited to get that in the mail for sure.

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Also, just got Shout Factory had a sale.

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was Shocktober and they had this sale on a lot of their horror stuff.

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And I picked up Silver Bullet to watch.

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This is 80s Stephen King novella, which became a werewolf movie with Gary Busey.

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I just showed it to my buddy last night and we had a good time.

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Yeah.

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Gosh, you've been, think, maybe the the loudest and the, you know, the longest flag bearer for like Mungo.

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And I think you've talked about pretty often about how much that movie influenced you for Shelby Oaks.

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you know, we can talk about that here in just a moment.

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But of course, I wouldn't ask the question if I didn't have the answer also.

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So if you don't mind, I have a couple that I wanted to share with you as sort of like because I don't get to meet folks like you very often where there's that particular love, again, a physical media and um You know, for instance, here we go.

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So I got the limited edition second site release of the Florida project and the nice guys.

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wow.

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Okay.

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Oh, yeah.

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I know you're a big fan of the nice guys as well.

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Incredible movie.

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Yeah.

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Where is the sequel?

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Give it to me.

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That's right.

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uh I also just got part two of free run Beyond Heroes Journey on Blu-ray.

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I'm to dive into that.

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And then speaking of umbrella entertainment, I picked up or I haven't picked it up.

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I've pre-ordered the uh 4K for Dogma and Angel's Egg.

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Oh my god, Angel's like, I'm so excited that's getting a theatrical release next month, finally, for the first time ever.

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And I'll get to see it on the big screen.

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Because it's basically just kind of been a bootleg movie forever.

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So it's really cool.

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You know that sentence you just said there makes me excited and nervous at the same time because I went to go see Daft Punk's In a Stella five five five five.

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Yes.

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The AI upscale was horrific.

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Yeah, no, it scared me.

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I didn't know about that and I went and I was like so excited to see this thing and I was like I love they're they're probably my favorite band and I was that's awesome.

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That's sick, I'm showing my Daft Punk tattoo everybody who can't see the video.

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I yeah, the first like minute I was like, why does this look like silly putty?

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That right?

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Like everyone, everyone, everything's goopy.

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What's happening?

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Why are there hylographics on like the highway signs?

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know what I mean?

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Crazy.

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And then I wouldn't go see Perfect Blue, the 4K upscale of that.

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I don't know if you had a chance to go.

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You're obviously busy.

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What did you think of that?

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I was very happy.

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Yeah, that wasn't AI, that was like actual 4K, I asked because I don't know.

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Okay.

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Okay.

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It felt a little weird in certain parts and I wasn't sure.

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This was sort of a larger screen.

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It wasn't IMAX, but it was sort of a and it wasn't even like a regal or AMC.

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was some kind of off.

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That's G-Kids.

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G-Kids I respect gratefully, greatly.

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G-Kids I don't think would have done that, no.

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Okay, I'm gonna take your word for it.

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And they actually just, they put a pre-order out for the 4K physical disc.

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So I was thinking about it.

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I went to go see it.

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I didn't necessarily love the viewing experience, but again, that could just be maybe the copy we got or something, who knows.

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But, okay, I've stalled enough with my own sort of fan boy questions.

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Let's get into Shelby Oaks here.

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I mentioned there in the intro, this is your directorial debut.

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It actually hits theaters the day that this conversation releases, which is on October 24th.

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Here's a brief synopsis for the listener in case for some reason they haven't heard of this movie.

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I would be very surprised if they haven't.

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But here we go.

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So Mia Burnett has been obsessively searching for her missing sister Riley for the past 12 years.

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Riley was a prominent YouTuber who especially was investigating supernatural phenomena.

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However, Riley's passion for paranormal led to her and her crew's sudden disappearance in a decrepit corner of Ohio known as Shelby Oaks.

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as I mentioned earlier, this film started as this Kickstarter Darling is campaign that the goal was two hundred fifty thousand dollars and it was funded in one day and then 29 days later the campaign finished with about fourteen thousand backers and raised an astonishing one point three nine million dollars so Take me back to that night when you you know that that countdown finally ended and just sort of what was going through your head how you're feeling in those those waiting hours That was a very crazy month because I was so, desperate to make something, man.

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I was just so ready to be let off the leash to make a movie.

