Oliver Franklin Anderson Presents The Night Country: Stories of Sleep Paralysis

Oliver Franklin Anderson is a local Los Angeles filmmaker and purveyor of digitized motion. Oliver's last film, Hollow, earned himself entry into notable film festivals, such as the Slamdance Film Festival, and additional accolades.

Oliver's latest project consists of a web based collective of horror shorts titled The Night Country: Stories of Sleep Paralysis. The series as a whole is inspired by hallucinations experienced during sleep paralysis. In Oliver's words: "While The Night Country is a series as a whole, the individual episodes are designed to stand alone as highly unique, short horror films". Additionally, he describes sleep paralysis as, "a glitch in the natural flow between sleep stages, causing dreams to blur into reality. Sleep paralysis is never a pleasant experience, causing terror in those experiencing it and vividly unsettling, if not terrifying hallucinations."

The first film in the series is named A Study In Blue and debuts Shelby Slayton as the actress. Shelby Slayton happens to be one of the "Slay" elements in Slayzinger Creative.  Along with Oliver Franklin Anderson directing, the creative team consists of Robert Allaire composing music and Frank L. Anderson as sound designer. The film consists of the creative nature inspired eeriness and dark, high contrast filtering that is synonymous with Oliver's film styling.  Below is A Study In Blue.

In order to create and produce the subsequent episodes of the The Night Country series, Oliver has put together a Kickstarter campaign for funding assistance. Consider donating to the production of a visually stunning and truly unique web series.

VHS Video Knight Episode 2: WAXWORK

In the spirit of the Halloween season, the VHS Video Knight has released his second installment. This particular chapter revolves around the 1988 horror comedy: WAXWORK. The episode features all of the deliciously retro and stylized elements of the inaugural production.

The Video Knight himself describes it as the following: "Video Steve and his robot (AKA The Lazer Child) return to their mystical midnight video lair to review the glorious and shit-tastic 80's horror film Waxwork (1988).

Take a look: 

VHS Video Knight Episode 1: OVERBOARD

A new web based video series has emerged from the ether to entertain and tantalize: the VHS Video Knight. A show about a man whose wife was kidnapped. He watches old VHS movies recommended to him by his weird robot friend. He does this in order to ease the pain caused by the disappearance of his wife.

During each episode, the man (better known as the VHS Video Knight) shares his fantastic and demented opinions of the old VHS movies he watches while updating the audience on the status of his missing wife. The knight always keeps a portrait of her close by to talk to and gaze at her lovingly and longingly.

Now that the VHS Video Knight has been introduced, take a few minutes to view the debut manifestation of the show: Overboard:

Post Apocalyptic LA: A Kill the Noise Mike Diva Music Video

Producer, DJ, and entrepreneur Kill the Noise (Jake Stanczak) recently collaborated with filmmaker Mike Diva in order to visually embody the essence and tone of Jake's forward thinking sound. The music video contains a grindhouse sort of theme to it and focuses on a post apocalyptic Los Angeles in the year 2054 when "a bio-mechanical virus called 'the noise' has turned most of humanity into bloodthirsty drones".

Armed with keyboard automatic weapons and jambox rocket launchers, the video game esq players fight off zombies to get to the main boss. Take a look at the video below and Jake's write up in Rolling Stone: 

the Cinefamily Presents Everything is Festival III: The Domination

The Cinefamily (at the silent movie theatre in Los Angeles) is presenting their third installment of the Everything is Festival: "the world's greatest (and only) gonzo convention for found footage collectors, alternative comedy, and experimental artists".

This amazing eleven day excursion into the abstraction of cinema includes a Cinespia opening party at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery with a viewing of Wet Hot American Summer. Other incredible highlights of the festival include a Pete & Pete cast and crew reunion, Pee Wee's Playhouse reunion, Nick Offerman (the legendary Ron Swanson of course), a Doug Benson movie interruption, and the Cat Film Festival (featuring Lil Bub).

All of the details and the schedule can be viewed here. Below is the original trailer for the upcoming festival:

Everything Is Festival III: The Domination (trailer) from Cinefamily on Vimeo.

