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KING OF NEW YORK. BAD LIEUTENANT. NEW ROSE HOTEL. Abel Ferrara over the past 25 plus years has been the definition of the word "independent." The prolific filmmaker, starting with the 1979 cult classic THE DRILLER KILLER, a film he made for only $20,000, Ferrara has attracted the best talent with his edgy, no nonsense, gritty, and unique look at the world around him, using his hometown of New York City as a backdrop. With KING OF NEW YORK and BAD LIEUTENANT, Ferrara established himself an indie powerhouse, making films his own way that continue to this day. However, for Ferrara, each film made is a struggle to make and an accomplishment once completed. Recently, Ferrara granted a few minutes out of his busy schedule to enter the Colonel's Crypt to talk about THE DRILLER KILLER, his love for films growing up, and offers invaluable advice for all filmmakers in this exclusive, off beat interview that only Ferrara can deliver.
COLONEL’S CRYPT: What inspired you to become a filmmaker? ABEL FERRARA: As a child, I was raised by my mother. I was raised by my mother. She came from a poor Irish family in the Bronx and I guess the movies were fascinating to her growing up. I can still remember her bringing me and my brother to the theater. The movies I saw as a kid, CASABLANCA, Michael Curtiz made some amazing films. THE COMANCHEROS, KING CREOLE, FRANCIS OF ASSISI, really unbelievable movies. There was a great movie in the 1950s that just blew my mind, IMITATION OF LIFE, directed by Douglas Sirk. Lana Turner was awesome and Douglas Sirk was a fantastic director. I saw it at six years old, and films like that inspired me. Then when I got older, I went to see some European films. When I first started seeing Ingmar Bergman and Fellini, films like THE SEVENTH SEAL and DOLCE LA VITA, and being raised in Italian culture, it really influenced me. Our culture was depicted so vividly, you know what I’m saying? We grew up in the 1960s where you got to remember this was a time where Spielberg did a two hour feature film on Super 8 that played in a local theater. What was brought to the table was that you could make money and become famous. It was a life career created from your ability to make art. There was nothing else I really could do. My uncle had a garbage route in the Bronx. I worked on some blue collar jobs. Anyway, me and my friend Nicholas St. John decided to make it a career. CC: DRILLER KILLER was your first feature that you shot for only $20,000 in 1978. What was it that made you decide to make a feature on your own? AF: The thing is at a certain point we had to make a living doing films. We didn’t want to do porno films. We tried my hand at it and that was not a viable deal. When those guys made TEXAS CHAIN SAW MASSACRE for whatever they made it for ($80,000), it was a revolutionary type thing because they made it for the type of money that could be raised. Raising two or three million dollars was out of the question but raising twenty to thirty thousand was within our realm, and CHAIN SAW made quite a bit of money. We were always making films, whether it was 15 minutes or 20 minutes, mostly through college. We stayed at school forever so we can maintain access to the equipment, and actually some of those films are available on DVD now which is pretty funny. At the time, the only way you were going to make a living was to make a feature. We based DRILLER KILLER on the success of TEXAS CHAIN SAW MASSACRE and we shot it on weekends and got half of it done. We raised the money through this guy named Arthur Weisberg from Detroit, he had a big porno industry going which gave him the cash flow to do a film like ours. DRILLER KILLER was probably one of our biggest financial successes. The first weekend that came out in Kansas City it was the second biggest grossing film there, it was in the summertime. CC: And that led you to MS. 45? AF: Then we were in the business from that point on. There was a bit of time between MS. 45 and FEAR CITY. The beginning was kind of rough and tough but basically it’s the same now nearly 30 years later. Financing your film on an independent level is a bitch man. It really doesn’t get any easier. CC: You said that DRILLER KILLER was made seeing the success of THE TEXAS CHAIN SAW MASSACRE, but in your later works they are less commercial and made more for the art of filmmaking. AF: Making films is a huge gamble to make money. If you want to be a writer or a poet, all you need is a pencil and a piece of paper, that’s one thing. If your art form is film, you have to understand that there’s a substantial amount of capital, whether it’s five thousand, fifty thousand, five hundred thousand, five million, or fifty million dollars to do your art, and it’s a marriage between finance and art. CC: Is KING OF NEW YORK what you’ve been most recognized for? AF: I would say that and BAD LIEUTENANT, also MIAMI VICE and CRIME STORY, the episodes I directed. They seem to be the most popular, but mainly it’s KING OF NEW YORK. CC: In your earlier films, Nicholas St. John wrote the majority of the scripts you directed, but recently, you’ve written the scripts yourself. AF: We always had our own stuff and our own visions. At a certain point Nicky couldn’t take the film business anymore. He couldn’t take the people. He couldn’t take the lies. He couldn’t take the bullshit. He’s a very religious person, and he’s putting his time and energy into his Christian faith. Then, Zoe Lund became my writer and she unfortunately died at a young age, she wrote BAD LIEUTENANT. She was quite a brilliant writer. Since then, I’ve used some different writers, Christ Zois and it’s great to work with Christ. You’ve got to get the script done so I would out it out myself. R’ XMAS was a true story so we basically had that story. NEW ROSE HOTEL was taken from a short story by William Gibson who’s a fantastic writer, so we’re going forward, we’re moving on. I’ve gotta do my thing no matter who’s with me. I’m not gonna hang them up because someone passed away. I’m