San Antonio in ruins, feral women, duct taped clones…what’s not to [Read it all...]]]> OK, you’ve really gotta see this short gem from San Antonio’s film scene. Let the movie’s title graphic speak for itself: The year is 3068. Earth’s only known inhabitants are females scattered & surviving on the outskirts of ruins that were once San Antonio.

San Antonio in ruins, feral women, duct taped clones…what’s not to like?

No Man’s Land was created for the 2007 San Antonio 48 Hour Film Project by Team Project Mayhem led by Brent Graham of MonkeyBot Films. The film won Best Cinematography and tied for Best Costumes. As Graham notes on his site, “it’s hard to lose those two categories when you have hot girls running around a jungle.”

Is it safe for work? Probably, but your employer will be quite disappointed when he finds you watching it on his dime.

No Man’s Land from BrentwGraham on Vimeo.

A: You bury it!

This macabre short film by Cofa Productions and Eric Fonseca premiered in 2006 at the Cameo Theatre. It was produced, written and directed by Eric Fonseca and was a year in the making. It is set to the classical [Read it all...]]]> Q: What do you do when your favorite toy has been murdered?

A: You bury it!

This macabre short film by Cofa Productions and Eric Fonseca premiered in 2006 at the Cameo Theatre. It was produced, written and directed by Eric Fonseca and was a year in the making. It is set to the classical piece Funeral March for a Marionette by Charles Gounod. Fonseca also made all of the puppets and sets.

Funeral March for a Marionette netted the Grand Jury Prize and Best Animated Short at the 2009 San Antonio Film Festival. You can check out another short, The Confrontation Fall of the House of Usher, on the COFA Productions YouTube Channel.

We’ll have more info [Read it all...]]]> You may have heard of San Antonio’s FILM CLASSICS PRODUCTIONS. They took their short film Four Minutes Till The End to the Cannes Film Festival earlier this year. They’ve also been showing the longer format Doctor “S” Battles the Sex Crazed Reefer Zombies. Sounds like somebody just mashed up my Netflicks queue!

We’ll have more info about a local screening coming in the weeks ahead, but for now content yourself with COMPOSE from 2006. This long short film, directed, written and produced by Bryan Ortiz, relates the tale of what happens when a loner misfit gets what he’s always wanted…to unexpected results, naturally. Enjoy. (Oh, you might want to turn down the volume if your mom is in the room. There’s some swearing going on).

Compose

That’s our good friend Brant Bumpers (from The Darkness) in the starring roll and, wait, is that some [Read it all...]]]> FRET was Comedia A Go-Go’s entry into the Bloodshots 2008 Filmmaking Frenzy competition. It didn’t win, but that goes to show the quality of the other entries because this movie is a nearly perfect little morsel!

That’s our good friend Brant Bumpers (from The Darkness) in the starring roll and, wait, is that some Boxcar Satan I hear in the background? Good stuff. A subtle South Texas tale of music gone wrong. Keep it up you guys…you make a homeboy proud!

If you aren’t familiar with Comedia A Go-Go you should drop by their MySpace for a schoolin’. They describe their troup as a “San Antonio based multi-media performance company who writes, performs, and produces a unique brand of sharply satiric and always uncensored sketch comedy.” They’ve been cranking out some really good stuff since back in the dark ages of 2002 and have three DVD collections available.

Check out LARP after the jump.

While the above gem did not win the Bloodshots competition, the comedy gangbangers are not unfamiliar with accolades. This next gem of a short film, LARP, was the winner of the 2007 AMD Bloodshots 48-Hour competition and it always makes me smile. LARP (which stands for Live Action Role Playing) combines two of my favorite things: local genre cinema and nerdy role players. Keep your eyes peeled for a more nuanced example of Mr. Bumpers’ craft. Enjoy.

Mars Needs Bibles

This video has been shown at numerous film festivals from Seattle to Costa Rica. It was directed by Mistah Pete and written by him [Read it all...]]]> Now presenting yet another classic of San Antonio Science Fiction Cinema. This time it’s the featurette “Mars Needs Bibles” by my good friend Pete “Mistah Pete” Barnstrom.

Mars Needs Bibles

This video has been shown at numerous film festivals from Seattle to Costa Rica. It was directed by Mistah Pete and written by him and Dennis Smith. It has a delightfully Ed Wood feel to it, right down to the low budget and spacy music. Warning: It may be borderline NSFW…your office may be more uptight than mine.

What To Do In A Zombie Attack

Created by San Antonio’s Lone Bannana Productions (that’s not my poor spelling, the extra “n” stands for “Nifty”!), written by Paul Scofield and directed by Joey Carrillo this 1950s educational [Read it all...]]]> This classic of San Antonio cinema takes you back to the simpler age of the nuclear family.

What To Do In A Zombie Attack

Created by San Antonio’s Lone Bannana Productions (that’s not my poor spelling, the extra “n” stands for “Nifty”!), written by Paul Scofield and directed by Joey Carrillo this 1950s educational film explains what to do in case of a zombie attack. I’m not the biggest fan of zombie cinema, but the retro vibe of this video totally works for me. Lone Bannana has Zombie Attack DVDs and shirts available on their site.