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01/04/2006: "Old School by Christopher Folino"

Originally, I wanted to shoot “Gamers” in my hometown of El Monte and to film in the exact locations of where I use to play "Dungeons and Dragons" and hung-out. However, when you make an ultra-low-budget indie film you need to pick one location and stay-put!

I thought it would be a nice ode to the city where I grew up in. However, I live in Newbury Park, CA now and all my friends have moved away from El Monte. Besides, the script took a departure from being barely semi-autobiographical to "what can we do make a really funny movie."

Since starting in 1986 and making various movies and shorts on video, the city of El Monte was my prop, I shot freely there and it was mostly due to working at the Public Access Station, KELM 3 and knowing the police.

Our first movie started while I was in high school and it was called “Lance Amater: The story of a legend” and I was in detention when the thought occurred to me, while being forced to copy the school’s rule book, who would live by these rules? And that's how the story of the perfect high school student at a catholic high school was born.

I caught a great break, The principal of Bishop Amat High School at the time was Merritt Hemenway who along with some key faculty members, like Dave Ayotte and the “Velasco sisters” were fully supportive. I was like sixteen and I had nothing but a script and enthusiasm and that was good enough for them.

And when you’re sixteen you aren’t smart, However, you have two things going for you! Free time and great friends. That’s all you need to start making a movie and the friendships I had with Robert Velasco, David Frisk, Victor Estrada, Peter & Wolfgang Shane, Kevin Sherwood, Kathy Padilla, The Hemenway family,The Frisk family, KELM, and Jim Clouet were my “Wonder Years.”

Our first attempt at making “Lance Amater” was on 8MM film. We started a film club and held a dance and got the famous KROQ D.J. Richard Blade to be the M.C. That’s why twenty years later, we hired Richard Blade to be the D.J. on the radio in “Gamers”.
Well, the club made a great deal of money and we got the camera donated for free by my hair-stylist who later became major of El Monte. See, cutting hair can lead to power!

I thought by just picking up the camera I was instantly “Martin Scorsese.” Yeah, like all I had to do was yell “Wonder Twin Powers” and say “form and skills of George Lucas, minus the really bad screenwriting and directing!”
My partner in filmmaking at the time was Dave Frisk and we shot a 45 minute film and after getting enough money to get the film developed, we discovered we had no sound and the camera work sucked.
It was devastating, however, after I graduated I joined the local public access station, and shot everything on video. Video allows you to rewind each take and see if that take sucks or not.

So, as most people were graduating from high school and never looking back, I spent the following year re-shooting the movie with a new cast.
I did the camera, the lighting, and the directing and then I would take it back to my mentor at the time, Jim Clouet.

And I remember sitting in a small editing room, I’m talking perhaps twice the size of a catholic confessional, editing “Lance Amater” with Jim Clouet and I use to bring him peanut M&Ms and cigarettes and he would edit my movie and yell at me for bringing him “crap footage.”

The room was full of smoke and it took years to edit that damn movie, because, he wouldn’t let me settle and he would challenge me on everything. Sure, I wanted to kill him, however, I learned more from that man than any film school.
I went on to make another movie called “The Art of Crime” with Dave Frisk and Kevin Sherwood and in 1992 I thought we were on our way. I left to go to USC and attempted to get into the film program.However, I ended up transferring to Loyola Marymount once I figured I had no shot at getting into to USC. It didn’t matter though, it wasn’t my time.
I wanted it badly, I really did. It’s hard to come from a place like El Monte and be given a chance and not immediately make something out of it. Failure sucks, however, coming from a place with no expectation and then getting a shot and failing and then having to return home, that feeling of failure can last a “lifetime.”

However, my road would be another five and a half years of corporate television for “The Home Depot” mixed in with meeting the wrong woman several times. And then the early death of my mother happened at the same time I finally met the right woman.

Shortly after, I was forced to move to Atlanta to keep my job with “The Home Depot” and after 13 months of living in Georgia my contract was up and I wanted to go back to California. I got married in San Francisco, that where the wife is from and a few years later my wife got pregnant and I switched jobs from Corporate America to the video game industry. It was awesome! My first day, I got paid to watch somebody play a video game! Christ! That was heaven until I had to make the footage into a cool trailer.

After, that it was about gaining enough experience to move to a premier video game company and having the opportunity to write, edit, and shoot a 35MM war spot and to create an animated spots for TV or for trailers that ended up on “The Incredibles” and “The Punisher” movie DVDs as bonus material.
And E3, the video games answer to the “Academy Awards” is the most intense boot camp ride in the world. It makes creating a movie in six days seems like a “cake walk.”
So after May 2005, and learning that my wife was pregnant with twin boys I had a new found motivation to take care of some unfinished business.

And all the lessons I learned from my public access days and the hours I spent making “Lancer Amater” and “The Art of Crime” with my friends and family kicked in.
Even though I wasn’t shooting in El Monte or with my original friends, I made sure “Gamers” represented that spirit.

It was made on our terms with some nice upgrades. The movie is shot on 35MM film with real actors. And thankfully by making all those smaller movies and failing, I didn’t place my family in a bad financial mess like most folks who make a movie.
So the “old school lessons” paid off and we got a real legimate shot with this film.
I’d be a liar, if I said that I didn’t want it to sell this film and make movies for the rest of my life. However, I live in the real world where I got a great day job and a family.

This movie was personal, it was more about taking the 800 pound gorilla that haunted me for over twenty years, screwing with my self-confidence, and finally kicking it’s ass.

It’s great to look people in the eye and not have to make any excuses on why I never made a movie. Now, I just smile and I sound like one of those annoying self-motivational speakers when I say “Never give up.” Twenty years is a long time to reach a goal, however, it sure beats becoming an old man with regrets.

We gave it our best shot with this movie. That’s what this movie is, our best shot for right now. It’s not the only movie in me, it won’t make or break me, it’s just my first movie and my first shot.

Thanks for reading the blog and remember to go to www.imdb.com and check out "GAMERS 2006 Message Board" for some behind-the-scenes triva and bonus blog.