Luis Iga Garza Talks About Murder In The Woods

Automatically transcribed; may contain errors.

i'm allison with FlickDirect and i'm speaking with louis eager did i say it right you gotta gotta fight yeah oh yeah sorry um and we're talking about murder in the woods a film that he's directed and is now let me ask you first off because this film has been out for a little while already i understand but now it's also coming into theaters and drive-ins is that correct no so we did a festival circuit ah okay so that's why however because um prior to being a filmmaker i was in marketing advertising you know we did a bit i did a big announcement and big things uh you know because it was my first feature film so i thought that's the way you do it like you do every other you know you know when i was in in the pharmaceutical industry when you're launching a product you know so i was not aware that you shouldn't make that much noise when it's just a festival circuit okay until you actually release it so yeah so that was uh that was a learning experience because then now imdb won't change the the one change our year but again that year is for wide releases or commercial releases and ours wasn't it was just festivals tell me how one goes from marketing into directing the feature films well i mean that was my since i was a little kid in mexico i grew up in mexico i've always wanted to to be a filmmaker i loved the the the director that got me into this is obvious i mean like a lot of filmmakers george lucas uh you know the whole make-believe of of creating these worlds that don't exist uh where the sky's the limit that's what my inspiration so i came to the states pursuing that but i wanted to be more involved in in visual effects and special effects practical effects and but you know so and i always wanted to go to usc because that's what george went so um so i came to the states i studied undergrad and i did fine arts so i studied graphic design and from that i went i went into marketing so um everything you see done in this movie like the poster the graphics is all literally me oh wow so you did a lot more than double duty here with oh no i'm doing it [Laughter] i'm also distributing the movie so all the assets that you see on the marketing side uh are also being done by me um i have a great uh social media manager that is also helping me putting together reassembling the artwork you know i give them layer files i can reassemble them so it's just been you know we we decided to do it ourselves just because when we were pitching the movie a lot of the distributors didn't understand what this was about because they've never seen something like this right so i would tell them hey we have a movie that is latino and they would see it and then they're like this is not a latina movie because he didn't have any stereotypes for a lot of the executives for it to be a latino movie needs to have stereotypes right you need to have the trollos or about crossing the border or about cartels gang members so that's the that's the the the reality so you know so we got offers and things but again as a marketer talking to i've never uh saw a you know distributor that that saw our vision and also understood the the product that heart they would have in their hands so that's when i decided to learn that the distribution business so i learned the theatrical distribution business and the digital distribution business in the past couple years and put it out and here you are yeah i mean a lot of well i'm very thankful for the investors that trusted in me uh because they also uh they're also uh giving us financing for the for the distribution so um that's great it's it's nice to have a little bit of backing there um so let's get into this film speaking of it's got a latino cast mostly or a minority cast but not in stereotypical ways was it always meant to be that way was it written that way or was that something that working with um yellina you decided that that was the direction you wanted to go in so i wanted so we when we met at usc we're one of the only two latino one only few latinos at usc at the time so um so we we always uh wanted to do something we always wanted to support uh our you know minorities and and our people to to be able to tell stories and represent them i mean elena is also she's also um she's also a an actress so she she she went through a lot where she would get scripts and and it was like one line here one line there not real arcs not real leading roles um so we wanted to give opportunities to latinos and people of color to play main roles so that was our goal from the get-go so when we when we when i brought the the idea to her about this movie and then we started collaborating and um and developing it and then she wrote it uh we ended up seeing everybody right but we wrote it for um we wrote it for people of we wanted to be a diverse cause that because that's our goal is to give opportunities to to to minorities so so if you look at the at the script it can be it could be played by almost anybody right so that was the goal so it's just general characters that was a goal however the casting was was was different in terms of your audience because it is a latino a minority cast do you feel it may alienate some of the individuals who are not of that background no on the because of the lack of stereotypes um when people see this movie they don't even i mean that was the issue not the issue but that was the thing with the executives it would be like oh this is a movie right so we accomplished our goal right we accomplished our goal but we did a movie that is just like a general market movie uh it you know it's for any any fan that likes this genre if you like thrillers if you like suspense you know if you like funny slasher movies this is your this is your type of movie so um so that's what's exciting was that we accomplished it right when people um you know when we were in general in markets where there were not a lot of like we're in portland and we have a lot of more general general market people enjoyed it and never would think about anything to do with latinos or anything so we accomplished our goal and we're super excited and happy about it however for some reason that ended up not helping us in the distribution side unfortunately well hopefully word of mouth and everything else i'll get it moving a little bit more uh in terms of putting in those cultural references