Your company Icon Film Studios - how did it come into being,
and what's the philosophy behind it? And what can you tell us about its The
Sleaze Box-brand?
Well, Icon Film Studios
in some shape or form (under many different company names)
has been
around
for twenty-two years. It was originally created by myself and long-time
friend Simon
Lynx
back in Upstate New York. I wanted to make horror movies since I was 14
years old
and
tried to figure out how I was going to do that at such a young age. It
wasn’t until I was in
my
early twenties is when I started making shot-on-video movies in my
backyard in New
York
and later made them when I was a college student in Tampa, FL. Throughout
the 90’s
and
into the 2000’s I made several short films and a few feature length
movies with Lynx
under
the Icon
banner. Towards the end of that decade I was mostly a film editor
for hire
and
working on a few short films here and there. In the 2010’s I teamed up
with friend, John
Miller
and together we started The
Sleaze Box in 2012, which started off as a web
series
where
we counted down Top 5 lists on horror or exploitation topics. When we
decided to
make
Amerikan Holokaust later that year, we wanted The
Sleaze Box to be the new
brand
for
the film and future films that we were going to producer and release.
From what I know, the first
feature film released under the Sleaze Box
banner was
Amerikan Holokaust - so what is it about, what was the idea behind it, and what
can you tell us about your approach to the story at hand?
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There
was a lot in the origin of
Amerikan Holokaustt. Both myself and John were doing the web series and making short
films,
but wanted to make a feature film. We figured it would cost tons of money
to make a
feature
film, so we had no idea when we would make a feature and what it would be
about. I
remember
being at a baseball game in the summer of 2012 with John and friend and
filmmaker
Shelby McIntyre and we were talking about movies. Shelby had said that
found
footage
movies were the hot thing at the time and were cheap to make. After that I
and
John
decide to try to make a found footage movie, but what would it be about?
After
watching
a documentary on serial killers Leonard Lake and Charles Ng where they
showed
footage
of their victims being videotaped, I got an idea to do a found footage
movie on a
serial
killer. We loosely based it on Lake and Ng, but changed the names and
characters.
We
also made the film our own type of found footage movie without following
the rules of that
sub-genre
and making it more a surreal video journal of these killers.
What
can you tell us about critical and audience reception of
Amerikan Holokaust?
The
film has gotten an awesome reception since its release in August 2013 from
both critics
and
fans. We self-distribute the movie on our own website and when we first
released the
DVD
it sold very well in its first month and continues to be our best seller
almost two years
later.
The movie came out at a perfect time when the underground cinema scene was
really
becoming
hot. It has become very popular all over the world. Being played in
several
festivals
and even being featured in a full article in Fangoria’s Gorezone
magazine.
Amerikan Holokaust has become a benchmark film in the underground cinema scene.
A few words about the anthology Make
Them Die Sleazy!, and were the segments all shot specifically for the
movie or is it a collection of separate shorts?
It
was a
collection
of separate short films that we made into an anthology feature. It was
after the
release
of
Amerikan Holokaust that we wanted to release another film. So, we
decided to
take
some of our short films we made and make them into an anthology. We did
shoot wraparound
segments for the film and I just edited it all together and there you have
it, Make
Them
Die Sleazy!
Your
latest film Naughty Dirty Nasty - now what's that one about?
That
one started as
just
an idea to shoot something fun and sexy. I wanted to do something that was
a mix of
the
Playboy Centerfold videos that were done in the 90’s, the Misty Mundae
films of the
2000’s [Misty Mundae bio - click
here] and the nudie cuties of the 50’s and 60’s with a touch of Bettie Page
stag films. The
idea
was just going to be different segments featuring beautiful women in sexy
situations. At
the
time when I was thinking of making the movie I met Krystal “Pixie”
Adams and Ashley
Lynn
Caputo, who later became stars of the film. It was pretty much a two day
shoot in one
or
two locations with a cast of five, so it was very easy to make. Then I
just took some music
and
started editing it making it a sleazy masterpiece.
Naughty Dirty Nasty
features its fair share of nudity and sex - now how far
does the film actually go, and is there a line you refuse to cross?
Naughty Dirty Nasty
only goes
as
far as a softcore porn you would see on Skinemax. Tons of nudity and
girl-on-girl action
and simulated sex. We try to push the envelope as much as we can as far as
nudity, sex
and
gore is concerned. I think the only line I wouldn’t cross is I would
never want to put any
of
the cast or crew in any dangerous situations where they would get hurt and
I wouldn’t
want
anyone to feel uncomfortable about what they were doing in the film. Also,
I would
never
harm any animals in a film. Most of the actors we worked with have been
very
fearless
and willing to go the extra mile in the role as far as nudity and sexual
situations is
concerned.
In our latest film $kumbagz, we have a girl-on-girl scene that trumps the
ones in Naughty Dirty Nasty
as far as being more hardcore than softcore.
