Happy St. Paddy’s Day!

Cheers!

We’re proud to announce that BILLY TRIGGER has officially entered Post Production and here is a new picture from the film to celebrate.
The film stars John Fallon, Fred Williamson, Pia Metni, Matthew Bennett, Meghan Gabruch, Anderson Bradshaw and Deke Richards. It was financed by JoBlo Movie Productions Inc. and directed by Christian Viel. Check it out on THE INTERNET MOVIE DATABASE and expect more new shortly.

The fine folks at 9 to 5 interviewed director/editor Christian Viel and writer/actor John Fallon about BILLY TRIGGER on their Podcast GO PLUG YOURSELF and it made for a very politically incorrect sit down. Sensitive ears beware. You can listen to it HERE! And thanks to Walter and Keith for the entertaining chat!

Wow. Where do I begin?

Assumption is the mother of all fuck ups. Something I know very well and try to avoid at all costs. But I made a mistake. Perhaps it was the fatigue, the stress, or any other issues related to trying to produce a film with very limited resources, I assumed that after a fairly rough start the first week, relatively smooth sailing the second week with Mr. Williamson, the third week, with only a major set piece and local actors, including Pia Metni with whom I have had the pleasure of working with before, would be somewhat the smoothest week of the show, hopefully something akin to a walk in the park.

Boy was I ever wrong!

First day had us travel all over the city for several shots for several scenes where Trigger basically tracks Catherine whereabouts. Montreal insane construction nightmare that creates gridlocks seemingly out of thin air made getting around very difficult and lengthy. Shooting in a real car in motion, in real live streets, made it also quite challenging. We had tried to schedule all the scenes with Trigger tracking Catherine the same day but unfortunately one of our actors was not available that day, so we had to schedule it for the big shootout day, something I was not too happy about but had to deal with nevertheless. In the end, it was a blessing in disguise because with all the traffic and complications of shooting in a cramped sports car, we barely managed to pull off the day as scheduled.

It was a great pleasure to work again with Pia – we get along very well and I felt her looks and the subtleties she brings to her performance was perfect for Catherine, on the shoulders of which the story arc of the whole film hinges. When you cast great actors, all you basically have to do is let them go, film it and adjust if necessary. I have to say that we have been blessed on that front on this film and this week was no exception. Everybody brought their A game.

Another interesting anecdote that night was that we had to have Pia shoot herself camera wise because of the car’s narrow confines. She had to hold the camera between her knees (and stabilizing the lens with her shoe!) because the space was so cramped. And then, when it came time to do John’s angles, well the poor girl had to do all the camera work herself, after a little crash course – she had some background in photography, which helped, but it was still quite a challenge with all the vibrations, potholes, low light situation and overall uncomfortable nature of the position she had to do it in, not to mention she had to feed her lines to John at the same time! But she aced it like a pro!

But I think that seeing Pia, with her bleeding arm, contorting herself against the windshield in her evening gown, trying to shoot a steady close-up, delivering her lines as she shot, while John was trying to act, dodging traffic and potholes (another Montreal staple), definitely makes my list of top ten most surreal shooting moments.

Day Two was supposed to be a shootout in a club, which leads to Catherine being wounded on Trigger’s watch. Pia had to lip synch a song and get shot, while we had several extras running around and Trigger and a Triad member (the great Nobuya Shimamoto) gunning it out for our anti hero and doing lots of collateral damage, which includes the lovely Catherine. We also had to shoot the missing part of the scenes from the day before, where Catherine interacts with another student while Trigger keeps an eye on her. It was going to be a long and difficult day to begin with. Then the bomb dropped. The location we had was double booked. They wanted us out of the place by 5h30 PM – and we would be allowed in a couple of hours later – while a group of 80 people would be prancing around in what was basically our set! All the gear was already in the place. We talked it through with the crew – some actors were already arriving…

In fifteen minutes, thanks to our intrepid make-up artist Marlene, who lodged a phone call with her sister and managed to land us an even better location available within the next half hour, we packed everything and move out to set up all over again. Everyone did step up to the plate and put together a great looking set in no time at all. While we went and shot the other scenes related to Trigger tracking Catherine, smack in the middle of downtown Montreal, I tasked Andy Bradshaw to coordinate the movements of the extras during the shootout so we would lose no time when we got back and hopefully roll the cameras as soon as humanely possible to recover the two hours we had lost because of the migration.

