Photos and Chainsaws

What you are looking at is the official image of the three directors from Bordello Death Tales. Handsome bunch, aren't we? (Left to Right: Al Ronald, myself, Jim Eaves). Weird to have 'official' photos, which seem to end up getting used over and over again for ages.

The black & white photo that's probably at the top of this blog, for example, (although may not be if you're reading a reskinned version within another site) is bloody ancient. It was actually a publicity photo from back when I was doing stand-up rather than directing horror movies. I was thinking of getting a new one but, frankly, who the hell do I think I am? I haven't stuck a photo onto my IMDB page either, and can't quite work out whether I should or not. On the 'not' side.. I'm a writer/director, so why the fuck should anybody actually care what I look like? On the 'should' side, most of the directors that I like best have carefully cultivated a public image, complete with wardrobe gimmics, and so I sort of feel like I can get away with it. Plus, let's be honest, I'm an attention junkie. If I wasn't an attention junkie I'd have never got involved in movies, let alone my prior stint in stand-up.

One of the reasons I've been thinking about photos.. The chainsaw from TrashHouse finally made its way back home to the Jinx office the other week. And it's almost impossible to resist the urge to pose with it. It's a hulking great thing, damn heavy and really looks like it means business. And I keep thinking, hey, maybe I can find an excuse to pose for a publicity photo with that sucker. I know it's pathetic and sad. But I make horror movies, for God's sake, so of course I want to pose with chainsaws. Maybe a chainsaw in one hand and a camera in the other. In an urban wasteland. Like I'm in Mad Max.

Please note; I think I'm safely into the realms of self-parody now. But when I look at the chainsaw I'm not too sure. The other odd thing, of course, is that I'm terrified of it. As an object. Even though it doesn't work any more, there's a part of me that feels like it's going to splutter into very real and dangerous life at any minute (hence the amusing 'trivia' that someone added to my aforementioned IMDB page) and start ripping up everything in the house. I'm not an outdoorsy kind of guy, and my only frame of reference for chainsaws is from my own and other people's horror movies. I don't associate them with gardening. I associate them with unpleasantness, so much so that it actually feels oddly transgressive to have one in the house.

Oh, and before I sign off, I was rather pleased last week to notice this blog quoted extensively over on The Melon-Farmers anti-censorship site. I've read that site for years, and is was strange to be reading it and suddenly realising that I was reading my own ramblings.

Rock on,
Pat