2014 - 03/2014 Meeting
Page Created: 07/24/13. Last Updated: 04/11/14.
RICK LAPRADE / KAT GREEN
RICK LAPRADE
Rick Laprade is a writer, director and actor who has also worn many other hats as an independent horror film maker. His works include the films EREBUS, an anthology horror movie set in a haunted house and VILLANELLE, a vampire film. A complete list of his film credits can be found on his Internet Movie Data Base Page. He has been a writer for Hasbro's Cakemix Studies and written copy and / scripts for SPIDER-MAN and TRANSFORMERS. He has currently has three graphic novels in various stages of completion.
..........Internet Movie Data Base:
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm3685415/
..........Official Site -- (which hasn't been updated in quite some time)
KAT GREEN
Kathleen Green (aka Kathleen Fitzgerald) has been a producer, a director, an editor, a cinematographer. She has also worked in a number of other capacities in the television and film industry. Ms Green is the Founder and Producer of Spygirl Pictures which is handling production and post-production work for the Rick Laprade film, EREBUS.
..........Internet Movie Data Base:
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm2781372/
..........Spygirl Pictures:
MEETING SUMMARY:
Meeting Date: March 8, 2104.
Meeting Site: Saddle River Valley Cultural Center, Upper Saddle River, New Jersey.
Official Attendance: 20.
Meeting Program: Talk / Movie Clips by Independent Horror Film Makers.
Notes:
Additional notes can be found after the Newsletter Account.
Newsletter Account
The following account is reprinted with permission from THE STARSHIP EXPRESS Copyright 2014 Philip J De Parto:
The Science Fiction Association of Bergen County held its monthly General Meeting on Saturday, March 8, 2014 at the Saddle River Valley Cultural Center in Upper Saddle River. Independent horror film makers Kat Green and Rick Laprade were our speakers.
Our Animation Associates were happy to catch additional episodes of GANKUTSUOU: THE COUNT OF MONTE CRISTO before the meeting. The Ice Nine discussion was also lively, with primary emphasis being on movies (Fantastic Four films), comic books (John Byrnes' STAR TREK: STRANGE NEW WORLDS is going bi-monthly), and television series (AMERICAN HORROR STORY, WITCHES OF EAST END).
Our speakers were Rick Laprade and Kat Green. The pair worked separately as independent film makers before joining forces on the haunted house anthology flick, EREBUS. They showed clips from EREBUS and VILLANELLE, an earlier work by Rick.
EREBUS was shot in a pair of haunted houses on Block Island, Rhode Island. This is a summer resort community which is virtually deserted for much of the year. Rick started shooting in one hotel, but too many weird things started happening, so he moved the crew to a different hotel on the island. After shooting had been completed, Rick brought the raw footage to Kat for editing and post-production help. They are currently searching for a distributor for the work.
Rick Laprade watched movies indiscriminately when growing up. He twice won national awards (at ages 5 and 6) for best science fiction or fantasy story. He attended the University of Rhode Island and graduated with BAs in Film and English, but learned more from watching the special features on DVDs. His first film was VILLANELLE which was shot for $ 3600 and maxed out his credit cards. VILLANELLE is a cop buddy movie, with the buddies being a disgraced police officer and a female vampire who is trying to discover her murderer. The movie had some local screenings, one of which was attended by his future boss, who offered Rick a position as writer / production assistant with a division of Hasbro. The position included writing promos, character bios, preliminary treatments, and other interior communications. Life at Hasbro was insane. The Rhode Island office would spend weeks developing an ad campaign for a property targeted at a particular age group, then get a call from California or overseas ordering a change in the demographics the night before the launch of the campaign. THE TRANSFORMERS was the most nightmarish franchise in this regard.
Kat Green went to film school at Columbia in Chicago, becoming involved with a theater company as an administrative assistant while an undergraduate. Her original focus was acting, but shifted to the other side of the camera when she walked in for an audition and found a room full of people who looked just like her. Our guest later interned at a non-profit company working on documentaries. This led to editing jobs at HBO, VH1 and ultimately the Weinstein Company. Like Rick, she found the business a madhouse, an environment populated by unpleasant people and which demanded all of her time. Ms Green decided that focusing on editing was the most humane way to remain in the field and started a boutique production company with her husband and a friend. The company 12 projects in various stages of production.
Among the topics the pair discussed were favorite movies, the value of film school, and some of their other projects. This account will be continued on the 2014 - 03/2014 Meeting page at sfabc.org.
Notes:
Other notes of interest from the Ice Nine discussion included Dark Horse Comics producing a comic based on an early draft of the script for STAR WARS, and references to the television series OUTCASTS ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Outcasts_(TV_series) / http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1697793/ ) and APPARITIONS ( I'm not sure which series was being referenced, so I have links to two series by that name http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apparitions_(TV_series) / http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1140939/ ).
Erebus took 10 days to shoot. Weird things encountered by the crew included the apparition of a blind woman, doors slamming shut behind them, and equipment being moved while they were sleeping.
Rick worked on dead on jobs for years before he landed at Hasbro. Other projects included My Little Pony and GI Joe.
Among Rick's observations were the importance of music in film, and how likes to have the sound built up in layers. Another was that it is necessary to have at least a moderate name actor attached to a film in order to market it to distributors. His AD knew Michael Barryman through FREDDY'S NIGHTMARES. He also stated that digital cameras are the best and the worst things that have happened to film making. The best is that now everyone can afford to make a movie. The worst is that everyone does.
Kat feels that 1 M is sweet spot to make a good genre movie. She co-founded Spy Girl Pictures in 2010 to do a documentary on hallucinogenic drugs. Previously she had worked on the HBO documentary Memories from Iraq. Ms Green wanted to work with people she liked, and editing was the most humane way to make a living in the film industry. Among her current projects is acting as US Coordinator for Crossway Pictures documentary HOSTAGE WITH THE DEVIL about Papal Exorcist Malachi Martin.
Unlike Rick, Kat attended film school. She said film school is worth it if you are good at networking with people who are connected. The best advice she got was to never forget that this is a blue-color job. Film school also teach you that when in doubt, cut to birds in flight. People will think you are having deep thoughts.
The duo were asked about their favorite movies. Rick said IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE, old Italian horror films, GHOSTBUSTERS, THE EVIL DEAD (remake: the crowning achievement of horror movies for the past 20 years). He thought that a good found footage film (Spanish): REC http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/REC_(film). Karen's faves included Tim Burton's BATMAN and SINGING IN THE RAIN. She did not like THE MAN OF STEEL, saying: "They're peeing on my childhood!"