still here. CC: With all you’ve been through growing up as a filmmaker and through the struggles, is that why there’s a theme of Catholism and sin in your films? AF: There was a film I did recently called MARY, about a woman obsessed with Mary Magdelene. Have you seen it? CC: I’m sorry to say I haven’t. AF: It’s alright, there’s no way you can see it other than a couple of festivals. The film I think deals with that subject the most. CC: You have a love with New York, growing up in the Bronx and all of your films have been shot in New York City, but I’ve noticed with your latest films you’ve also been shooting in Italy. Why have you started shooting there as well? AF: I’ve been living in Rome for the past two years. When you see MARY, you’ll see because MARY was a film that set in Jerusalem, Rome, and New York. We went there and we financed MARY from Rome. I also financed GO GO TALES there. We shot GO GO TALES at Cinecitta Studios in Rome. IFC Films are going to put them both out. They like the film a lot. CC: I used to work for IFC. AF: What happened, you don’t like them? CC: I love them. I got laid off, budgetary thing. AF: How long ago was that? CC: About two and a half years ago. AF: And you do your site now? CC: It led me to doing the site. AF: Do you make films? CC: I used the severance from IFC to make a short film so in a way they executive produced it. AF: That’s great man. I’m telling the future is on the net, so if you figure out a way to use it to reach a wide audience, you can get the money to make more films. I’m working on it. CC: What would you say would be the best advice of any aspiring filmmaker? AF: You need to live with the reality of what the film needs to live on, what a cameraman needs to live on, what an editor needs to live on. When you sit and write a budget, don’t do a budget in dreamworld. Sit down and write down what the rent is going to be, how much people are going to cost to feed everybody, how long it’s going to take to make the film, and get to a number that’s going to give you an opportunity to make that film. It’s going to give you the time and piece of mind to make that film. Then you’ve got to go and raise the money for the film, so start with your mother and work from there. Go to any place you can think of. The most important thing is that you’re honest and straight up and get across the point, unless you can find investors that don’t want their money back, which if they do, have them call me. You also have to make a movie that people want to see. If people want to see it, it will give you an opportunity to get the capital back to the investors. That’s what you gotta do and you’ve gotta be honest with the budget. You have to get the money back. In this day and age there’s a lot of different ways of finance. That’s what you gotta do. You also have to know in advance where you are going to sell the film, what you’re going to do with it. You have to know where you want to go and do it. You can’t be working in the dark. If you do want to work in a situation where you are making films that aren’t in a way going to sell, like a 30 second film, then you have to find people willing to finance films that aren’t looking for their money back. The whole thing is to be very honest with what you’re doing, there’s opportunities out there everywhere. There are films that are done just for museums for example. You’ve gotta keep pounding at it, don’t get discouraged, and go after it. Just remember that Vincent Van Gogh sold only one painting his whole life. The thing is, it’s not about money, it’s about life. If you want to make films, make it your life. CC: You have shot all of your films on either 16mm or 35mm. Do you see yourself shooting on HD or shooting on digital in the near future? AF: I’ll use whatever equipment I’ll get my hands on to tell my story. The thing is Kodak is not going down without a fight with their 35mm negatives. My film has to be screened on a big screen at film festivals. It’s one thing to look at it on a computer screen, but when you start looking at it blown up on a big screen, it’s a big difference. However, I am shooting a documentary called CHELSEA ON THE ROCKS. It’s about the history of the Chelsea Hotel in Manhattan. We’re shooting that on High Definition. It looks pretty good. When I use High Def, I’m using it for the editing process and the timing process, so I got the best of both worlds as far as I see. CC: In addition to CHELSEA ON THE ROCKS, what else is coming up for you? AF: I’m doing a prequel to KING OF NEW YORK. It’s called THE LAST CREW. CC: That’s great. Are you close to production? AF: We’re very close. We’re hoping to shoot in New York but it takes place in 1978 so I have to find the right locations, but that will be coming very soon. It’s about the rise of Frank White. At the same time I’m doing a documentary in Naples right now. I’m editing it as we speak. I’m also looking at putting up a website to get direct access for my current films. How many people do you have over by you? CC: Just me. It’s a labor of love, I don’t make any money off of it. AF: Neither do I with my films so you’re in good company (Laughs). I have to look at this site. Hang on a moment. (Abel takes this moment to go on his laptop and look at the Colonel's Crypt website) AF: You run everything? So you’re the Colonel? CC: Yeah. AF: Why do you call yourself that? CC: A friend of mine gave me that when I worked on one his films, a gentleman by the name of Chris Garetano. He called me that because I organized everything for him and took charge on the set. AF: That’s cool. So you make your own films and do this website on your own? CC: Yeah. AF: When do you have fucking time to do all this? CC: I don't know but I manage. AF: Just keep rocking man. Just keep going at it. It’s not a matter of easy or hard, it’s a life. From looking at your website, I can see you know what I’m talking about out and keep it going man. CC: Thank you for time. AF: Just remember to be true to yourself and take care.
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