Naughty Dirty Nasty
stars Krystal Pixie Adams, who seems to have become some
kind of a fixture in the
Sleaze Box universe - so what can you tell
us about her, what makes her perfect for your movies, and what's it like
working with her?
Krystal
is wonderful to
work
with and we are very lucky we found her. I think she is perfect for our
films because
she
is very fearless and is not afraid to be nude or be in our films whatever
subject matter
they
are. She also has the right look and style for our films. She knows how to
act in front
of
a camera and the camera loves her. She is also willing to go the extra
mile in her
performances.
She is also a very good person and very talented not only as an actress,
but
as
a model and an artist. She is a very talented painter in which we included
some of her
portraits
and art pieces in an extra feature on the Naughty Dirty Nasty
DVD.
Any future projects you'd like to talk
about?
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Well,
our latest release came out this past
February
called $kumbagz, which is a modern day exploitation film about a young
woman,
played
by Krystal “Pixie” Adams, who falls into the world of prostitution and
you see the rise
and
fall of her in that world. The film is written and directed by John Miller
and features many
staples
of The
Sleaze Box such as Ashley Lynn Caputo, Joe Makowski, Bob Glazier,
Jules
Sceiro,
and Joel D. Wynkoop [Joel D.
Wynkoop interview - click here]. We also have a slasher film coming out later this
summer
called
Death-scort Service, which is kind of a throwback to the classic slasher
films of the
80s,
but set to modern day times and is about a killer targeting call girls in
Las Vegas. The
film
is a collaboration with Sean Donohue of Gatorblade Films. Sean directed
the film and
both
of us wrote and produced it. It also stars Krystal and Ashley plus many
other beautiful
and
talented actresses. I am also working on a screenplay right now for the
next film I want
to
direct which is called Chaos A.D. and hopefully I’ll be shooting that
one in early 2016.
Please do talk about your partners-in-crime at Icon Film Studios
for a bit, and what does each of them bring to the table?
Our
company is very small and throughout the
years
there has only been two people as major players. In the pre-Sleaze Box
days it was
Simon
Lynx and I. Now it is myself and John Miller. Both of us write, produce
and direct
films.
Throughout the years both Simon and John brought a lot to the table as far
as coming
up
with ideas and writing scripts. A supporting player I would like to
mention is Zach Short,
who
has scored a lot of our music to our films throughout the years. I would
also like to
mention
people that I have collaborated through the years on different projects.
Special
make-up
effects artist and filmmaker Marcus Koch [Marcus
Koch interview - click here] who I worked with many times and
has
done
the effects on
Amerikan Holokaust. Shelby McIntyre, who directed the
documentary
Strip
Club King, which I co-produced with him. I also at times worked with
Shelby and
Andrew
Allan who both run Cult Movie Mania, where I done some editing for them on
projects
and also Cult Movie Mania has released
Amerikan Holokaust and
Naughty Dirty Nasty
both on VHS. I’ve also been working with Sean Donohue on Death-scort
Service and
Sean
was also a producer on Naughty Dirty Nasty.
Apart
from films you produced yourselves, Icon Film Studios
also
distributes movies by other producers these days - so do talk about some
of the movies you carry for a bit, and what are some of the requirements
to be released by Icon Film Studios?
We
wanted
to make The
Sleaze Box our brand to release hard-to-find out there movies.
I think
the
only requirements is that it fits in our genre which is horror, sci-fi or
exploitation and it has
to
be somehow weird and sleazy in some type of way. Some of the films we
released are
some
classic shot-on-video movies from the 1990’s like Phil Herman’s
Burglar From Hell and
Tales
Till The End [Phil Herman
interview - click here]. We will also be releasing another gem from him called
Jacker
and
Jacker 2, both will be in a double disc set. Phil is a great filmmaker from that
age of shot-on-video
gems
and his films are just great entertainment and fun to watch. The
shot-on-video
films
of the 80’s, 90’s and 2000’s are our version of the B-movies of the
50’s, 60’s and 70’s.
Other
films that we released are Terence Muncy’s zombie epic Hell Walks The
Earth and
Joel
D. Wynkoop’s Slasher Weekend [Joel
D. Wynkoop interview - click here]. Slasher Weekend will be out this July and
is actually
a
brand new release. Joel originally shot half the movie ten years ago but
finished the film
this
past year.
How did you get into filmmaking in the first place, and did you
recieve any formal training on the subject?
I
got into filmmaking as a teenager. Night of the Living Dead was
an
inspiration to me. Once I saw that film I was hooked on horror. As I
mentioned before, I
shot
some films with my friends at home in New York in my backyard. I pretty
much had no
training
at that time and just used two VCRs to edit my films. When I went away to
college
in
the mid-90’s to Tampa, FL is when I learned film and television
production. There I got to
actually
edit on real video equipment and I got to shoot on 16mm film and edit on a
flatbed.
