The live YouTube premiere “Return of the Jackalope” happens this Wednesday, September 23 at 8 pm ET for FREE. CinemATL’s own Michael D Friedman co-directed, co-wrote and co-stars in the movie. Here are some of his co-thoughts on the co-screening…
WATCH ON YOUTUBE: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oRQOTG5ffJ8
Ever since I posted on Facebook that Return of the Jackalope would be having a live screening I’ve received a lot of questions about it. What is this movie? Is it new? Is it a sequel? Do I need to see Jackalope One to understand it?
Let me try to answer some questions.
Return of the Jackalope is a feature-length mockumentary.
Here’s the official synopsis: In 1995, brothers Jimmy Ray Johnson (Chris Burns) and Bobby Ray Johnson (Dave R. Watkins) collaborated to produce the horror movie "Curse of the Jackalope." The film was purchased at the Lula (GA) International Film Festival and Barbeque Cook-Off by producer Richard McCovey (Michael D Friedman) and released into theaters by his company, McCovey Pictures. Amid bad reviews and a disastrous distribution, the film grossed a total of $17 at the box office. Over time, the film has gained a hint of notoriety as the "lowest grossing film of all time." Richard McCovey Jr has taken over his father's company, with grand plans of re-releasing the film. But first, he has to reunite the cast & crew for the ten-year Anniversary screening, an event he's dubbed "Jackalope X."
The movie was shot way back in 2004 and 2005. The film premiered in 2006 at the Faux Film Festival in Portland, Oregon, and also played the 2006 Rome International Film Festival, amongst others.
Since 2006, however, the film hasn’t really been seen except for the rare folks that might have had a burned DVD screener. While we flirted with some distribution companies after its festival run, we never found the right fit. It’s never been made available digitally or online.
I guess life imitates art, huh? A lost film about a lost film being rereleased years later…
That’s what this screening is all about. Instead of the movie collecting dust on a shelf somewhere, we decided to make it available online.
To do this, however, has been a challenge. Since the movie was shot, technology has changed A LOT. Back then, most everything was shot in SD on MiniDV tapes, and edited with Final Cut Pro 7. Digital technology has evolved so much that it’s nearly impossible to deal with either of these formats anymore. So, we had to take the final SD festival cut of the movie and upgrade it to HD in Adobe After Effects. It only took 6 days to render! But now it looks much better on YouTube. I then had to go through and update all the captions, titles and credits to look nice in HD. That was fun (not). I do it all for you, though…
Anyway, enough technical jibber-jabber. I’m happy to say the movie still holds up well. Are there some details I’d love to fix? Sure, but after 14 years, you kind of need to let things go (unless you are George Lucas.)
In addition to my main co-stars, Dave R. Watkins and Chris Burns, there’s also many familiar talented Atlanta actors – including, but definitely not limited to, Mary Kraft, Adam Boyer, Stephen Caudill, Candace Mabry, Samantha Worthen, Matt Cornwell, Muta’Ali Muhammad, Mike Brune and Steve Warren.
My fellow CinemATL Pocast host, Martin Kelley, is also featured. As well as some Atlanta Screenwriters Group writers turned actors, like Robert J. Lee and Nathan Flood. Add on top of this cameos by Ernie Hudson, Garrett Wang and Dean Haglund, amongst many others, and it’s a fun romp.
And no, this is not a sequel. You will be able to understand everything in the movie. “Curse of the Jackalope” is a complete fictitious movie created specifically for this movie. A full short was produced, though, so maybe you’ll also get to see that at some point in the future.
I hope you can join us for the live FREE screening. There will be a Q&A in the chat room, so feel free to type in your questions, comments and reactions. After the screening, you will be able to watch the film on YouTube on demand for a limited time.