I am a fan of advertising.
In the three plus years that I have been writing this column I have tried, desperately so, to deconstruct movie advertising’s biggest lasso that’s aimed at your wallets: trailers. I’ve always been attracted to this woefully neglected segment of the movie business as I’m constantly amazed we can have meaningful dialogue sessions about what this or that actor is getting paid or how much a production cost to shoot but we all might as well be troglodytes when it comes to having a meaning discussion about the obscene monies that are spent to try and get your attention.
It warms the sub-cockles of my heart to see a trailer, then, like the one for HOMO ERECTUS: THE MOVIE that only balances the needs of an audience to know what the movie is about but to infuse some genuinely earned laughs and also warm that special region of our corporal vessels that can now appreciate an Ali Larter from Heroes in what I can only say is the greatest cavegirl costume in, well, ever. And the trailer has good laughs. When you don’t have a corporate sized budget you are handicapped in that your wallet can’t afford to have a Don LaFontaine voiceover your preview or have a house like Trailer Park to produce it. What’s here, then, is a solid representative sample of a little film that not only could, it looks like it has.
What follows is a conversation I had with the film’s director, writer and actor, Adam Rifkin, after seeing the trailer and talking about things that caught my eye as well as letting Adam have the chance to explain about why he would visit a genre that really hasn’t been done since money-grubbing corporate ooze dripped over THE FLINTSTONES and hasn’t been funny since HISTORY OF THE WORLD and Sid Caesar showed how you could make the pre-historic amusing. You’ve also got elements of Woody Allen absurdity, dumb bo-hunk hilarity, the clubbing of ladies like seals which is always a good comedic device regardless of the time period and Gary Busey. Gary Busey, by the way, needs no modifiers; he is like the dice in a Yahtzee! tumbler after a vigorous shake: completely unpredictable when it comes to the outcome.
It was my pleasure to talk to the man behind not only this film but of THE CHASE, THE DARK BACKWARD, PSYCHO COP RETURNS and scads of other productions that range from completely normal to films that obviously display his passion for the medium. When you have Ron Jeremy, David Carradine, Talia Shire, Busey, Larter and a cast that well exceeds a few dozen I imagine there are some stories behind how this little movie was an exercise in moviemaking, expediency, balancing and how it ended up being a part of Slamdance.
CHRISTOPHER STIPP: First of all, thank you for talking with me before you took off for Slamdance and, secondly, I really liked the trailer for the movie. It actually made me want to see the movie without giving away too much.
ADAM RIFKIN: I appreciate it, thank you.
STIPP: Seeing how it was an independent picture did you have to cut that trailer yourself or did you get help from Mr. Potter…
RIFKIN: Mattt cut it. He’s been cutting all the media for us and he’s been doing a great job.
STIPP: That guy. He initially sent me one of the trailers that was bat-shit crazy. It’s got all the quick clips….
RIFKIN: Right, right…
STIPP: And it’s all, “DIRECTED BYâ€, “WRITTEN BY,†with completely unrelated action movies tossed in there and it drove me nuts. He’s asking me to look into this film and I couldn’t tell anything by the initial trailer he sent. So, thankfully, after he sent me over to your MySpace page I was thankfully able to get a great look at this movie. So after all this rigmarole of establishing what this film looks to be, tell me what this movie is really about.
RIFKIN: The basic idea of the movie is that I play a somewhat philosophical, somewhat neurotic caveman who believes that we as a species have the ability to evolve way beyond sticks and stones to possibly great heights…but the rest of my tribe thinks I’m an idiot. I’ve got all these ideas for these inventions, all these ways I think I could make life better for ourselves and they just think I am out of my mind; because they like it the way it’s always been. And I’m madly in love with the beautiful cavegirl who is, in turn, madly in love with my big, great-looking, really dumb brother which has me completely heart-broken. Basically, it’s like navigating all those minefields but, at the same time, the whole tribe is gearing-up for war against a tribe on the other side of the mountain that is plotting an attack…so everything leads up to that.
The idea, essentially, is that nothing has changed.
Everything is the same then as it is now but hopefully it’s real funny. Also, there’s no grunting or anything like cavemen-speak. We talk completely normal dialogue, I wear my glasses in the movie, which is never mentioned…and it’s just inspired, as when I was young, loving the older Woody Allen movies, Mel Brooks movies…just inspired by those kinds of movies.
STIPP: I was going to say it reminded me of HISTORY OF THE WORLD when I saw the trailer.
RIFKIN: Yeah, HISTORY OF THE WORLD, exactly…HISTORY OF THE WORLD and BLAZING SADDLES, and BANANAS, LOVE AND DEATH, SLEEPER all those movies and just loving those movies is what gave me the kind of idea to do this movie.
STIPP: And, on a sidebar, what happened to Woody Allen’s zanier sensibility? I think movies like PROOF and MATCH POINT and good, they’re decent, but they’re no BANANAS.
RIFKIN: He even comments on that a lot in his own stuff, STARDUST MEMORIES in particular, and I am a huge Woody Allen fan by the way, huge fan, and LOVE AND DEATH is his transitional movie; it was still wacky but it started to get a little philosophical. And, right after that, he made ANNIE HALL, which won Best Picture, and it changed his career.
