Season 10 Bonus Q&A with Horror Filmmaker Dane Elcar (Brightwood)

[00:00:06] It's a Jacked Up Review Show Welcome all, welcome all. As always, try to have something for everybody and you got yet another very talented horror mystery director. Dane Elcar is on the show to talk about his new movie Brightwood.

[00:01:00] Thank you, thank you for having me on. I will say it is Dane Elcar. My father is Dane Elcar. So close, he was in the mind, he was in the mind. But that's all right. How are you doing?

[00:01:18] I mean, what kind of a year has it been for you in terms of just behind the scenes and getting everything off the ground? I mean, it's been crazy. I mean, we shot the film in 2021, of May of 2021. So

[00:01:41] just the whole post-production and then getting it actually distributed and then waiting for this day to come where it was released on August 22nd has just been kind of incredible, exciting, also

[00:01:56] horrifying. And now that we're on the other side of its release, you know, the film kind of goes out and has to take on the life of its own. So which has been also kind of fun. I'm finally leveling out

[00:02:11] a little bit like I'm relaxing a little bit now. There you go, you're quiet in time. Yeah. Well, I don't know if it was behind the marketing, but who knows do them because I kept seeing a get heavily promoted on Twitter. People kept sharing the trailer.

[00:02:24] Yeah, yeah, we did that with Sinophobia releasing our distributors. So that was that I'm glad you were seeing it. Yeah, absolutely. I'm interested in that. It was very freaky. I'm like, see this is what's really missing on the horror scene is just a

[00:02:38] trailer that keeps you in suspense because everything else seems to be like an action or mystery movie where they give everything away and you're like, okay, I'm going to just watch it because the famous actors are director. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:02:52] Yeah. I mean, yeah, we didn't we didn't have those. So it was how can we how can we rethink all of this to kind of present it in an interesting way? So I'm happy it kind of fell in front of you and I'm happy you reached out.

[00:03:06] It is now available for rent or purchase on Amazon about my copy. Oh, great. So tell us a little bit about what the kind of nutmere fuel that makes you want to craft

[00:03:21] a story around it. It's interesting this started out as a short film that I never thought would make I would make into a feature. I just had an idea I used to go for jogs with my daughter

[00:03:35] in a stroller around this local park in New Jersey called Brightwood Park. And I would go around and I'm kind of an amateur photographer so I'd you know, kind of look at the light and see all the stuff and I would take photographs

[00:03:48] and I could see that there's you know, in the right light these things that you would consider really beautiful can be very sinister and I started kind of falling in love with the idea of taking this location and turn it into a story. And at that same time

[00:04:04] I came up with this idea of a person, a man just getting trapped going around in circles, kind of like a twilight zone. And so I put those together and very no budget filmmaking, you know, two guys in an iPhone made this short called the pond which

[00:04:25] in a way is the kind of basic structure of what Brightwood would become. But the short film as I was making that, that short film just it takes place in the one location

[00:04:39] and just one actor played by me actually. And as I was making that I thought to myself, well in this like how interesting would it be if I were to drop of this kind of married

[00:04:52] couple right on the verge of divorce into this nightmare and kind of see where that would take them as a couple. And so I finished that short film it got into some festivals, it opened up

[00:05:03] some conversations with some great people and great filmmakers. And then time went on and I started working on another project with my producing partner Max Wartendijk who did this and also stars as Dan. And we were working on another project and then COVID hit that fell through

[00:05:23] and then I just started, you know it had been percolating in the back of my brain but I was like hey what if what if I actually worked on this this feature with this couple and I kind of knew

[00:05:33] the game I knew the rules I knew where I wanted it to go I knew how to end the film. And so I sat down and wrote it I just took this kind of funny dirty couple threw them into this

[00:05:45] scenario and just let them run. And that's kind of how the whole idea started. Sweet. From short to feature. There you go. What are some other advice you would give for those

[00:05:59] who are trying to pick and choose which of their shorts could actually be elongated to a feature? I mean that's an interesting question. I think that if the story stays with you, if you do something,

