PSYCHO De MAYO (aka Gringos Muertos)

Greetings fellow cinefiles and vidiots,

Chris LaMartina here for your May installment of Lost Trailer Park: Never Coming Attractions. Y'know, I didn't start this out thinking that every trailer would be a holiday horror flick, but when the title, "Psycho de Mayo" came to me... I thought I'd better embrace it before someone else does. (Don't worry the holiday horror spoofs will stop next month... you'll see).

But anyway, for May... we have "Psycho de Mayo"... a goofy slasher spoof that I imagined in a different time (perhaps the mid-to-late seventies) would have been released in Mexico as "Gringos Muertos".



INFLUENCES
There's no sync dialogue in the spot because I figured the movie as a "foreign" production and I bet any American ads would strongly disguise accents or poor dubbing. I even dubbed the screams intentionally poorly... I swear!

The trailer style is pretty "generic slasher", but I definitely watched a tv spot for "Mardi Gras Massacre" a few times before I wrote the script.

BEHIND THE SCENES
The party footage was shot at my 25th birthday bash. My girlfriend got me a pinata without even knowing I'd planned to set-dress our apartment for a Cinco de Mayo fiesta. So, it was perfect that we could get those pinata-bashing shots in the early set-ups.

A friend of mine worked at a prop warehouse and let me get my hands on the huge sombrero, poncho, and gigantic cactus. It really makes for a fun killer costume and, to my knowledge, no other slasher has had a villain like ours. So, I'm pretty happy overall with the finished product.

The "story" scenes were shot in about an hour or so.

And by the way, since you're reading this... let me take a minute to tell you about my next feature film, "Witch's Brew"... its a gory horror comedy about cursed beer. We're currently raising the budget through donations over at kickstarter.com... if you can, PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE donate...

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1972109475/fund-our-new-film-witchs-brew-a-gruesome-horror-co/backers

CAST
Maraca to the face... Patrick Matanle
Cactus Girl... Randi Williams
Killer... Corey Schuler
Partygoers... the Chris LaMartina Birthday Allstars

CREW
Voice-Over by Andrew Shearer
Written, Directed, Edited, and Scored by Chris LaMartina

Thanks and see y'all in June. Donate to "Witch's Brew" or ELSE!
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1972109475/fund-our-new-film-witchs-brew-a-gruesome-horror-co/backers

SHRIEK of the EASTER BEAST

Greetings, friends!

Just in time for Easter, comes "Shriek of the Easter Beast", my loving faux trailer-tribute to obscure holiday horror movies and small town monster flicks.



INFLUENCES
I always wanted to make an Easter horror film and this finally gave me a chance. The Easter holiday, despite the gruesome premise (dude gets nailed to cross, then returns from the dead), doesn't have many (if any) horror flicks dedicated to it. "Critters 2" comes to mind (and its one I watch every Easter), but besides that, you'd be hard-pressed to find a more perfect Easter-exploitation movie.

The title is obviously a riff on Michael Findlay's bigfoot joint, "Shriek of the Mutilated" and I think our Easter Beast looks just as menacing as the white-furred Sasquatch of that flick. Fans of bad movies, I'm winking at you.

BEHIND THE SCENES
Most of the trailer was shot early on a Sunday. The inserts of the kids were shot at my godson's first birthday party (!). I set up a fake "easter egg hunt" while they ate lunch and grabbed some quick angles while they searched. My niece, Harper is the little girl watching the magic show. This isn't her first role, though. She plays one of the babies that's kidnapped in my flick, "Book of Lore", coming out this May from Pop Cinema. Buy it here! - http://www.alternativecinema.com/index.php?pg=si&item_id=1054

The stop motion was shot and edited in about two hours (as if you couldn't tell, ;p... ). Didn't want to get too complicated. I'm no Dave Allen, but I think it works in context. Jimmy George told me it looks like the Yeti from those Rankin-Bass movies. I'll take that as a compliment...

CAST
Hero... Ryan Thomas
Sheriff... George Stover
Magician... Matthew Bowerman
Little Girl... Harper Korch
Carrot Death... Corey Schuler

CREW
Written, directed, edited, and scored by Chris LaMartina
Voice-Over by Andrew Shearer

Let the cinemadness begin...

So what is "Lost Trailer Park: Never Coming Attractions"?

It's a pet project of a mine. Once a month, I'll be producing a trailer (movie preview) for a non-existent feature-length movie... mostly campy tongue-in-cheek horror flicks, but not always. If it falls into the category of exploitation or grind house flicks, then it's definitely fair game.

The trailers are just that. Exercises in short form content. I'll take the best parts of a proposed feature and cram it into a 2 minute block (more or less). I don't have any intentions of elaborating on most of these titles, so... you're getting the best parts minus any superfluous bullshit. Cuz we all know when it comes to movies like these... the trailers are very often are the best part.

First installment is on April 1st. Just in time for Easter...