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I was so tired of waiting and to feel that rush of, okay, we can do it now, you know, and, still 1.3 million is not actually a lot of money to make a movie.

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But for us at that time, that was game changing.

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And I'm so grateful for that support.

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And thank you for being a backer.

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Because you guys let us just go start shooting soon.

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That's really the thing is like there's so many filmmaker friends of mine who are on hold who are so close to getting approved who maybe have an actor on board but they don't have everything they need and they're just waiting and they're waiting to get the approval to actually start and you guys just let us start.

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And I'm just so, so happy about that.

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Yeah, I mean, it was uh really cool to see again as someone who's been watching you and your channel for years.

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Gosh, I mean, I think I started to see I think my first ever review and this is hard to really track down, but I think the first ever video review that I've ever watched of yours was Dread.

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wow.

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I think you went to go see maybe Tiff.

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Yeah.

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If I remember correctly.

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Yeah.

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Yeah.

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Gosh, I can't believe I just pulled that out the back of my brain.

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But that was I think that's around that time.

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A couple of reviews that come to my brain immediately are like your Batman v Superman review, which I know you probably don't love today.

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But at the time I was like, why don't I love this movie?

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And then you sort of spoke into existence why a lot of the reasons why I didn't love it at the time as someone who, again, loves comics, loves the medium.

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This movie was made for me and yet I don't love it.

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And I was just sort of reeling in that moment.

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I'm backtracking with Shelby Oakes to see you again one day, have that thing be funded.

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And then you start to slowly drip out this These teasers of like we've got like a couple studios who might be interested and then you guys did a great job You Aaron Coons the entire team there that you had sort of set up that Kickstarter did an incredible job Staying, you know verbal with the entire with the entire group of backers It's been really cool to see and to see where we are today, right?

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It's just Gosh, I'm honestly again.

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I'm spending my wheels here But it I feel almost as proud as I think you might be you know, mean like I just I feel I you know I didn't do anything.

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I just sort of put the credit card down but I'm happy I could help in some way.

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No, man, that's that means quite a bit to hear.

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it was very important that we make sure the backers felt that they were appreciated, you know, because they are appreciated.

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And I've seen a lot of Kickstarter campaigns over the years kind of start do really well.

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And then you hear about, well, no one's getting their rewards.

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Nobody's getting like the box filled with the shirts and all the cool stuff.

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And we wanted to make sure that not only did everyone get those physical things, but we had a lot of digital rewards, too, as you know, like we had the the BTS that we would release weekly of like behind the scenes and stuff.

00:16:47.470 --> 00:16:51.549
And I had a documentarian follow me everywhere for the entire shoot.

00:16:51.549 --> 00:17:02.018
You know, and there's, in my car and on the way and, you know, all kinds of stuff just to make sure that everyone felt like they were getting a genuine behind the scenes look at how to make an indie movie.

00:17:02.018 --> 00:17:02.618
Totally.

00:17:02.618 --> 00:17:08.779
Well, I wanted to also hear you talk a little bit about Camille Sullivan, plays Mia in the film.

00:17:08.779 --> 00:17:11.000
From what I understand, she is sort of the heartbeat of this film.

00:17:11.000 --> 00:17:18.942
And also that's not a play on this story that I've heard you tell where you and the crew could actually hear her heartbeat through her shirt mic.

00:17:19.462 --> 00:17:25.505
So if you could just talk a little bit about what makes Camille's performance so pivotal in this film.

00:17:25.505 --> 00:17:29.518
And then also, why was she so instantly right for that role when you guys were casting the film?

00:17:29.518 --> 00:17:33.357
It was an instinctual thing for I'll do the last part of your question first.

00:17:33.357 --> 00:17:34.377
It was instinctual.

00:17:34.377 --> 00:17:38.298
saw Hunter Hunter and this film she did and she was just so remarkable in it.

00:17:38.298 --> 00:17:43.317
And I immediately just saw her as this character and felt that she would embody her.

00:17:43.317 --> 00:17:46.097
And we just offered her the role flat like that.

00:17:46.097 --> 00:17:49.758
she gratefully she loved the script and we had some meetings and we talked about it a lot.

00:17:49.897 --> 00:17:55.018
I think what really made it for us was Camille's dedication.

00:17:55.057 --> 00:17:58.501
She never showed up to set being like.