I think, knowing what I know of him, just by being a fan of his, I think he needs to do what he feels inspired to do.
STIPP: And are you trying to capture some of that Woody Allen absurdity in HOMO ERECTUS?
RIFKIN: I don’t know if I would ever be able to do that but just loving those movies is what inspired me to want to make this movie.
STIPP: And quite a big cast. This is not your average, no name, no recognition, independent movie. You’ve got Ron Jeremy, Ali Larter…and Gary Busey of all people!
(Adam Laughs)
RIFKIN: Yeah. David Carradine and Talia Shire play my parents. And, yup, Gary Busey plays the villain. Tom Arnold plays the first gay caveman to come out.
STIPP: Oh, that’s him in the trailer! I thought that guy looked familiar.
RIFKIN: That was Tom Arnold. Ali Larter, who is now in Heroes, which is great timing.
It’s shocking to me that anyone showed up…in a movie opposite me because I’m not an actor. I never considered pursuing acting but, again, out of my love for Mel Brooks and Woody Allen I felt that in order to go for it and to do this movie in the way they made their movies I had to do it they way they did it. I mean, they always made these movies that they wrote and they directed and they starred in. That was the formula and I wanted to see if I could do it.
It was a load of fun.
Like I said, I’m not an actor and anyone who sees the movie will get evidence of that but everyone around me IS a real actor and they’re all real good and they helped me be better.
STIPP: I am curious to know, being someone who saw one of your earlier films that I paid to see in the theaters and enjoyed in high school, THE CHASE, talk about how the difference between having a bigger budget for that than you doubt had for this movie. Any outside studio financing beyond what you kicked in?
RIFKIN: No, not at all. This was made totally independent.
(Laughs)
Nobody would be crazy enough at a studio to put money behind a movie starring me. Maybe someday, hopefully, but not quite yet.
What happened was this company out of Texas called Burnt Orange financed the movie and they are affiliated with the University of Texas in Austin. The film department there gets to work on the movies that come through this company. So, the basic idea is that they’ll finance a movie as long as you come and shoot it in Austin and, in exchange, they’ll give you all kinds of free PA’s and interns and things. All of the students get to work on the movie and they get to learn how movies get made at the same time. So, it all sort of works out real well. Austin was perfect for the setting because Austin has all kinds of caveman/nature settings and, what was funny, was we lucked out.
Their production schedule is directly linked to the semester schedule so they needed to greenlight a movie by a certain date and they didn’t have (Laughs) a different movie in time. Our movie, by luck, they needed to greenlight something, otherwise they would’ve missed their semester, the timing was perfect.
STIPP: Was there an oversight committee that watched what you were doing with their resources?
RIFKIN: Oh yeah, they’re all down with it now but, at the beginning, they were like, “Well, we’ve got to a movie.†It’s just funny how it all worked out, timing wise, because if they had the luxury of time I am sure they would’ve talked themselves out of our movie.
STIPP: With a cast this large, and with the budget being the size it was, how did you coordinate everyone’s schedules with regard you having to be done within a certain period?
RIFKIN: That is an amazing question that I don’t really have a good answer for because I am as shocked as anybody that we got people to show up.
I mean, David Carradine, for God’s sake; he’s legendary. And it wasn’t like anyone was saying, “OK, I’ll do it for the cash.†That’s not how it happened. Maybe…you know what…Maybe people got into the idea of dressing up like cavepeople. I don’t know.
Listen, I’d like to believe they did it because they read the script and they thought it was funny but I HAVE to believe there was more at play here than meets the eye. If I was an actor, and I’m not, but if I were I would think, “Hey, this is a pretty short schedule, it would be fun to dress up in a caveman costume, I’ve got nothing to do for the next six weeks, I’ll do it.†I’d like to think this is how it went down but I don’t really know how I got them to show up, I swear to God.
STIPP: And did everyone have to come from L.A.?
RIFKIN: Some of them came from L.A. and some of them we cast in Austin.
STIPP: And how long was the shoot?
RIFKIN: It was four weeks in Austin and then we did a week of pick-ups in L.A. It was quick, I mean we had to move fast. And here’s what was really crazy….The locations were, every one of them, at least an hour or two hours outside of town. We had to drive two hours outside of town before the sun came up every morning and then, every location beyond that, we had to hike, like sometimes miles, in to these remote areas to get to where we actually shot…All done in the dark because we shot late in the year and we had very few hours of sun. We had to make sure that the second the sun started coming up we were shooting. It was crazy but somehow we pulled it all together. People just got into it. It was a mindset. They just became maniacs about just getting out there, getting on location and getting as much shot as possible. I didn’t have time to be nervous about the acting part because before I got down there I thought, “Jesus, how am I going to pull this off?†But, because we were so pressed for time, and racing against the clock so much, I just did not have the time to get nervous. I would just jump in front of the camera and do the lines, and jump behind the camera again and watch what we just shot and move on, and run to another location and “Ok, let’s shoot this†and then jump in front of the camera and say a line and it was insane. But it was fun.