[00:06:13] I mean I guess there's two ways of doing it right? There's the way you have the feature in mind and then you make a short version of that feature or something from the feature that

[00:06:22] kind of stands out that you want to make into a short film is kind of like a concept piece. That was not the case for this. So I had was straight out just planning to make a short film

[00:06:34] but the idea stuck with me and the passion was there because making a film is not easy. So you need to have the drive and the passion to kind of tell this crazy story and get people on board to tell

[00:06:46] the story with you in a collaborative way. So yeah it has to be something that really sticks with you and stays with you. Sweet. Did you get the acting or filmmaking bug from your late great father, Dana? Oh yeah. I mean he was always,

[00:07:09] he was always working on something, always reading plays. He everywhere he lived in his life practically he seemed to start some sort of theater. He loved films but his real passion was theater so he and he was obviously on television. So my environment was growing up

[00:07:29] with him in a small professional 99 seat theater in Santa Paula, California and so this idea of like adults playing make believe in front of people has just been the norm in my life since I was a child.

[00:07:47] It's been hard for me to imagine trying to do anything else even though time has rightfully forced me to do a number of different odd jobs here and there but I finally got to make the

[00:07:58] feature. It's lovely. Yeah and he was a great actor in his own right. You might remember the FBI agent and the sting but I first saw him in the movie Failsafe years before I even saw his famous show.

[00:08:10] I love Failsafe yeah yeah with what's his name? Walter Matthow. Walter Matthow, Jack Lemon yeah it's a good name Matt. Great film. So Neil Lamette seems to be, I have the time I wonder how

[00:08:25] many people actually know him versus have seen his influence on all these other procedurals and Paul, I don't know but I mean I went through a phase where I watched a lot of his films and I

[00:08:34] thought I mean he's amazing and I've always I think like somewhere I haven't actually read it yet but I like intend to read his book which I've heard is quite good. Oh nice. He was a playwright

[00:08:47] so doesn't make surprise me that he'd do a book on his own memoirs. Yeah yeah yeah yeah I love Sydney and then and yeah again just my dad growing up in that environment

[00:09:00] I didn't get to visit the set of MacGyver too often. I was very young but when we did you know the idea of like the big cameras and all these people what are they doing? I mean it was a

[00:09:12] lot of fun. They shot it up in Vancouver at least when I visited which I remember being very cold. A stellar and have you always kind of just, has the camera just spoken to you more or has

[00:09:27] it been kind of more about the staging, lighting and just the other elements like the music? You know that's a that I um I always when I grew up it was always the you know the writing

[00:09:42] process and the dialogue and then working with actors. I love working with actors and I love collaborating with actors. In fact on this on this project on Brightwood I brought them on really

[00:09:53] early um on like the second draft I brought them in and they they because the pandemic was still going on we would just do zoom calls and we would start every day once a week and then

[00:10:06] we go two times a week but I would just have them read and then I would go rewrite and they would have them read and go rewrite and it was a very important working with them

[00:10:13] and talking and having conversations was a really important part of kind of like distilling down the script and writing so it's always been the writing first and foremost from working with actors. Later I've always loved cameras and I've always loved lenses but I never thought that I would

[00:10:33] shoot a film. I never thought I'd be a DP and I depied this this film and really like I said the drive to see the film made and to actually get a feature film made

[00:10:44] was really strong so what I did was I sat down and I just started going down the you know basically teaching myself how am I going to film this movie? How light this movie?

[00:10:57] What lenses could I use given the light that's available to me? And so just taking it step by step in what do I have and what do I have to work with and what do I need to learn in order to

[00:11:09] actually see that the things could be done and so during that process I yeah I mean you start to at least I nerd out about it now so it's I mean I will say that I'm not, I think I got

[00:11:27] to a level where I could film this movie there's obviously so many amazingly wonderful talented people I would love to collaborate with in the future but to have that knowledge and to

[00:11:38] kind of force yourself to learn these things was amazing. That's a good point. I've been on some in the film sets where I kept encountering people who wanted nothing to do with it. I'm like

[00:11:49] you need to know it even if you're not good at it you should know how to talk to the boom mic guy and all this. I think so I mean I've done, I've been a boom operator,