00:17:58.594 --> 00:17:59.894
I'm here, let's just go.

00:17:59.894 --> 00:18:02.175
It was so serious for her.

00:18:02.175 --> 00:18:13.421
She cared so deeply about it to the point where, you know, she would ask me questions that I had never considered about the character of Mia and like get to a place where she was putting her own stamp on it.

00:18:13.421 --> 00:18:18.022
And she was giving us so much every day and so much of her time.

00:18:18.022 --> 00:18:22.084
And also there, you know, there's some physical requirements of her in the movie too.

00:18:22.084 --> 00:18:25.869
And we would offer her, you know, we could do this with a stunt double or we could...

00:18:25.869 --> 00:18:29.609
We could have somebody else drive the truck, for instance, right now, because you're not even going to see her face.

00:18:29.609 --> 00:18:31.349
And she just wanted to do everything.

00:18:31.349 --> 00:18:35.374
She was like wanted her fingerprint on this character as much as possible.

00:18:35.374 --> 00:18:35.973
Wow.

00:18:35.973 --> 00:18:37.554
I want to sort of build off that a little bit.

00:18:37.554 --> 00:18:42.034
You mentioned again how she wants to sort of just be present and also like lead from the front.

00:18:42.034 --> 00:18:48.634
I know a lot of times when it comes to creating art, especially when it's an ensemble like film and I often think of like comics as well.

00:18:48.634 --> 00:18:50.933
Like there's a particular role that you have on this team.

00:18:50.933 --> 00:18:53.834
And if you do your job really well, the team succeeds.

00:18:53.834 --> 00:19:00.054
And if one person doesn't, know, the sort of the weak link sort of brings the whole project down.

00:19:00.054 --> 00:19:04.978
I know you mentioned again the car, but like What else did she add to that role of Mia in the film?

00:19:04.978 --> 00:19:06.857
And again, I don't want to mind you for information.

00:19:06.857 --> 00:19:09.218
I'm actually seeing the film on Thursday.

00:19:09.218 --> 00:19:11.498
So we're recording this on Tuesday, October 21st.

00:19:11.498 --> 00:19:12.458
I'll see you in a couple of days.

00:19:12.458 --> 00:19:12.998
I'm really excited.

00:19:12.998 --> 00:19:13.438
Sure.

00:19:13.438 --> 00:19:16.057
And actually my my showing is sold out.

00:19:16.057 --> 00:19:17.357
So I think that's exciting.

00:19:17.357 --> 00:19:19.778
I don't know if you've been hearing the sort of the drumbeat.

00:19:19.778 --> 00:19:20.698
Oh, that's good.

00:19:20.698 --> 00:19:27.498
When I my tickets, honestly, mine was one of the mine and my partner, Olivia's, were one of the last that we could get for that Thursday at seven p.m.

00:19:27.498 --> 00:19:28.958
So it's really exciting.

00:19:28.958 --> 00:19:30.286
But again, back to.

00:19:30.286 --> 00:19:32.945
Kamel, what did she really bring to this role?

00:19:32.945 --> 00:19:35.685
Something new that you didn't initially have there in the script?

00:19:36.105 --> 00:19:42.229
She really understood where I was coming from in this personal sense of yearning.

00:19:42.729 --> 00:19:54.503
Not just for like in my own life as a kid and being estranged from my sister and yearning to find her and to reconnect with her, but also yearning to make movies and to tell stories.

00:19:54.503 --> 00:20:03.008
And there's this aspect of her character that is very much so dedicated and obsessed and very, very driven.

00:20:03.309 --> 00:20:08.509
And I think Camille had that in real life every single day.

00:20:08.509 --> 00:20:12.789
I don't know that I really met Camille Sullivan until after the shoot.

00:20:12.789 --> 00:20:15.829
And I'm not saying she wasn't method or anything.

00:20:15.829 --> 00:20:19.589
But it was very clear that she was super focused.

00:20:19.769 --> 00:20:24.069
And there was no like, hey, let's go hang out after wrap.

00:20:24.069 --> 00:20:25.369
Let's go get a drink or whatever.

00:20:25.369 --> 00:20:29.766
It was very much so like, no, I'm going to go back to my hotel and I'm going to work on my lines for tomorrow.

00:20:29.877 --> 00:20:30.518
Wow.