STIPP: And at anytime did the process of moviemaking turn into personal motivator after all this hustling?
RIFKIN: Yeah, you know, but not a lot. For the most part everyone was pretty down for the challenge because we all had a big powwow before it started and we basically all said, “This is going to be like four weeks of insane hell but let’s all just go for it. Let’s just be maniacs and get it done. We can rest when it’s over.†For the most part, everyone was pretty down with it.
And I will say that the locations were so pretty, and I’m not even like a nature guy, I’m from Chicago, I like the city, but the locations were so great that everyone was digging being out there in these nice locals.
STIPP: I usually don’t ask the question, because I know I’ll get a pat answer, but what was it like working with Mr. Joshua, Gary Busey?
RIFKIN: Oh my God, Gary Busey… the best way I can describe him, of working with him, and he comes off really funny in the movie… he’s difficult to wrangle. The best way to describe it would be what would happen if you brought a homeless person onto the set and tried to make him act professionally? I mean the guy has been in eight zillion movies but he’s… a little bit kooky and it’s tough to know what you’re going to get and he doesn’t quite do the same thing twice and marches to the beat of his own drummer and, suffice to say, there’s some pretty crazy footage of him that didn’t make it into the movie, maybe we’ll cut something together.
STIPP: And, Ali Larter. Who would’ve thought?
RIFKIN: We totally lucked out. Aside from the fact we were thrilled to get her because she was perfect for the part, because she’s a legitimately good actress, but as soon as we finished the movie she booked Heroes which is obviously one of the biggest shows on TV right now. Amazing luck on everyone’s part.
STIPP: Was she the one you wanted right from the get go?
RIFKIN: When you’re going into a situation, casting a role like that, and you don’t have the money to pay whatever someone wants to have someone show up, you never know who is or is not going to be open to it. So, with our L.A. casting person we put the word out that we were making this movie to the agents of the people we thought were good for the role. And we got word back about whether we would open to Ali Larter, she was high on our list, would we be open to her because she was tickled by the idea that it was a caveman movie. I immediately said, “One-hundred percent. Absolutely. Stop sending it to anybody else and let’s play this out because she’s perfect for the role.†She’s been in a lot of things and I’ve always thought she was really solid. I was in Texas, though, while this was going on and Brad Wyman, the producer, in L.A. was the one who sat with her, explained to her who I was, what we were up to and then she and I had several phone conversations as she had some questions and I made her watch movies like LOVE AND DEATH, SLEEPER because she hadn’t seen those…and we got really lucky. She got the script, she said, “I’m game, let’s do it, what the hell. I’ve never done a movie like this before. It seems like fun.â€
STIPP: Now, I want to be able and see the whole thing. Where can we see the film?
RIFKIN: Here’s where we stand right now: the movie was selected to premiere at the Slamdance film festival and it premieres this Wednesday night. Now, because it was made independently obviously we need to sell it to a distributor who’ll put the money up to release it at a theater near you.
One place to get attention for an independent film is at a film festival like Slamdance. So, what we’re hoping is that we get some positive feedback, some positive attention, some positive buzz from our Slamdance screening and the more people who can check out the trailer, the better, because the more people that the distributor see are checking out the trailer, the higher the numbers are, in terms of views, and we can say, “Look at how many people are watching the trailer for a movie that’s just come out of the blue, that’s a small movie that doesn’t even have a distributor.†That’s big.
STIPP: Now, I was told, by someone in the know, to ask about what Blumps are in your films. They seem to be like Sam Raimi’s yellow 1973 Oldsmobile Delta 88 cameos. Can you explain what Blumps are and why they’ve been a fixation in your films?
RIFKIN: Blumps is a fictitious company that manufactures everything. Like Blumps Squeezable Bacon, Blumps Accordions or Blumps Washing Machines or Blumps Suppositories, whatever, and so the logo, the character, the face of Blumps is actually a painting of my grandmother’s face but it’s got that 1950’s smiley, happy, like everything’s happy if you buy our product kind of 1950’s vibe. So, since THE DARK BACKWARDS I have put Blumps, some sort of Blumps product, in every movie, to a lesser or greater degree.
The challenge in HOMO ERECTUS, then, is that it is set in caveman times so where would you ever stick a product of any kind?
STIPP: Right.
RIFKIN: So, it is prominently displayed in HOMO ERECTUS but I can’t tell you where it is.
STIPP: I have to find it.
RIFKIN: Oh, it’s easy to find. You’ll see it, plain as day.
STIPP: And when is THE DARK BACKWARD coming out on DVD?
RIFKIN: DARK BACKWARD will finally come out in October of this year.
STIPP: Really?
RIFKIN: It’s been years but it is finally coming out October, 2007 and the disc is going to be loaded with extras.
STIPP: Did you get Bill Paxton and Judd Nelson to contribute?
RIFKIN: Absolutely. They did interviews and we made a documentary on the making of it and we did a screening and a Q&A afterwards and a whole bunch of other cool stuff.
STIPP: Adam, that’s it from me. Thank you kindly for talking with me before you take off for Slamdance. Good luck to you on Wednesday.
RIFKIN: Thank you so much.
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