[00:11:57] I've done sound mixing, I mixed some sound here. I do editing all the time actually, I edit probably more than anything on short films recently yeah so all of that is just practice

[00:12:12] that having that knowledge you know when you're filming a scene knowing how it will work in the edit or if it won't work is just so important it's so vital to know what that would actually

[00:12:25] mean. Playing a god jury and executioner kind of. Yeah yeah yeah so and especially if you're doing low budget filmmaking right because there's the idea of getting a lot of coverage but

[00:12:38] we didn't have a lot of time so I had to make these decisions like I'm gonna film in this wide up into this line and then I know I'm gonna cut into the close-up so it's a risk but I would

[00:12:49] just shoot it that way so because I knew how I was gonna edit the film. Lovely. Yeah. Well what's your favorite part about directing the actors because obviously there's already the

[00:13:02] on-run rule you know they don't tell you how to direct you don't tell them how to act but there still can be a fun bit about foreplay on staging the scene and

[00:13:12] yeah I mean I mean I'm on this project this is my first feature film and so it's kind of like jumping into a you know jumping off the plane and figuring out how you're gonna land but I think

[00:13:25] that I've always treated the collaboration as a conversation and each actor's you know obviously different and I love what actors bring in and I invite them to bring as much of they want. I can

[00:13:39] always say yes or no. It's a dance. And so if they have ideas you know tell me I'm always ready for that and but a constant conversation that's really what it is. It's

[00:13:53] up until a point you shoot and then because I was this is what was so different because I've worked with actors in the past but as someone who was also shooting it there was this strange

[00:14:06] because I'm the only one looking through the camera and I'm basically right there I had a steady cam and I'm right there. I'm also kind of dancing with them as they're acting and I can kind

[00:14:16] of decide what to get and what to shoot and so really it made the whole process really organic you know. I mean there was things we planned out everything to a tee however once we were there

[00:14:30] it was yeah it was really just like this kind of organic thing everybody kind of knew what they were supposed to do so we could kind of really play around and it was great. Wonderful.

[00:14:42] And when you see the actor just go beyond what both you or they anticipated isn't it just so fun just feeling that energy and I mean that's why you do it. You're always kind of looking for

[00:14:55] lightning you know there's something about it. You can you want a spark of something sincere and real and if they can reach that you know it's fantastic. It's a fantastic feeling or if I have

[00:15:10] to do something to kind of push them a little bit in that direction yeah I mean that's the that's the adventure of it all trying to capture that lightning. Go to the top of that mountain

[00:15:22] yeah. Any projects you'd like to hint at that are upcoming? I mean I have a really fun thriller that I've been working on it's kind of a Hitchcockian thriller that I'm also working on with Max Wharton Producing. Obviously everything has been kind of a little bit

[00:15:42] on hold with the strike rightly so we really support the strike and what's going on and I hopefully the new meetings that are starting up this Wednesday with the WGA will be done.

[00:15:55] Something's gotta get man. Yeah it can't get happening. But when the you know when the time is right uh yeah I look forward to starting a new project. What do you recommend for those

[00:16:09] who take either storyboarding or shotless and how to go about that? I love I love storyboarding but the the interesting thing I learned on this as someone again coming only from the first time

[00:16:24] feature filmmaker um every sort I've ever done I've I've storyboarded here I worked with Max months in advance on this intense shot list. He was making the schedule I would sit and just

[00:16:39] go down everything every shot what lens we would use and he would schedule it down to how long it would take to change the lens because we were so afraid especially that we were shooting in

[00:16:51] the woods we were shooting uh during the day where the weather could you know be changing at any any moment so we just planned everything out. We'll return after these messages. If you like small town mystery, crazy news and wild history then the Florida Men on

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[00:18:16] with this crowd of cool cats check them out I storyboarded probably some scenes but what did I ended up doing the shot list was so extensive that the night before I would kind of just draw

[00:18:34] on the side of the script just kind of give me little reminders and that was it and that was a kind of a fun fun way to work. I love that line scripts are very more common than people