Shooting guerilla style in the middle of downtown is a daunting task at best, especially when it involves running in the traffic, but everything went without an itch. Everybody was on and we wrapped those scenes fairly quickly. So we headed back to the new location, and while stuck in the never ending traffic, I planned with Deke Richards the strategy we would employ to try and get all the day’s shots done as quickly and efficiently as possible. Bradshaw did a spectacular job coordinating and our extras were the most disciplined extras I have ever had the pleasure of working with so we breezed through everything at a blazing pace.

We managed to get through everything within the time we had, hence avoiding overtime. There is something to be said about the fact that when there is adversity, when everyone pulls together as a team and gives it their all, you can accomplish great things. I felt very proud of our cast and crew that day – everyone pulled through under extremely difficult circumstances and we got everything done along with fantastic and exciting footage.

Pia was a trooper as usual and delivered an outstanding performance with the song she had to lip synch to. I never liked the song personally until I saw her sing it – then the scene finally bursted alive and she sold the moment that needed to be there for the scene to make sense. So it was a surprisingly fulfilling day considering how bad of a start it got in the first place. But our day was not over yet! We had to return producer’s Berge Garabedian vehicle, all the way to the other side of town. Normally an half hour ride in ideal conditions, it took us almost two hours as both major highways were down to either one lane or diverted to service roads… When we got back, I had to dump all the footage of the day. So I basically slept less than two hours before we where to hit the road again for the third day.

Third day should be easy, I was thinking. We were at a familiar location where we shot before, we only had two actors, John and Pia, they had quiet scenes overall to do, mostly dialogues… Smooth sailing, right? Wrong!

When we got there, the city had decided to redo the entire pavement on the street, literally blocking access to the very building we were shooting in… Parking spots where now miles away and we had to haul all the equipment by hand, bits by bits, trying to not get our feet covered in tar in the process of crossing all the streets. Combined with all the noise of the machinery, a quiet dialogue scene quickly became a challenge! Not to mention that everybody was arriving late because of the situation and the exhausting need to cary all the equipment by hands… This was not a fun time. But once everything was set, things went smoothly and quickly. We got to do a cool gore effect that was very effective and convincing – so much so some people started feeling nauseous. Always a good sign that the stuff works right!

Friday was mostly small scenes, at several locations. Everything went more or less smoothly if a bit chaotically. We had to improvise sets several times during that day – everything worked out fine but it is always a little stressful. By now, fatigue, stress and lack of sleep had taken their tolls – Bradshaw was feeling under the weather, bruised up and stuck with a nasty head cold… But he soldiered on and pulled off an adequate fight with Trigger, which leads to their final confrontation inside a junkyard. Several small scenes were shot after that, related to Trigger’s presentation as a character. And with that, we were done with Principal Photography. We have a day of pickups shots, establishings, etc. to do next week and then it will be an official wrap for Billy Trigger!

I am still in pain as I write this – knees, back and shoulders are all conspiring to remind me I am not a young buck anymore. Glad we got through it – it was definitely one of the most challenging shoots I ever attempted, both physically and mentally. We joked that the whole thing almost felt like a bet, like something we wanted to prove ourselves that we could do it – at times it did feel like a dare… And now that it is over, it feels like a daze…

When I wake up, I will be in post editing the sucker… And all is well again in the world. We made it out of hell, relatively unscathed… Time for some rest and a well earned beer.

If there’s one thing I learned on this show is; you gonna do a micro budget flick, AVOID car scenes. I swear my next flick will all take place in a fucking house. Anything having to do with cars has been hell. It didn’t help that Mr. Trigger drives a sleek sports car, with a cramped interior, which made it very hard for a camera man to be inside. DAY 1 was my first day with Pia Metni who plays Catherine in the film and we spent the bulk of our time in that damn car,  a smart car still much smarter than me. Pia actually wound up doing some of the camera work herself for my reverse, going MacGyver on our asses by using the sole of her shoe, putting it between her thighs and placing the camera on it. Pretty ingenious. The logistics of the situation definitely added to the realism of the scene as well. I am supposed to be stressed out driving Catherine around; no problem there! Trying to act while ducking Montreal heavy traffic and construction, concerned about NOT killing us, fished that emotion out of me pretty easily. Was a tough and draining day, but we pulled it off.