um i'm gonna put you this dia de los muertos um the altar in the home was that a part of the original script to get that cultural background into it or was that something you thought i will add that in because no it was part of the whole development because um so um because they're happy i mean we wanted to base it in reality right so if you live in new york if you live in l.a in more metropolitan areas and you go to any university or in high school you see that it's a mishmash of all types of scholarships and forms right and which is amazing because the younger the younger um you know the young adults and the young and the kids are not they're they're they're becoming colorblind which is great right so because they're growing up with with with diversity so it's something that is changing slowly but it but it's but it's changing so so we wanted to give it that reality so if you go to any stella like for example if you're in l.a and you go to east l.a and you go to a home you know because their their background is probably mexican or salvadorian they're gonna have you know this type of references where you know they're still there and all that so so that's why we wanted to base it in you know make it as real as possible but not hit people in the head with the stereotypes you want to make it organic as this is what you know it's part of the culture and i think you did a really good job of that blending all of that together because it wasn't so much in your face it was just part of their reality yeah i'm so happy that you you uh you know you caught up on that and and every time people like that you know audience and critics and people that watch the movie and they catch those little nuances and and don't get hit in the head you know uh it's a it's it's it's it's very satisfying as a filmmaker to you know that people are are are actually seeing what you intended to do good i'm glad yeah i definitely did uh talk a little bit about working with danny trejo how did you get him involved in this uh script so since we literally it's going to sound cliche but literally i was going out to investors with a different project they needed a lot more money and they were like well we like you we like your drive your pain in the butt you don't give up so why what can you do with this money do you have any other scripts i'm like oh i have a great horror script slasher which i didn't so i called yelina who actually was a writer on the other project too and i'm like hey we need to write a horror script [Laughter] and we both love slashers growing up because they're not all the time scary intense it's like you're fun the characters are relatable you're having a good time it's full of tropes um so we literally went to a coffee shop and started developing that literally in a napkin developing the story and when we you know came out with sheriff lorenzo we like it has to be done in trejo there's no option it has to be danny trejo so when we went to the casting process and everything we didn't cast that role we went to dani treco directly um i met uh danny's assistant michael who ended up helping us on set he was very helpful he ended up in the art department so he i met him at an event and then through him i built a relationship and then he introduced me to gloria um danny's manager i mean agent and she's been very very helpful so we send her the offer and you know dan is a very very busy man if he's not making a movie he is giving talks and he's doing charity work he's an amazing human being so um so you know we weren't able it was we weren't getting a yes yet and we're like three days away of shooting you know like so but again we didn't have to so uh luckily by a miracle of god uh jelena ran into him at a restaurant wow that's a great story yeah it's crazy um but then and she she approached him and said hey danny did you get oh yeah when do you guys need me um oh we need you this friday and he was okay i'll get back to you and then three hours later gloria emailed me saying you know yeah you know he's in i love that story that's a good way to tell all the time it's amazing i mean this movie is full of miracles i'm telling you like with the budget that we made it and you know it's been it's a miracle that we have a movie and even a bigger miracle that people are are loving it working on an independent film with such a small budget for young filmmakers out there what are the challenges that you faced even um at the level you're at and what you know you can offer them in terms of advice i mean i mean this could be uh a 12 episode show [Laughter] just i mean because everything that could could go wrong with that um you know from it was it was also my first feature film i mean at usc had these short short films but this was my first long feature films the first time working with you know a-list actor like danny trejo and other veteran actors like soledad and kurt and and so it for me it's just tenacity right like no you know know that you can deliver what you promise you know and learn learn all aspects of filmmaking because a lot of times you know i say yes to things i don't know but i know i have the capabilities of doing it right i'm gonna deliver and because i'm a man of my word i don't i don't sleep until i deliver on that promise so because we saw this movie in 2015 and we you know haven't given up five years later there's there's the lesson to everybody be tenacious five years later you'll get some success from it you know i mean it's it's it's it's just the way you know in the independent world that's the way it is gonna have the money you don't have the the the the attention the the cast even though we have that in trejo you know you know they people want even bigger cast a lot of the distributors so now this film is going into theaters we're able to do um or drive-ins correct so yeah so we opened august 14th in drive-ins and theaters nationwide and now we're ending our run uh we're still in a few theaters uh in certain cities and this weekend we'll still be in some theaters uh however on this on friday the 18th we come out on vod ah okay in all digital platforms okay i really actually like the idea of watching this movie in a drive-in even though i didn't get to because for some reason i think it's the perfect atmosphere for this film was there a different experience for you did you get to see both in the theater and in the drive-in and was it a different experience