5 Questions with Callum Hanlon
1) Can you talk briefly about your background, and how you first got interested in filmmaking?
I got started with a mini dv camera, shooting skateboard videos in the parking lot of my elementary school. I went to film school, where I learned a lot about debt. After an underwhelming film school experience, I sold all my camera gear and moved to Spain to teach English. I thought I was going to become a study abroad counselor and live the expat dream. I thought smoking cigarettes and drinking coffee in plazas in Spain sounded like a pretty good life, but then I started shooting videos with a point and shoot camera and I won some spec commercial contests. I got sucked back in and eventually moved to LA. Shooting videos for the spec commercial contests actually taught me how to self-produce and grow beyond sketches and Jackass videos (which I still love). I learned about sound mixes, and lenses and color correction and that on the call sheet you have to list the closest hospital. I wanted to figure out how my make my work look as good as the people around me, and the budgets were always so tight that I wound up doing everything myself with the help of my peers.
2) What’s the backstory here - what was the initial idea and how did it evolve from there?
Budd and I were eating breakfast one morning and he told me a story that had some similarities to our short. I was cracking up and said we should write a script inspired by it. I went home and wrote the script that day, filling in the blanks and tweaking some details to make the story work as a short. Then I brought it to Budd and we reworked the script until it got to a good place. I'd like to acknowledge my fiance, a talented filmmaker named Stephanie Ward, for reading so many drafts, many of which had two or three different lines of dialogue and were not worth rereading as a "new draft." She's very patient.
3) What was the biggest challenge in making this film? And generally what part of the creative process do you enjoy the most, and the least?
A guy I knew socially, who had claimed to have made a lot of money from cryptocurrency (remember bitcoin?) reached out when I was trying to raise some money for the project. He was interested in becoming a producer and had agreed to put up most of the money. When I repeatedly warned him that short films are a money pit and he was guaranteed to see zero dollars back, he assured me that it was nothing and he was excited to be a part of the project. Then one week before we shot the film, he disappeared. Our amazing producer, Julia Grimm, offered me the out of pushing so we could raise money, nut the wheels were already in motion and if we pushed it might be another several months to raise money and regain our momentum. The location, crew and gear were already booked, so I just put the whole thing on my credit card and started our indiegogo two days after we wrapped the short. Thanks to the generosity of many crew members who never invoiced me and all of the generous donors on indiegogo, we were able to raise about half of the budget and the other half I got to write off on my taxes as a loss. I earned enough credit card miles to cover my flight to Jersey for my sister's wedding, so there's a silver lining.
4) What’s a film you’ve seen recently, new or old, that you really loved and why?
I just rewatched Blue Ruin. It's just as tense the second time around, and knowing how cheap it was makes me like it even more. I dream about throwing together a crew to crank out Lifetime movies, or something quick and cheap, where I get to be on set with a crew of people that I love working with. I dream of being the next Roger Corman.
Budd has been watching this really great show called The Office. It's pretty funny. He really likes it.
5) What’s next for you?
I have a day job as an Executive Producer at Twitch, so that occupies a lot of my time. I've been working slowly on a few things. One of those projects started as a short script and has expanded into a feature. I'll shoot the short once we're out of quarantine. Hopefully it works and serves as a proof of concept for a feature.
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IG: @callumhanlon_kinda