‘The Blood of the Dinosaurs’ – An Interview with Joe Badon

Joe Badon is the writer and director of the short film “The Blood of the Dinosaurs,” which is screening as part of the Midnight Shorts program at this year’s Florida Film Festival. The film is as an Adult Swim style surrealist Kids’ Show, and here is a quick interview with Joe about how he came up with this short, shooting in New Orleans, and his advice for young aspiring filmmakers.

Chris Crespo: When conceiving and writing this short, do you start with one idea and then see where you can push it in different directions, or is this a number of different ideas you already had and managed to combine them together into one short?

Joe Badon: I’ll start with one idea usually and then that springboards into 8,000 other ideas. That tornado of ideas turns into my rough draft. Then, after the rough draft, I’ll refine the chaos into something that kind of makes sense.Continue Reading …

‘With Peter Bradley’ – An Interview with Alex Rappoport

“With Peter Bradley” is an intimate portrait of 82-year old Black abstract painter Peter Bradley, who as a young artist, art dealer and curator rose to remarkable heights in the 1960s and ‘70s, before slipping gradually into obscurity beginning the 1980’s. Screening at the Florida Film Festival, this documentary is a fascinating and well made look at an artist’s process as well as his past accomplishments and current place in art history, and in this interview I ask cinematographer turned first time feature length filmmaker Alex Rappoport about his process in putting this all together, the film’s incredible jazz score, and his future ambitions.

Chris Crespo: Your production notes state you had over 20 hours of footage when you decided to start editing, so how did you manage to cut that down to a 90-minute feature? How did the overall story and feel of the documentary reveal itself to you as you assembled the film?

Alex Rappoport: I had 20 hours recorded when the Covid shutdown started in March 2020. So I did technically start editing at that point, but it was mostly organizational and a way to keep myself sane during those awful and scary weeks. We started filming again the first week of May I think, and then I shot frequently with Peter until the end of June before really sitting down to edit in earnest. At that point I had maybe 50 hours of material. And then I picked up interviews and little bits of Peter painting in the Fall, after I had a sense of what gaps needed to be filled narratively/biographically.Continue Reading …

‘Sulam’ – An Interview with Noam Argov

Noam Argov is an Israeli American filmmaker and MFA Writing/Directing Student at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts, where she is a Film Futures Scholar and BAFTA US Scholarship Program nominee. With a background in documentary filmmaking, Argov began her graduate film program to transition into original narrative film and television, and she now has a new short film, “Sulam,” which has two screenings coming up at this year’s Florida Film Festival. In this interview we talk about her own personal experiences informing this film, the casting of the film, and Noam’s first ever experience at the Enzian Theater.

Chris Crespo: The story presented in Sulam feels very specific, as it is based on a mix of your childhood memories growing up in Central Florida as an immigrant – was this a story you’ve been wanting to tell for a while, and do you plan to continue to explore the themes present in this film in your future work?Continue Reading …

‘Our Males and Females’ – An Interview with Ahmad Alyaseer

Ahmad Alyaseer is a Jordanian filmmaker with a new short film, “Our Males and Females,” which will have two screenings at this year’s Florida Film Festival. This very well made and thought-provoking short film centers on a religiously conservative couple tasked with having their deceased transgender daughter washed and prepared for burial according to local and religious customs and deals directly with identity acceptance in both life and death in a very interesting way. Here is an interview with Ahmad in which I ask him about the genesis of this film, the Jordanian film industry, and his future projects.

Chris Crespo: With trans rights being a major issue at the moment, what kind of pushback did you receive, if any, while putting together this story of a conservative couple preparing their transgender daughter for burial?

Ahmad Alyaseer: We definitely received many push backs when we were trying to get funds, grants and investors on board, many of them were really interested in the script and loved it but couldn’t attach their name to it because the topic was very controversial. This took us months to try and raise money for the film but with no luck; at the end, I ended up fully self-funding it from my own savings.Continue Reading …

‘Take Me Home’ – An Interview with Molly Jordan

Written and directed by Liz Sargent, “Take Me Home” is a film that centers disability from the POV of the lead authentic character, Liz’s sister Anna Sargent. Filmed in Orlando, with local crew and in the home of their parents, “Take Me Home” will screen twice at the Florida Film Festival,  and I had an opportunity to ask a few questions to Liz’s sister Molly Jordan, who is Associate Producer/Education Director for the film as well as Co-Guardian to Anna.

Chris Crespo: As this film makes its way around film festivals, what is the one thing you want audiences to take away from it at the very least?

Molly Jordan: I want people to see the range of emotions, human capabilities and spirited strength and resilience of Anna. I hope this opens dialogue and hearts to have a broader and more expansive view of people with disabilities so that there’s more love, tolerance, and acceptance for these marginalized communities. I also hope that though it’s important to understand the differences amongst this community that there’s far more commonalities that link us all. If we come from seeking to understand before being understood, open mindedness before judgement and love, compassion and empathy, our canvas is far more interesting, vibrant and complex.Continue Reading …

‘Immediate Family’ – An Interview with Denny Tedesco

Denny Tedesco is a producer from Los Angeles, California, and in addition to working behind the scenes on many projects and productions around the world, he also produced and directed the excellent documentary “The Wrecking Crew,” about the musical geniuses behind the biggest hits of the 1960s and early 1970s. And his newest documentary, “Immediate Family” will be playing twice at the 2023 Florida Film Festival, and similarly covers another group of studio musicians who wrote the biggest hits of singer-songwriter era of the 1970s and 80s. In this interview I ask him about the long tail of “The Wrecking Crew,” and how he managed to secure so many big names for his new filmContinue Reading …

‘Animation is Cinema’ – An Interview with Signe Baumane

Signe Baumane is an independent artist, animator and filmmaker based out of Brooklyn, New York, and she has spent seven years working on bringing her new film “My Love Affair With Marriage” to life. And now with the film playing at the 2023 Florida Film Festival, I had an opportunity to ask a few questions about the process of making this film and how animation can be seen as a viable genre for adult storytelling.

Chris Crespo: In the seven years it took to make this movie, what were some of the biggest challenges in making sure this film got completed?

Signe Baumane: The first challenge is in the psychological realm – how do you continue work on the same film for 7 years and don’t lose motivation, inspiration and excitement? In that regard I am like a terrier who grabs a leg of a fox burrowed in a hole and keeps pulling it until the fox is pulled out of the hole. Every day I sat at my table and made 30 – 70 drawings until the film was done. The reason why I was able to do that – I felt that the film’s message was important, I felt I was serving a higher purpose, not just feeding my insatiable ego.Continue Reading …

‘Everything is Content’ – An Interview with Brian Lonano and Blake Myers

Brian Lonano is a filmmaker who has returned to the 2023 Florida Film Festival with his 8th short film to be featured in the Midnight Shorts block. This year he brings production designer and co-director Blake Myers with him as they screen “CONTENT: The Lo-Fi Man” to this year’s festival goers, and in this interview I asked them about the genesis of this wild short film, their concerns about “content” in the modern internet era, and their advice for aspiring filmmakers.Continue Reading …