00:20:30.518 --> 00:20:34.999
mean, again, leading from the front there with sort of she knows her process, right?

00:20:34.999 --> 00:20:38.119
Like, I think it's really easy, as you said, sort of fall into those trappings.

00:20:38.119 --> 00:20:43.412
And I see trappings as not like a negative thing, but like you want to build that camaraderie among your team and all that.

00:20:43.412 --> 00:20:53.875
But again, if if that's going to hinder your performance and sort of your process as an artist, of course, and I'm good on her for noticing that, recognizing it and staying away from those temptations.

00:20:53.875 --> 00:20:55.684
I'm sure that we're there.

00:20:55.778 --> 00:20:57.115
And you said it here just a moment ago.

00:20:57.115 --> 00:20:59.147
You perfectly set me up for my next question.

00:20:59.147 --> 00:21:04.301
And you've talked about it to death about your estrangement to your sister because of the church.

00:21:04.301 --> 00:21:13.147
We don't necessarily need to rehash all that explicitly, but outside of the obvious and we've talked about a lot of stuff thus far with the film without again spoiling anything.

00:21:13.147 --> 00:21:26.355
even as a longtime fan and an avid viewer of your channel, as I said, your release of that 2021 video of how I left the Jehovah's Witness of the Pursuit of Filmmaking added a whole new level of respect and admiration from yours truly.

00:21:26.355 --> 00:21:34.617
And again, to build off that, I've heard you talk about this one aspect of the film again, and sort of refinding that relationship much more down the road.

00:21:34.617 --> 00:21:43.038
And again, as much as you're comfortable with, but can you expand on the little bit of some of these major sacrifices that you've made while making the film?

00:21:43.038 --> 00:21:47.814
And then also, I'd love to hear also what your sister thought of the film when she eventually saw it as well.

00:21:48.107 --> 00:21:51.519
Yeah, she loved it.

00:21:51.657 --> 00:22:02.634
I was at a festival and she was there and I heard someone, she was standing next to me and a bunch of people were talking to me and a bunch of people were talking to her and somebody was like, what did you think, how do you feel right now?

00:22:02.634 --> 00:22:06.577
And I could hear her like in the background just going like, I'm so proud of my brother.

00:22:06.577 --> 00:22:07.326
Oh, wow.

00:22:07.326 --> 00:22:09.166
And that was a really wonderful thing.

00:22:09.166 --> 00:22:15.828
um As far as sacrifices, yeah, I think the biggest one really has just been time away from my kids.

00:22:15.828 --> 00:22:17.314
It sucks, you know.

00:22:17.314 --> 00:22:21.717
My kids are four, I love them to death and I spent as much time with them as possible.

00:22:21.978 --> 00:22:44.428
you know, days like this where we do press and the festival tour and everything, it's been tough to kind of explain to them at this young age that like what that means and uh you know, there's been this, I cried the other day because I had to step outside for a second and I was just gonna get something out of my car.

00:22:44.430 --> 00:22:48.130
And my one son, Grayson, was like, Daddy, are you going on a plane again?

00:22:48.130 --> 00:22:48.730
Oh, man.

00:22:48.730 --> 00:22:51.589
And I was like, Oh, God.

00:22:51.589 --> 00:22:53.990
I was like, No, Grayson, I'm just going to the car for a minute.

00:22:53.990 --> 00:22:55.430
I'll be right back.

00:22:55.678 --> 00:23:02.545
That's the kind of like, like straight through line, like brain dump from a young kid that they don't realize how powerful that is.

00:23:02.545 --> 00:23:04.567
But you, you know how powerful that is.

00:23:04.567 --> 00:23:06.930
Yeah, totally.

00:23:06.930 --> 00:23:08.611
I could, could totally see that.

00:23:08.731 --> 00:23:10.544
My gosh, you could have brought him here for this interview.

00:23:10.544 --> 00:23:11.238
I wouldn't mind.

00:23:11.238 --> 00:23:13.965
I'll just have him have him during the chat, you know, whatever.

00:23:13.965 --> 00:23:17.299
He would just be playing with the microphone the whole time being like, what is this?

00:23:18.461 --> 00:23:18.811
Okay.

00:23:18.811 --> 00:23:22.512
Well, again, I don't want to take too much of your time because I want to get you back to your kids.