each time yeah i mean for me i mean i've seen this movie for me because i also edited the movies so i had an editor ryan jump on board and he assemble it and edit it and then i and again we're low budget so when we run out of funds i had to take it and then finish it up um fine cut it and you know try different things so but yeah i mean it's funny because these movies like it's it's it's a throwback you know to those lashes from the 80s and 90s so to watch it in a drive-in it's such a throwback way that the experience is actually great i went to a couple of drive-ins uh to see it when we were playing in southern california so i wanted to see you know people the audience um i also brought up a good friend of mine who helped us uh he's older so he cannot be you know have a lot of exposure so it was great also for to people to get out that that cannot you know they're more sensitive to to the virus uh to be in a secluded place where you know they're safe because you're in your car and you leave and that's it and it's a 90 it's a 90-minute film too so it's not that you have to stay a long time and you have to go to the bathroom and everything so it's a pretty safe um it's a pretty safe way to to enjoy a movie but yeah it was it was amazing because i mean i haven't gone to driving in years since i was a kid right and now it's my full experience it's uh it's amazing it's um it was really really cool to see it yeah i honestly do think because again i went to drive-ins as a kid aging myself now but um i think that it would have been a great way to see this film as and as a drive-in just because of the nature of the film you know a horror film in the woods so i'm glad that audiences were able to see it um yeah and i'm still pushing i'm still pushing for some southern california driving to hopefully take us back uh just for like a weekend or something i mean it's hispanic heritage month so maybe do an event around that you know starts literally starts today uh it's from uh tomorrow is mexican independence day so pretty pretty exciting so yeah so i'm still pushing because i i believe that people really enjoyed it in that way and i you know i i think a lot of people because they didn't have we didn't have a lot of time and budget to market a little bit a lot of people didn't know that it was out there so and everybody's asking me now like oh it's still at the drive and still driving i'm like no sorry so i'm still you know so i'm pushing so hopefully we can get back in there i'm in the south florida market so is miami somewhere you've been where you want to be going to or fort lauderdale that kind of area we're we're talking to some drivings there uh hopefully they'll take us in uh because i use i lived in miami for six years okay yeah before i was in la i i uh i lived in brickell and colgate coral gables i'm very familiar with that area and a lot of my friends are there and actually i passed i spent half of the quarantine in miami because i i was in a in a business trip and i got stuck there oh no that's the perfect place to get stuck in yeah yeah lots of culture lots of good food if they're open that kind of thing absolutely i want to talk about the ending of this movie because i loved it i absolutely loved it i didn't see that coming i'm not gonna spoil it but i loved it will we be getting a sequel well i really hope that the executives from universal lionsgate blumhouse you know sony have that question once they watch this movie because we we would love to to do a sequel you know however again it's it's the it's a challenge no for us to be able to do a sequel you know the movie needs to be successful right you know we need everybody support everybody to go on run tomatoes imdb give us a give us a a review because that's very important that's what studios look at studio looks obviously is show business right so they look at the bottom line so we need to make a lot of sales from vod a lot of downloads give us um you know that would give us placement on the on the vod platforms and if you are like the number one you know top 10 in itunes and all those things that obviously brings attention and helps so that's why you know it's you know the only we don't have a lot of money we're competing with budgets of a minimum of 10 million dollars just for marketing right so so we the only the only power we have is the people and to help us spread the word and you know like the movie buy it and share it with their friends and give us reviews well we'll make sure that at least down in this market that people get to see you know this is coming and what it's about you should definitely get it so i yeah that i and you know what here's the thing if you don't get a sequel i'm gonna come and find you and find out what the sequel would have been because i really want to know what happened yeah yeah i mean it's it's it's it's uh we i just we really enjoyed the the world that we built uh so we really want to continue right i mean that that would be you know if all of a sudden you're like you know murder in chicago right murderer chicago you know the murder franchise we're in number 15.

that would be a great place to be [Laughter] that would be interesting we'll see how all that goes we'll change the murder in murdering the hood murdered in somewhere exactly exactly um rural kentucky there you go anyway i want to thank you for taking the time to speaking with me today and the film was a lot of fun it was great to see the cultural references and it was great to see such a diverse cast not shown in such a stereotypical way so i wish you much success with it in the future and your other endeavors and yeah if there's going to be a sequel you need to let me know i definitely will definitely will and just so for your audience to know if they go to our website uh marindawoodsmovie.com that's where all the platforms are going to be listed on friday they can just click on the one they want to purchase or rent from and also all the links to our social media pages are there so they can follow us uh to stay tuned for the sequel yes now i have people intrigued because they're going to want to watch the movie to get to the end just to see what happens because i honestly wasn't expecting that and i was like what what yeah i need to know inquiring minds need to know it was a great great plot twist at the very end yeah absolutely you're welcome you have a great afternoon bye thanks bye [Music] you