Downtown LA Devil's Night Drive In

Nestled deeply into the concrete jungle of downtown Los Angeles lies a homage to the simpler times. The Devil's Night film and music video production company is currently hosting a summer drive in movie series. The location for film showings is situated on a second level parking arena on the corner of 4th Street and Broadway. The surrounding cityscape creates an excellent ambiance for this juxtaposition of old and new.

The film series includes:

• Food provided by The Devil's Night Car Hops!
• New Astroturf for your seating pleasure! 
• Walk in/Bike ins Welcome 
• DJ Morgan plays swell tunes before the feature 
• FM Transmitter puts the sound into your car! 
• Car Hops bring the food & popcorn to you! 
• BYOB

Upcoming dates and film titles for the Devil's Night Drive In are:

Pulp Fiction (August 4th, 2012):
Gates @ 7:00 Show @ 8:30:
Tickets on sale July 24rd, 2012

16 Candles (August 25th, 2012):
Gates @ 6:30 Show @ 8:00
Tickets on sale August 7th, 2012

Pee Wee's Big Adventure (September 8th, 2012):
Gates @ 6:00 Show @ 7:30
Tickets on sale August 28th, 2012

Tickets are $10 for presale and $12 at the gate. Purchasing a presale ticket guarantees the space for an automobile and they will sell out.

Photo via Yelp by Christina C

Oliver Franklin Anderson: Hollow and the Slamdance Film Festival

Oliver Franklin Anderson is a local Los Angeles filmmaker. Originating from Appleton Wisconsin, Oliver graduated from the Experimental Animation program at the California Institute of the Arts (CalArts). His film, Hollow, has recently been accepted into the 2012 Slamdance Film Festival in Park City, Utah. Hollow is a cerebral experience with an ominous undertone that embraces viewer intrigue and wonder throughout its duration. Take a look at my interview with Oliver coupled with stills and the film Hollow.

TNC: What influences drew you to study Experimental Animation and what are your goals with it?

Oliver: The Experimental Animation Program at CalArts gives you freedom to work in any medium, you can do everything from live action film to writing interactive programs for gallery installations. I don't like being restrained by medium, my thinking is that whatever works for the project I'm working on works, so the program was a perfect fit, and it was a great place to learn and develop as an artist.

TNC: What films and which directors inspire your personal work and why?

Oliver: I really admire the works of Larry Fessenden and Woody Allen, that's an odd match. The two largest influences on Hollow in particular were La Gloire de Mon Pere directed by Yves Robert, and the 1987 BBC version of My Family and Other Animals directed by Peter Barber-Fleming. La Gloire de Mon Pere has this wonderful opening title sequence that takes you slowly floating over the beautiful hills of the south of France, this is coupled with the calls of cicada's which have been turned into a rhythmic base for sequence's score. That rhythmic calling of the cicadas inspired the lush symphony of insect calls that makes up Hollow's soundscape. My Family and Other Animals is a BBC mini series based on Gerald Durrell's semi autobiographical book by the same title about his childhood on the Greek island of Corfu, it's filled with atmospheric and beautiful natural history photography, particularly of small life forms, insects, lizards, fish and such, similarly Hollow is peppered with close up cameos of the creatures I encountered as a kid growing up in rural Wisconsin.

TNC: Could you describe the genesis of your film Hollow and the concept behind it?

Oliver: I wanted to do something beautiful and rural, with a hint of horror. The initial idea idea I had that lead to Hollow was the image of a murdered girls body in the grass, covered in morning dew and insects, the current incarnation of the film slowly grew from that image. I have a deep love for the natural world, ghost stories, and the macabre, all the elements over time meshed together perfectly.

TNC: Congratulations on Hollow's acceptance into the 2012 Slamdance Film Festival. What is the background on the festival and what it is all about?

Oliver: Thank you! Slamdance from my understanding is the rebellious younger brother of Sundance, it was formed by a pair of filmmakers who were rejected by Sundance in the mid 90's, Slamdance takes more chances and is far less commercial than Sundance, it's also limited to films with budgets of under 1 million.

Hollow from Oliver Franklin Anderson on Vimeo.