00:23:22.512 --> 00:23:25.884
And I know you probably have a ton of other press things you have to do for this film.

00:23:25.884 --> 00:23:29.694
Again, we're the week or we're recording this the week of the release of the film.

00:23:29.694 --> 00:23:36.586
So as we close out this conversation, Chris, my gosh, what an absolute honor it was to chat with you here today again, as a longtime fan of yours.

00:23:36.586 --> 00:23:38.037
I'll say it one more time here in a moment.

00:23:38.037 --> 00:23:41.241
But I honestly didn't think that a moment like this would ever exist.

00:23:41.241 --> 00:23:47.490
Like what I actually get to chat with you about, not just like even your channel, but also this like this.

00:23:47.490 --> 00:23:56.472
to me, and your channel is very important to folks like myself who love to hear sort of the discourse of film, this feels much bigger to me and I think probably to you as well in some way.

00:23:56.472 --> 00:24:00.513
So I love to end this conversation by talking about intention.

00:24:00.874 --> 00:24:15.405
I know you've said that you don't really have any plans of quitting that aforementioned YouTube channel, but for years it felt like your main intention with film was fostering a community of like-minded movie lovers and celebrating it with folks like myself who would watch your reviews either.

00:24:15.405 --> 00:24:21.445
You know, I tried not to watch them before I see the film, but if I saw you covered a film, it would often intrigue me to go see that film.

00:24:21.445 --> 00:24:27.226
And I think there are many examples, but the one that really comes to mind immediately is like Puss in Boots, The Last Wish.

00:24:27.885 --> 00:24:31.026
No chance of seeing that film, Chris, until I saw that you reviewed it.

00:24:31.026 --> 00:24:39.965
And again, speaking of like not watching a review before I see the film, I had to watch that one because like, is Chris reviewing Puss in Boots, The Last Wish?

00:24:40.125 --> 00:24:40.945
I went to go see it.

00:24:40.945 --> 00:24:42.306
I was in an empty theater by myself.

00:24:42.306 --> 00:24:44.238
And when I tell you, it one of my favorite movies that year.

00:24:44.238 --> 00:24:52.178
Yeah, because of your review and you're sort of you talked about earlier sort of the propping up of film that maybe doesn't get that sometimes, you know, sure.

00:24:52.837 --> 00:24:53.877
It is so good.

00:24:53.877 --> 00:24:54.938
It is awesome.

00:24:54.938 --> 00:24:56.218
I need a 4K of that.

00:24:56.218 --> 00:24:58.438
But anyway, I'm going to quote making movies.

00:24:58.438 --> 00:25:00.897
I don't know if you've actually I don't know if you've read this year.

00:25:01.377 --> 00:25:02.198
You read this one.

00:25:02.198 --> 00:25:04.657
I assume you at least own it if not read it.

00:25:04.657 --> 00:25:05.519
I read it.

00:25:05.519 --> 00:25:06.119
It's incredible.

00:25:06.119 --> 00:25:10.748
think City of the Met has the best directorial debut of all time with 12 Angry Men.

00:25:10.748 --> 00:25:12.334
Like it's insane.

00:25:12.334 --> 00:25:14.233
the top five film for me right there.

00:25:14.233 --> 00:25:15.294
12 million year men.

00:25:15.334 --> 00:25:15.554
Yeah.

00:25:15.554 --> 00:25:17.433
Lemaitre says here, he says this is what he says about intention.

00:25:17.433 --> 00:25:28.933
So he says, the best circumstances, when you set out to tell a story and the script writer and the director discuss their intention with film, you can sometimes achieve the third intention where you can see the work evolve in others.

00:25:28.933 --> 00:25:33.594
The result contains revelations, feelings, and ideas that you never knew existed.

00:25:33.594 --> 00:25:35.713
So Chris, final question here for you.

00:25:35.713 --> 00:25:39.354
Can you think back to what your initial intention was with this story?

00:25:39.354 --> 00:25:41.718
And then also how did that intention evolve over time?

00:25:41.718 --> 00:25:50.486
once you started discussing it and planning it with some of your staff, I wouldn't say staff, but sort of the other folks that have worked on this film with you during the Kickstarter and otherwise.

00:25:51.064 --> 00:25:58.577
my God, mean, like we were uh the tiniest Pokemon when we started working on this movie and we have evolved.

