Watch the grown-up director’s infinitely better film WINNERS TAPE ALL: THE HENDERSON BROTHERS STORY now at [ Ссылка ].
IMDb.com Synopsis:
Steve and Bob are two guys who enjoy their fanboy role-playing lifestyles a bit too much. Their obsession with vampire role-playing games leads them to decide to become vampires and get revenge on a world that doesn't understand them. Unfortunately for them, it takes a bit more than cheap Halloween makeup to scare people, so their attempts just lead to even more ridicule and physical harm. But that all changes when they discover a dealer of the occult named Maxwell Selwyn who can give them want they want: a potion that will turn them both into vampires. They fork over the money and sure enough, their dream comes true. They set out to finally get revenge on the world that rejected them... only to find they were better off with the cheap makeup.
Director’s Notes:
Hello, brave YouTube viewers! You’ve stumbled upon RAISING THE STAKES – a vampire comedy made by a bunch of teenagers on consumer-grade MiniDV cameras that looks about as good as you’d expect from that description.
So, I made this movie in 2004, when I was just 16 years old. My friends and I had been making silly short films on Digital8 videotape during our high school sleepovers (This was in the pre-YouTube days of the Internet, so thankfully none of those shorts are available for easy streaming, because they’re much more embarrassing than this movie you’re watching now).
I thought it’d be a good idea to make a feature film before we all graduated and went our separate ways. I ended up saving back loose change and pocketing all of the spending money my parents gave me on a school trip to Disney World for souvenirs. In total, the budget was $110.
I remember telling Josh and Zane – the lead actors in the film - that the movie would only take about two weeks to shoot. Six months later, we finally wrapped. We were young and inexperienced and certainly learned a lot on the shoot… including that movies generally look better if you actually take the time to light them and that streetlights and your friend’s car headlights aren’t enough to properly illuminate night time shots.
After we released the film, it managed to get a lot of positive press and attention – which is still amazing to me. However, the original cut of the movie makes me cringe. By the time the last public screening took place, I could no longer enjoy the movie as it was.
As a result, in 2010, I took the master tapes and did a new edit of the film to re-release alongside DIE AND LET LIVE. This is the cut you see today, which runs about 10 minutes shorter, while also reinstating an alternate ending and also utilizing a few better takes that my 16-year-old self chose to leave on the cutting room floor.
Now, in 2016, I have a new movie with Josh and Zane called WINNERS TAPE ALL: THE HENDERSON BROTHERS STORY and I think it’s the best film I’ve ever made. However, the plot of the film pokes fun at the faults of microbudget filmmakers, so I only think it’s fair to disclose my embarrassing backyard movie.
Plus, we haven’t sold a copy on VOD in years, so we might as well try to get some YouTube monetization.
And finally, I’d like to take a minute to dedicate this upload to Nicholas Shomo, who passed away a few months ago. Nick played Alex the Necromancer, the deus ex machina of this film and also helped come up with some of the jokes. RIP Shomo.
Anyway, I hope you enjoy watching this silly little movie… at least the parts that are actually lit well enough to be visible.