Also
they had some of the first non-linear computer editing equipment there, so
I got to learn
that
too. After college, I was able to get my hands on a copy of Final Cut
Pro,
which was
brand
new at the time and mastered that program.
What can you
tell us about your filmwork prior to Amerikan Holokaust?
Well,
when I
was
in college I had a show called Creeping Death, which was basically a cross
between
The
Twilight Zone and Tales From The Crypt. It was broadcast on our campus TV
station
and
on public access. My first, I’ll call it, mini-feature was called Chameleon, which was
about
a creature that can transform into anything that it touches. I shot and
produced that as
my
senior project in college and it actually got released on VHS from a small
company for a
brief
time. After that I made my first full feature film called Bleed which I
self-distributed in
2002.
Then throughout the 2000s I made several short films, mostly horror
related. I coproduced
and
edited the documentary Strip Club King: The Story of Joe Redner about the
life
and times of strip club owner Redner who owns the world famous strip club
Mons
Venus.
I also edited a few feature films including Herschell Gordon Lewis’s The
Uh-Oh! Show [Herschell
Gordon Lewis bio - click here].
Going
through your filmography, you seem to never stray too far from the horror
genre - so is horror a genre at all dear to you, and why (not)?
Yes,
horror is my all-time
favorite
genre and I’ve been a fan of horror films since I was a teenager. My
favorite horror
films
come from the 60’s, 70’s and 80’s. With the horror genre you always
get something
new,
different and unpredictable at times. I do like other film genres, but
with horror you can
go
in different directions as far as storytelling. Watching horror films is
like going on a roller
coaster
or entering a haunted house at a theme park. It is one big thrill ride.
Horror is also a
universal
language. It doesn’t matter where you come from and what side of the
world you
live
on, we all get scared and jump at the same things in movies.
Having
made indie movies for quite some time now - how did the independent
filmworld change/evolve over the years?
It
has changed dramatically throughout the
years
and mostly in the last decade. In the 90’s when I was finished with
college and ready
to
make movies it really wasn’t accepted to just shoot a film on a VHS
camcorder. You had
to
use film, which a production on film would cost thousands of dollars and
even in the low
millions
for just a low budget film. Now with affordable HD cameras that shoot in
24p to give
it
that film look and editing software that you can have on any desktop or
laptop computer
you
can make an affordable film. Plus also with the software they have out now
you can
self-distribute
your own films and sell them on your own web site. And with the help of
social
media
like Facebook and Twitter you can reach people from all over the world and
that helps
you
get the word out about your films.
How would you
describe yourself as a director?
I
would describe myself as a hands-on
director
and what I mean by that is when I direct a film and the actors in it I try
to describe to
them
exactly what I want and what I envision. I often act out the scene myself
before we roll
to
show the actors what I want from them. I also work with the actors a lot
and give them
back
story to their characters and tell them what emotion their character is
dealing with at the
time.
I also try to give my films a unique style and look from the camera
angles, to the
editing
style, to the lighting set up and even the set design and wardrobe. I want
my films to
stick
out whether it is in story or style.
Filmmakers who inspire
you?
The
filmmakers that inspire me are Alfred Hitchcock,
George
A. Romero, Dario Argento, Herschell Gordon Lewis [Herschell
Gordon Lewis bio - click here], John Carpenter, Martin
Scorsese
just to name a few. All of them are different types of directors, but all
have a style
and
vision that I admire. I have watched all of them for years and have
adapted some of
their
style into my way of filmmaking.
Your favourite movies?
My
all-time favorite film is Star Wars. I was four years old when it
came
out and was in love with it ever since. Those films were my childhood.
Other films that
our
my favorite starting with the horror genre are Night of the Living Dead
(1968), Dawn of
the
Dead (1978), Psycho (1960),
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974),
The
Shining
(1980),
Halloween (1978), Tenebre,
Two Thousand Maniacs,
Dementia 13 and the
nonhorror
ones
would be Empire Strikes Back, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Goodfellas,
Memento,
Taxi Driver, Shawshank Redemption, Boogie
Nights, Goonies, Back to the Future,
12 Angry
Men
- just to name a few. ... and of
course, films you really deplore?
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The
Blair Witch Project, Boondock Saints,
Twilight
and the awful remake to Psycho. Lots of the films that I hate I try to
block out
because
they're so bad. Your/your company's
website, Facebook, whatever else?
Check
us out at www.thesleazebox.com,
on Facebook
www.facebook.com/sleazeboxfilms,
on YouTube
www.youtube/thesleazebox.com,
and on Twitter @sleazebox Anything else you're
dying to mention and I have merely forgotten to ask?
Just
wanted
to
thank (re)Search my Trash for interviewing me and just want to thank all
the fans out there
that
support us and keep checking out The
Sleaze Box for more insane,
terrifying and sleazy
films
coming your way in the near future.
Thanks
for the interview!
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