Bengie's Bells

For those of you who attended the premiere, the first sight to greet you on the big screen was this message from our sponsor. We're a bunch of corporate sell-outs.

Deleted Scenes

Hello!

Thanks to everybody who turned out for the premiere last Friday. I hope you all had fun. So far I haven't heard a bad review. Except for one guy whose response to my query on his opinion said, and I quote, "Yeah, I didn't mind it." How lukewarm. I would have preferred a heated thrashing of the movie than such a "blah" response. Then again, I guess if someone didn't like it, they probably aren't going to tell us.

So for those of you who did enjoy the movie and are thirsting for further Lawson carnage, we present to you two Deleted Scenes!







There might be a few more deleted scenes coming soon. If not, you'll have to wait for the awesome DVD! Coming Soon!

Thanks for reading and checking out the scenes!

-Tommy

TODAY'S LAWSON FUN FACT: Although we haven't got the final figures yet, it's estimated that more than 300 people turned out for the premiere Lawson: White Heat!

HaHAAAA!!!

We had the big premiere on Friday. Moved from the 217 seater to the 440 seater. When we first heard it was a little overwhelming. The night of, it was awesome! We had over 300 people. Not sure the exact number, but it was a great turn out all things considered. I didn't expect a 440 to be filled, especially for a midnight showing, but 300+ people is pretty damn good.

There were a few parts in the movie where the audio crapped out. It bugged the shit out of me. Literally I was squirming in my chair, wondering what the hell was wrong. I had thought I fixed the majority of the stuff on the computer. It sounded fine on the TV when I prewatched, and in the headphones when I was touching up. Finally when a couple of things that had never given an issue were beyond quiet or unheard at all, I realized I did all I could, just the audio hookup wasn't playing a channel. So anything that had sound balanced on the second channel, would either be really quiet, or in the case of a couple voice over FX, not heard at all. Needless to say, I was really upset about it, but after the first ten or so minutes, it basically balanced itself out and everything went pretty smoothly after that.

Nothing but positive reviews from people. I was pumped, the other guys were pumped, passed out some raffle prizes to all the asians that won. I was in turn able to work on my stand up routine making jokes about it. Good times had by all!

Waiting to get some more screenings going asap. Working on the DVD. Just posted a couple deleted scenes on the lawson youtube page. What else is going on? Film Festivals. Should start hearing from some of them in the coming weeks hopefully. Can't wait to get the stamp of disapproval! Riveting!

ah yah

We were featured in this weeks issue of the weekly dig. Find it on news stands around Boston now! Or you can see it on their website which I don't feel like posting a link to.

The theater shit. I had mentioned previously that I was a little disappointed that our poster isn't up, we got the dreaded asterisk next to the movie title as an unofficial movie and shit, but I realize it's not an issue. I am backtracking also because they've been nothing but cool to us throughout this whole ordeal. I actually think they're surprised with how many tickets have been bought already too. I personally made a few seperate trips and wound up picking up over 40 tickets.

Tommy and myself headed down there today to test the DVD and we were brought into the main theater. We were wondering why as we are supposed to be in the upstairs half sized one. We assume since tickets are selling pretty good, they moved us to the bigger one. No complaints from us! I think they realize that regardless what the content of our movie is, and whether its something theyd normally show or not, its bringing people there and we are obviously REALLY pumped and excited about it. They've been great. I've just been stressed and nervous and looking for things to get antsy about, when really theres nothing to worry about.

We saw the shit on the big screen. I mean REALLY big screen. It's much larger than the upstairs one so I am really psyched about that. In my opinion, it looks even better blown up huge and seemed more legitimate than watching on the big tv at home. I don't know what it was but for some reason it looked more "cinematical" to me. We caught the first ten minutes or so, and I am actually glad because I got to hear an audio issue I need to fix. One of the only redubbed scenes in the movie came out louder than I'd anticipated. My computer at home, it sounds great. It all sounded balanced. At the theater? Egan's voice was out of control. So I should have it touched up as best I can, all things considered.

Cant wait! Cant wait for it to be over and finally get people to see what a lot of hardwork, time, and no money can do for you!

promotion, festivals, shit's hard!