00:25:58.577 --> 00:26:00.638
we have evolved into other forms.

00:26:00.638 --> 00:26:09.544
uh It started as a type of thing where it was like, no, let's just shoot this with our savings and I'm just going to upload it to YouTube and call it a day because I can't wait anymore.

00:26:09.544 --> 00:26:11.085
I need to be making things.

00:26:11.085 --> 00:26:23.605
And the fact that that was the initial impetus that then just kept getting bigger to the point where I had like no that the ideas were not containable anymore and they were just kind of flowing.

00:26:23.605 --> 00:26:29.486
it just, as soon as that happened, it was going outside of the type of thing that I could have self-financed.

00:26:29.486 --> 00:26:33.286
I realized, okay, we're going to have to go to other places to try to find money.

00:26:33.286 --> 00:26:36.385
And so it evolved constantly.

00:26:36.385 --> 00:26:43.145
I mean, it changed when, when Camille signed on and I suddenly was working with this incredible actress who could bring so much to the movie.

00:26:43.145 --> 00:26:48.145
would change when, when Aaron Coons first, I met him at Fantastic Fest and he showed interest in it.

00:26:48.145 --> 00:26:52.102
Of course, when Flanagan saw rough cut of the movie and wanted to be involved.

00:26:52.221 --> 00:27:01.701
There was this constant set of mountains that we were kind of climbing and then we would get to a peak and then look at the next mountain and be like, we're going to try to climb this one now.

00:27:02.461 --> 00:27:05.362
I don't know that it ever was.

00:27:05.362 --> 00:27:07.981
I think it was just constantly doing that all the time.

00:27:07.981 --> 00:27:08.461
Wow.

00:27:08.461 --> 00:27:19.021
mean, it's really refreshing to hear you say that too, because I think a lot of times as artists, you sort of go in with this vision and some people have a hard time sort of separating from that.

00:27:19.021 --> 00:27:23.981
I'm a firm believer that collaboration sort of instigates the best story.

00:27:23.981 --> 00:27:29.501
you, you often in our brains, we think we have this perfect idea, a nugget of an idea of a story.

00:27:29.501 --> 00:27:33.579
But then a lot of times I've found, and I'm sure you probably have found this in some way or another.

00:27:33.579 --> 00:27:43.096
bouncing those ideas off of another person and sort of getting their perspective on that idea can really sharpen that idea in a really, in a way that you wouldn't be able to do by yourself.

00:27:43.096 --> 00:27:43.615
That's true.

00:27:43.615 --> 00:27:44.297
No, absolutely.

00:27:44.297 --> 00:27:46.888
The best idea in the room is the best idea in the room.

00:27:46.888 --> 00:27:54.276
It doesn't matter who if it's the directors or if it's, you know, a PA or something like I was very, very clear when we were shooting this movie.

00:27:54.276 --> 00:28:09.678
Like I said it from day one, I was like, do not be afraid to come up to me and say that you have a thought, you know, because I I've been on indie sets in Ohio where with my friends as actors where I could see the director was a tyrant.

00:28:09.678 --> 00:28:12.278
and difficult to work with and a nightmare.

00:28:12.278 --> 00:28:16.758
And I was just wanted to make sure that everybody on set knew making movies is supposed to be fun.

00:28:16.758 --> 00:28:17.958
Let's have fun.

00:28:18.077 --> 00:28:19.958
Let's have a good time making this movie.

00:28:19.958 --> 00:28:21.057
It's going to be stressful.

00:28:21.057 --> 00:28:23.557
It's going to be a lot of hard work, but let's have fun.

00:28:23.557 --> 00:28:29.097
And I wanted to make sure that everybody could come up to me and say, like, here's an idea I had for this or what do you think?

00:28:29.097 --> 00:28:31.998
And the best part is that you have department heads.

00:28:31.998 --> 00:28:36.397
have a costume designer, and they are the head of their department.

00:28:36.397 --> 00:28:39.319
All costumes, all wardrobe things go through them.

00:28:39.319 --> 00:28:41.810
director of photography, head of all camera.

00:28:41.810 --> 00:28:48.575
These are like the little presidents of all of the departments and they can all have control over their departments.