[00:18:48] even give me credit for. Yeah yeah and then you get to kind of obviously I think it's almost more for the actors too because I have the shot list and if I'm working with Dana Berger who played

[00:19:04] Jen you know if she has a question the night before I had just quickly drawn it out and like red ink or something I can be like that's the shot that we're gonna try to do here so it's

[00:19:13] almost it's more it's often for them as well or the crew that I'm working with. Good good yeah and isn't it wild how people are still sometimes snobs about what kind of cameras everyone's using when it's really what you're comfortable with and what gives you the look

[00:19:35] you're looking for. I mean absolutely and that's what decision that's what that I chose to use just kind of a lighter Sony Alpha camera because if I had tried to use a bigger camera,

[00:19:50] heavier camera I knew how much I was going to be running around and I had worked with the camera before so what I did is said okay I'm gonna use this camera I know how to work this camera

[00:20:02] and then I just focused on lenses and what lenses I could use with this camera to make it the best of what I saw in my head so. Lovely yeah and when you get an idea how do you recommend those

[00:20:22] who got these ideas to jot down like keep track of them? I don't know that's a hard because I admit that I have a number of ideas in my head all at any time. I think it's really about

[00:20:38] the one that really just kind of sticks with the one you keep thinking about and again it has to nobody can make a film by themselves I mean I wore a lot of hats on Brightwood but you still

[00:20:50] it's a collaborative effort and you have to find something that you think you can really bring other people on board and then have this passion that can be the driving force at least

[00:21:01] if you're writing and directing it anyway I think if you're writing it it has that element as well you're gonna be living with this story for years so I find that I kind of let these things percolate

[00:21:14] in my brain for a while and I might make a note here or there and then once I really decide I'm gonna write that one I know the opening scene I kind of know where the story is going

[00:21:24] I know how I don't necessarily always know exactly how it's gonna end but I vaguely know where I wanted to go and then I'll sit down and just start start writing it and then it's really about

[00:21:37] the doing it which is for me just getting up shit-ass early and typing you know at like four or thirty in the morning and just doing it every every day until it's done and sometimes that's a quick process and sometimes it can take months if not years so

[00:22:00] and what do you feel are just some degrees of a production that are often kind of ignored for better or worse that sound all the time I would say have a have a good understanding of audio

[00:22:13] have a good understanding of mic placements where you would you know where you want them to put the lobs understand that a lot of times people forget that you can see the lov packs or you can see

[00:22:28] the lobs in their shirts you know you always just have to be kind of aware of these things also though to really take the time to get good audio on set on the location

[00:22:42] get that fully and yeah get get it because you don't you really don't want to especially in a low budget situation unless you have a lot of money for post you really don't want to do ADR

[00:22:54] you want to try to capture the sound on set which we almost everything except for maybe one or two words was all on location sound for this no I would say sound sound sound sound that's good and it's wild too how somebody do the whole

[00:23:15] fix an impose is like you just can't recreate it oh no no no no it'll never it'll never actually I mean I still I mean I still hear things that I'm now that I'm kind of like uh but no one

[00:23:31] no one will really notice probably watching the film but yeah you just the idea of fixing anything in in post is I always unless it's specifically planned out for that like you're doing a

[00:23:42] special effect shot um but yeah you want to capture as much as you can in the camera and with the mic for sure totally yeah and what do you recommend for uh going about sound mixing

[00:23:58] running out of studio or just having a reliable team in that well I mean I so the story of the sound of brightwood start because I do a little bit of um uh well sorry do you mean

[00:24:11] sound mixing or sound design or kind of all aspects I just all aspects just for the answer to and make sure it doesn't get compromised so um I love doing sound design I'm not a sound

[00:24:25] engineer uh that's a whole that's another level of skill so what I like love to do is as I'm kind of editing the the the film I'll say oh you know maybe this look the kind of cool sound can be

[00:24:38] here we'll have like the rustling leaves and um high pitch noise here so I'll start laying down bits of sound design and and and some alternative music that probably won't be used

[00:24:53] but just something to have it there um uh I'll start laying down the sound design very organically as I'm editing and as the story is kind of coming together and then with with brightwood