Since we started the movie, we made rough estimates and calculations of what we spent on the movie. Keeping in mind that we used a lot of things already in our possession, made do with home made props and set design and all that shit, we didn't spend a ton of money on the movie at all. Between the group, we said about 2000 dollars. Even that to me is on the high side of what we spent. I'd like to catch peoples reactions and get their opinions on how much the movie cost to produce. I think the majority of people will assume a lot higher than what we spent.

This leads me to the next part of the whole movie making process. Now that it is finished, we need to get the damn thing out there. We want people to see it. Maybe they will laugh, cry, shit their pants, walk out, who knows? But getting them to see it and spreading the word is what we are doing now.

**REVAMPED** The theater told us we'd be able to have a poster up and flyers and all that jazz, but we aren't actually mentioned on their monthly schedule. I was pretty bummed about it, and they put a note up to let people know we are a rental and not an official show they put on. At first I was like why? I know we arent the usual art type fare shown at indie theaters, but we are still the shit! I think mostly I am just nervous and paranoid cause I want everything to go perfect and want the place to fill up. We could probably get more people in there if more people knew we were there to begin with right? Such is life.

It is ridiculous to me when I am looking at everything we did to produce the movie, and now we are spending what seems to be more on promotion, flyers, festival entries, posters, etc. etc. The theatre rental itself cost a quarter of the shooting budget. Festival entry fees range from 30 to 60 bucks a pop. We are paying a bunch of people to sit there and watch the movie and decide if we are good enough to be seen by others. Our movie definitely has a specific crowd that would love it. I truly believe it would be the most important crowd as well, and that is the teenage dude crowd, looking for some raunchy humor, violence, and offensive language. The issue is, our movie will probably be judged by some old fart who is stuck on the "old days" when movies had no sound and the visual impact told a million stories on its own. It sucks. We PAY people to decide the fate of whether or not a couple hundred people in Toronto, Long Island, Pittsburgh or Denver can actually come and see our movie. We should be getting paid because maybe there are huge crowds of people who DO want to see it, but they don't even know about it. I can now see why "independent cinema" is such a tough thing to do. There are so many people, production crews, and indie companies out there trying to grab a piece of the pie, but really, we aren't even given so much as a glimpse as to what we would be eating anyways.

Maybe we should open up shop on a festival of our own. I'd love to be able to be a part of something like that. Then again, my taste, your taste, and anybody else judging would all be different as well. I guess there is no real fair way for your movie to get seen.

Whatever.

I am rambling on. I could go on for a lot longer, but I don't want to bore the two of you reading this. Bottom line, show some support to the local guys busting their asses! I.E. US!

Here we go!

It's almost 1 in the morning right now. Technically its Thursday morning, to me since I havent slept its still Wednesday. So we have 9 days until the big premiere. Its getting down to the nitty gritty. We have done flyering, lots of internet postings and whatever we can to spread the word. The tickets have sold fairly well so far. I think a lot of people are waiting for the night of the show to buy em, but they're over half gone. Not too shabby.

Me personally, I am starting to get really nervous. Getting butterflies in the stomach just waiting and waiting and wondering exactly how it is going to go. I want to be able to sit and hear peoples reactions. Are they going to laugh? Get up and leave? Throw popcorn and tomatoes at us when it is over/ Whatever happens, good or bad, so long as people have SOMETHING to say, and they aren't indifferent will be fine with me. It is just crazy to think that after all this time (original preparations started in June of 2006), almost 3 years later it is finally finished. What a marathon. We've had our ups and downs, disagreements, differences of opinions, fuck ups, things going better than expected, worse than expected, lost locations, lost actors, lost mustaches, audio issues (I suck with audio when I do it), so on and so forth. So many things have gone on and changed since we started. So to say I am nervous and curious about everything should be obvious. I am even sitting here rambling to nobody on the blog just wondering whats gonna happen.

I guess for the next week I will try to post daily updates leading up to and after the premiere. Also be on the lookout on May 20th. We should have something in one of the local papers, the Weekly Dig in the arts and entertainment section. More to come