Filmmaking Focus

When asked what unites his films, amateur filmmaker Larry Longstreth II says, “They always seem to have an extremely intelligent and very subtle sense of humor. That sarcasm is just a part of the way our crew communicates, so it’s not hard to translate to our movies. It’s made our stuff pretty popular online.”

The most popular of his short films are Nintendo: Old School Revolution—a funny animated “fan film” that tells a tale of vengeance and honor in the video game world provoked by the assassination of Mario (of Mario Bros. fame)—and Zombies in My Neighborhood—a comedy about a movie crew (including a “zombie choreographer”) attempting to make a horror flick. Larry tells us that Zombies in My Neighborhood “got us invited to LA and NY to work with Troma, where I met Lloyd Kaufman.”

Larry lives in Ohio and currently works in construction, a job that “takes me all over the country for weeks at a time…It’s tough balancing the work and the filmmaking but with motivation it can be done.” The 24-year-old filmmaker finances his own films. His recent short The Losers Have a Junkyard cost him $1550.

Larry is largely self-taught: “I never stayed in school long enough to learn the craft. I just took a crappy DV camera and went out and made movies.” To any other filmmakers looking to do it on their own, he recommends William Goldman’s Which Lie Did I Tell, Lloyd Kaufman’s Make Your Own Damn Movie, and The Guerrilla Film Makers Handbook. But he warns, “Don’t use filmmaking books, film school, or a busy schedule as a way to hide from actually going out and getting it done.”

The two people whom Larry credits as first getting him interested in filmmaking are in fact two non-filmmakers. “My dad, Larry Longstreth the First. He wasn’t a filmmaker, but nobody told more stories, sang more songs, or joked around more than our dad. He was an entertainer, though he never realized it…He died a few years ago, so he’ll never see where Aaron [Larry’s brother and collaborator] and I go with our movies, but he’ll always have a huge influence on them…Our stepdad, Dave Schulenberg, had more classic movies taped than anybody I’ve ever seen. He had an entire cabinet filled with VHS tapes…Watching these movies, reading fantasy books, and collecting comics were how I passed my free time. I had no idea I was developing a taste and appreciation for art.”

Larry, like many directors, has had to learn how to effectively work with others. “It started out with me writing, directing, acting, editing, and pumping out DVDs. Now I try to delegate but it’s really hard. At our level, there isn’t a lot of money involved, so you can’t trust a lot of people to get anything done without having to nag them, and that’s no good for anybody. I’ve only now just begun to find a crew of people I can trust. They have to have a motivation and a desire to be a part of the project. If they just want to prove how smart they are or make a name for themselves, they won’t finish…or even worse, they’ll hurt your work.”

Larry insists that everything he does in making a film be in service of the narrative. “I don’t climb up onto a roof to get an aerial shot when a ground shot will do just fine. That means I put the STORY before any camera angle, special effect, or glamour shots. I think it’s a very simple theory: Story first. If climbing on the roof better tells the story, go for it. If you’re doing it to say you did it, stop wasting production time. Still, I think it’s incredibly rare to find a director who not only says it, but actually believes it and directs his movies accordingly.”

Anyone who wants to learn more about Larry Longstreth and his films can visit his website at www.Bullcrank.com, where you’ll be able to view several of his movies online. Larry insists, “You can expect big things from us, that much I promise…You don’t have to be an independent film fan to love what we do…I guarantee you’ll be entertained.”