00:28:48.575 --> 00:28:58.119
But then at the end of the day, they can come up to me and be like, for instance, costume designer, Shana Novofoli can come up and be like, you know, I know we talked about green for this, but what do you think about blue for this?

00:28:58.119 --> 00:29:01.261
And here's this, this type of fabric and here's what I think it means.

00:29:01.261 --> 00:29:08.642
And you're watching all of these people who are artists in their own right, bringing their form, their own artistic craft.

00:29:08.642 --> 00:29:12.565
and their own years of knowledge to you and offering it to you.

00:29:12.565 --> 00:29:20.299
And so that's why you want to foster a really great experience on set for people is so that they can, they're going to make your movie better, you know?

00:29:20.299 --> 00:29:20.851
Yeah.

00:29:20.851 --> 00:29:27.637
This is the part of the show where I play that clip from Shawna where she compares you to a mixture of Stanley Kubrick and David Fincher.

00:29:27.637 --> 00:29:30.040
Sort of like you're directing style on set.

00:29:30.040 --> 00:29:30.401
No, I'm kidding.

00:29:30.401 --> 00:29:30.968
I'm kidding.

00:29:30.968 --> 00:29:33.113
Yeah, No, Shana's Shana's amazing.

00:29:33.113 --> 00:29:33.594
I love her.

00:29:33.594 --> 00:29:34.685
She's great.

00:29:35.051 --> 00:29:42.606
Well, Chris, if you can, as we close out this conversation, give me 30 seconds here just to let the facade totally fade away so I can quickly fanboy.

00:29:42.606 --> 00:29:48.191
So again, as I said earlier, been a dedicated viewer of your years in your channel for a long time.

00:29:48.191 --> 00:29:56.997
And not only were you a central influence for me to look at film with a sharper eye and not just someone who finally convinced me to give anime that real shot as a young person.

00:29:56.997 --> 00:30:03.010
And maybe most importantly, perhaps you are this walking, talking proof of concept.

00:30:03.010 --> 00:30:15.964
And truthfully, All the validation I've ever needed to create what we're talking on right now, the Oblivion Bar podcast, something like this could not exist if I wasn't already listening to you on your channel, yours and the like, the weekly weekly planet.

00:30:15.964 --> 00:30:19.467
Like those two were like such a huge influence for me in the early 2010s.

00:30:19.467 --> 00:30:20.237
So thank you.

00:30:20.237 --> 00:30:20.616
My gosh.

00:30:20.616 --> 00:30:22.637
What an absolute honor it was to chat with you here today.

00:30:22.637 --> 00:30:27.471
I guess again, I should say one more time, Shelby Oaks in theaters right now as you're listening to this, everybody.

00:30:27.471 --> 00:30:36.882
So if you're listening to this conversation, get on Fandango or whatever your app is and order yourself a ticket for the closest viewing and go out and support indie filmmaking.

00:30:36.882 --> 00:30:41.801
Go out support specifically, know, Chris and his team and Indie Horror here with Shelby Oaks.

00:30:41.821 --> 00:30:45.238
So Chris, anything that I left off, anything you want to say before we head out of here?

00:30:45.238 --> 00:30:46.530
Well, thank you, first off.

00:30:46.530 --> 00:30:46.901
Wow.

00:30:46.901 --> 00:30:49.586
I'm so humbled by all of that.

00:30:49.586 --> 00:30:50.598
No, you said it all, man.

00:30:50.598 --> 00:30:51.700
That was wonderful.

00:30:52.173 --> 00:30:54.096
Well, I'll have links for everything.

00:30:54.096 --> 00:31:00.592
Everybody is as you're listening this I'll have links for Chris's social media and all the Shelby Oaks the tickets that you can buy I'll have that in the link.

00:31:00.592 --> 00:31:05.646
So again, Chris, what an honor man I would love to get you back on at some point when you're not so busy.

00:31:05.646 --> 00:31:05.987
Sure.

00:31:05.987 --> 00:31:08.842
We could chat for a little longer I want like an hour of just physical media chat.

00:31:08.842 --> 00:31:12.713
If you can do that at some point my gosh, that would be like a week in the show.

00:31:12.713 --> 00:31:13.835
I think I'm good after that.

00:31:13.835 --> 00:31:15.548
think Yeah, that'd be awesome, man.

00:31:15.548 --> 00:31:16.506
Thank you.