[00:25:05] um I then worked with um a uh a sound engineer um and dialogue mixer named Joey Zampala who's a very I'm sorry hi Joey yeah and uh yeah hi Joey and he uh he kind of took my initial sound design

[00:25:28] and added to it and mixed it finally and got it really sounding nice and got the dialogue sounding nice and then a few months later uh we got the score finally from Jason Cook who's my

[00:25:40] composer and I've worked with Jason for a number of years and he did this amazing thing where he uh really just handed me this kind of 84 minute symphony of music and I of course I

[00:25:55] and he knew this as well but I wasn't I was never going to be able to use it all and I hopefully it will be released some sometime soon but um what it allowed me to do is I could go in

[00:26:06] and kind of pick these pieces and kind of figure out how they fit into the story very organically as well and that turned out to be beautiful and then once all of that was done um I have a friend

[00:26:19] who uh is a very great as a great sound engineer Jeff Prosser in Los Angeles and we got into a studio and he did the final like 5.1 up mix and there you go it sounds amazing so Dolby yeah that

[00:26:32] was the amazing uh the amazing story of Brightwood's Brightwood's sound isn't it also wild how you can use it as part of a horror movie's tension oh I mean I think that particularly with films like

[00:26:46] this the especially you're having this kind of repetitive nature of seeing the forest and seeing the woods and again you're showing us typically what would be considered maybe pretty things or things in the light where it's just woods and forest you slap on a good piece of

[00:27:05] tension building ambient music and you got a totally different way of looking at it I mean that's the whole beauty of the art form because you can juxtapose these images and the sounds

[00:27:15] and create different feelings and then moods lovely and uh you were fortunate enough to release this movie at uh Horror Hound among other places um what are some other festivals that really have a

[00:27:30] good turnout and are very friendly to independent movies um well we opened at uh Other Worlds which I think might have been that I think that festival is there like last it was the

[00:27:42] last festival but it was such an amazing festival so I do hope something I do hope they bring it back at some point um another hole in the head in San Francisco speaking of the bridge behind you

[00:27:52] was uh great um those again say yeah a lot of fun the crowd was great uh I would say um uh the Salem Horror Fest in Salem Massachusetts was definitely kind of amazing highlight

[00:28:07] um Hey Lynch is fantastic and uh she just runs a great festival and the people there were fantastic so it was it was a great screening it was great to see it on a big screen

[00:28:23] that's very eye-opening but I will say but I will say all the fest that it's as a as a filmmaker and as a film uh when you're invited to a fest it's kind it is a special thing and each

[00:28:37] festival was great panic fest was great uh in Kansas City but it was we were only invited for the um streaming part of the festival so I didn't actually get to go there would have loved to have gone

[00:28:48] there uh but when you get invited to a festival it really is they're taking a chance on the film and that type of support we would not be where we are today have these festivals not taken a

[00:28:59] chance on on the film so I thank all of them so much uh all together uh since we're very digital now you feel like sometimes it can kind of isolate or get people too uh comfortable like hey we'll fix

[00:29:17] anything if we make a mistake and say oh you can't cover this up oh in terms of filmmaking yeah I mean that's interesting yeah I mean I I I think certainly there are elements that the technology

[00:29:31] is now so advanced it's you really can go make a kind of some beautiful images and and beautiful things with the phone um but yeah I at the end of the day I can't at least for me it really is

[00:29:48] about um kind of the collaborative experience of doing it and so that means having to get out and it means having to like go on a location or go to a studio and shooting with people that you're

[00:30:00] you're uh doing this kind of um insane art where you you hope it'll all work out and and um I love it I so I I'm not really sure if that answers your question but at least for me that's

[00:30:17] I means it's not a problem I love this confidentiality boost and yeah so for students or independence or even professionals working uh what's the best way to just kind of do a little checklist both mentally and physically uh do some background checks also just

[00:30:39] make sure there's no bad apples on your set I know it can sometimes be hard and sometimes it wears its head too late in the process well you have to I I mean yes you have to know

