Angry Video Game Nerd: The Movie bursting from a landfill near you!

[adrotate banner=”1″]Love him or hate him, there is no denying that The Angry Video Game Nerd has become an important figure in the world of internet reviewing of video games and in the world of calling things a shitload of fuck. But say what you will of the annoyance of the billions of copycat “angry” reviewers who think mixing swear words together is humor, at least James Rolfe makes his shows entertaining and informative beyond the poo jokes. So there is no denying that Angry Video Game Nerd: The Movie will be divisive at best and the cause of endless flame wars at worst. And it looks filled with the same type of humor and budget that makes up his reviews, only shot on location and with a story that lasts longer than 20 minutes or so. A plot built around the urban legend about the Atari ET cartridges that were buried in the desert after destroying the video game boom of the 80s, which quickly blooms into aliens, government conspiracies, zombies, robots, and all sorts of craziness. I’ll give it a whirl, who knows? And I actually played the ET Atari game as a kid. Because I’m awesome.

“Angry Video Game Nerd: The Movie” is a passion project by independent filmmakers James Rolfe and Kevin Finn, based on the popular web series. The film is being produced outside the studio system, entirely funded by fan donations. Principle photography took place in Spring of 2012, in the Los Angeles area, with Jason Brewer as the DP. Additional filming is taking place on the East Coast. Editing is in its early stages.

The film is inspired by the famous Atari video game burial of 1982. Atari produced a game based on the biggest blockbuster movie of that year, E.T., and rushed it to meet the deadline for the Christmas shopping season. It was a commercial failure and millions of unsold game cartridges were buried in a desert landfill in Alamogordo, New Mexico. Coincidentally, it’s not too far from Roswell, the landing site of a different kind of E.T.

The Trailer features music by Bear McCreary (Battlestar Gallactica, The Walking Dead). The track is called “Maverick Regeneration” and can be downloaded as part of the Play for Japan album. All proceeds go to help earthquake victims in Japan.
https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/play-for-japan-the-album/id450785090

The film is expected to be completed in the summer of 2013, but only time will tell. Independent films take a long time to finish. This one is no exception. It’s eventually expected to be released on DVD and/or Blu-ray, and to be available around the world, after showing to some live audiences in theater venues. Digital downloads is also an option. The immediate goal is to finish the film first.

See updates on James Rolfe’s personal site
http://cinemassacre.com.

ET 2600

Who would bury this Mona Lisa???

Return of the Ghostbusters (Review)

Return of the Ghostbusters

Return of the Ghostbusters
2007
Directed by Hank Braxtan
Return of the Ghostbusters
The Ghostbusters are back, and they’re now in fan film form! Wait a minute…. A Ghostbusters fan film? Feature length? That’s crazy! What’s even crazier is it is a sequel! The original production was a half-hour fan film entitled Freddy Vs Ghostbusters, and that spawned this stand-alone sequel that attempts to remain true to the themes of the original Ghostbusters films while still trying to be not a carbon copy. Now, as this is a fan film, we can expect some of the acting to be a bit off. I won’t focus on wooden performances, but if someone is so bad they actually make it painful to watch their scenes I am going to point them out, because that’s what I do: be a jerk on the internet. But back off, man, I’m a scientist. Really, I am, which is great because I can use that line ironically and nonironically at the same time.

The film was produced by Braxtanfilm, a small company out of Denver. Directed by Hank Braxtan, who also co-wrote it along with star Tim Johnson. Being that they are small time, I don’t have any cool trivia to pad out part of the review with. The visual effects were done by Ryan P. Wilson and Justin Rader, who donated their services for nothing if I am correct. This helped the film save a lot of money. In fact, the film only cost around $2000 while it looks like it cost considerably more. Lots of props were donated by Ghostbusters fans, which helped make the Ghostbusters equipment look like they had actual props and not leftover toys from The Real Ghostbusters line.

I am a fan of the Ghostbusters franchise. I grew up with the films, I watched the cartoon, I drank the Hi-C, I own some Ghostbusters kids books. When the movie was released on DVD I rented it to watch the commentary, and my roommate at the time had never seen the film, so we watched it regularly. He was from China, and didn’t understand the term “ghostbuster” which wasn’t in his dictionary, but I explained what was going on and he enjoyed it.

We’ve had a fan film here before (Star Wars: Revelations) and will have some more later, but for now this Ghostbusters fan film is our focus. So whip out your Ecto Cooler, leash up your class-5 full roaming vapors, and prepare for a ride into fanfilm land with the Ghostbusters! Just remember not to cross the streams.

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