[00:30:49] your you have to know your crew and you have to know that all of these people are there again for this kind of insane art insane passion and you you know you you need to be able to run

[00:31:03] a safe set a safe environment everybody needs to feel comfortable and everybody needs to know that they can come to you especially if you're the director or producer come to you uh with any

[00:31:14] with any issues and be able to communicate with you because as I said before that type of this type of collaboration on all levels um in all aspects of filmmaking is a constant conversation

[00:31:25] that is just having uh that you want to have and you want it to be free flowing so um with that in mind yeah you go into all of these things um you know working with all of

[00:31:39] these people and everyone's going to have different strengths and and uh but then hopefully you can kind of wrangle them all together and and set them all on the course that you are all trying to make

[00:31:51] good good because yeah even if it's just two days it's a long amount of time to just have to put up with someone who's you know 20 or more. Sure sure sure and I think that a lot of that

[00:32:06] you know as someone who's in as someone who is the director you know you just have to be ready again you have to kind of understand the different dynamics of communications that

[00:32:14] could potentially be going on and being able to kind of get in there and ease a situation or you know anything that might come up that's directing really uh I mean it's not as simple

[00:32:28] as this but so much of it is solving problems and a lot of those problems tend to be if not a technical one tend to be a communicative one so constantly you know either solving

[00:32:39] solving one of those either it's a technical issue you got to figure out or some or stir you got to figure out like what's going on with somebody you know and and figuring out

[00:32:48] what they're doing right something happened that yeah absolutely and given how do you feel like there's always going to be some digital platforms people I see people putting their

[00:33:04] material on red box and 2b the amazon still has it but they got to make sure it's by one of the companies is that you know they're approved right right um oh you mean in terms of

[00:33:17] like self distribution or self or pre pre planned right so we had um we were lucky enough to get a distributor and that's harder than you think a lot of films go without finding distribution

[00:33:32] these days so that process started with my producer reaching out to a number of different sales agents and then we were um we got our sales agent who's wonderful and she for a very long

[00:33:47] time uh you know went about trying to sell the film in the United States and um it was not that it was not easy we it's the sell of our film as there's no stars you know everyone would say you

[00:34:00] we really enjoyed it it's a very fun film it worked out but we don't know how to necessarily sell it um and that's the game so eventually uh Ray at uh Ray Murray at Sinophobia

[00:34:13] releasing just kind of again took a chance on the film there was something about it he was really to take a risk and and uh and he actually you know paid and is a good company and um

[00:34:27] there are a lot of scams out there that you have to really be careful yeah i'm probably really away now they use I think an aggregator to get up onto all of the platforms and I do know that

[00:34:40] if you choose to do self-distribution you could you could do that um but I do think having the kind of push with a distributor is still something that I preferred to have and and don't foresee wanting necessarily to self-distribute however I do know other filmmakers

[00:35:02] that have a very different idea on that and the next films that they do they would go straight to the aggregator that puts it up on all the different you know platforms and just go

[00:35:11] through them so that might be the wave of the future who knows yeah tough to say it's always changing yeah even stuff for that we recommend will last barely half a decade now it seems

[00:35:26] yeah yeah that's true oh well this has been a delight and just very to the point and yeah we need laid back chats like this so yeah this is lovely sir and well thank you for having me

[00:35:41] on yeah it's great great questions and um yeah this has been a delight so I just sit yeah stay steady on both two feet yeah you as well I will try I'll let you know when it hits the podcaster

[00:35:57] feed and uh oh what will it actually go out on like will it be on the the jacked up review show or yes yeah I think your pod being fantastic yeah I was just listening to one of the uh

[00:36:12] episodes I think with the um uh with the uh Mystery Science Theater oh yeah that was so fun yes yeah I love Mystery Science Theater I used to watch those all the time and as I was listening

[00:36:26] to your podcast I was like I think the first thing I ever saw was actually the movie it must have been and it took me to the show yeah whatever you can do to refer you yeah

[00:36:39] all right well thank you so much this has been great absolutely yeah have a good one bye follow us on the web on facebook twitter and instagram the podcast is available on podby spotify i heart radio anchor apple and anywhere else

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