DAY 2 started with a sucker punch. The location we had locked for a shoot-out, fell through, the dude double booked it. But lady luck smiled on us via our makeup up girl Marlene, whose family happened to own a club that was like 15 minutes away from where we were and it was available for us to shoot in. So while Viel, another actor and myself shot a scene downtown (with Viel going Commando, lying down in the busy street, cars zooming inches from his head, to get a shot), everybody else stepped up their game, moved our gear to our new location (a much better one than what we had initially booked) and dressed it up in record time. So yes, we managed to get our shoot-out. Huge kudos to everybody for stepping up their game and making Day 2 happen, what could have been a total disaster was salvaged via quick thinking, mucho efforts and quick action. Driving the car back to producer’s Berge Garabedian’s house (yeah it was his car) proved to be another nightmare. Montreal highways blessed us with more construction i.e. closed lanes and bumper to bumper traffic. Long story short, we got back home at 2AM in the morning, and hardly slept for the next day.

Day 3 was all about a dialogue driven scene between Pia Metni and myself and it went down without a hitch. Pia was a pro and I dug her energy. On my end, I had prepared that scene big time before we tackled it, I knew what I was going for (a different side of the character being revealed) and it all rolled out organically. I am very proud of that scene and the work that Pia and I did on that day. Day 4 started easy with a swift scene with myself and fine gent Howard Rosenstein but then became another battle. A location dropped on us at the last second so we had to improvise. Co star Anderson Bradshaw was starting to get sick hence not in tip top shape, and we had a fight scene to do. But like a good soldier, Bradshaw forged through it, we executed said scene and got it in the bag. Phew!

So that’s it. End of shoot. I would like to personally thank Christian Viel, Anderson Bradshaw and Deke Richards for the INSANE amount of work they put into this baby. Would like to thank producer Berge Garabedian for believing in the project and his moral support throughout and of course our wonderful cast and crew for their dedication, efforts and stellar work ethic. BILLY TRIGGER wound up being a suicide mission and at the end of the day we survived it. I can only speak for myself and say that I am a better EVERYTHING for it. I learned more on this show than I have on any other: acting, the film-making process and my shortcomings as a human being. I was also faced with obstacles that I had never encountered before; I worked hard in solving them and eventually did, I am proud of myself for that, and I now know for next time. Now to deal with pick-ups and the post shoot downer. Expect more updates as Christian Viel enters Post with the film. Later yall!

Local Montreal website CULT MTL dropped by the set of our new action flick Billy Trigger and talked to star Fred Williamson and actor/screenwriter John Fallon. Here’s an excerpt of the sit down.

Fallon’s horror movie reviews are stylistically chock-full of male-centric bravado — less critical and more in line with a guy who just wants Jack Daniels and, as he’s written in the past, a “good flick.” His personality and his work on Trigger fit perfectly in line. “Action has always been my first love. You know, then I started writing about horror and people pigeonholed me for that. And I love horror, too,” says Fallon.

Though the gritty nature of Trigger hearkens back to gritty low-budget action films of the 1970s, both Fallon and Williamson insist it’s not a throwback, but the real thing. “We have a junkyard chase scene — you never see that in movies anymore,” Fallon points out. “Gritty throwbacks are bullshit,” says Williamson. ”What Tarantino does with the negative scratches,” he continues, referring mostly to his work on Grindhouse, “it’s just bullshit.” He adds that there was no way that would have gone over well in the 70s.

You can read the whole article here!

The good streak continued on Day 2 with two fights scenes back to back  and a groovy shootout. Although my left leg still gave me problems, again, I worked around and with it, took the pain and accomplished what needed to be done, no matter the amount of takes it took. Will that fucking leg ever heal??? Grrrr! As for the shootout; after the first take, I yelled out loud: “I just dropped a load”! I could’ve done that bit all fucking day. I just love shooting guns man! So all in all what on paper should have been a very hard day, wound up being much smoother than I thought it would be. Oh and big props to Valerie Wiseman for her high fall (her first ever). You aced it girl!

Day 3 had its complications (another shoot-out). We eventually resolved said issues and moved on. I really don’t have much to say about all of it. With that, it was great to have my brother Pat and producer and bud Berge Garabedian on set that day. I wish they would have been there on a smoother day but hey what the fuck you gonna do. After that bit I once again got the pleasure of seeing another scene I wrote between The Hammer and Meghan come to life. They owned it and I was smiling form ear to ear. My babies live!

Day 4 was yet another intricate shoot-out. Director Christian Viel and stunt coordinator Anderson Bradshaw were on fire  and it went smooth. I got to perform a couple of cool stunts and then had yet another one on one with Fred Williamson who brought the thunder down. Fuck I love acting with that dude! Another plus was having journalist Jason Hewlett on set. We had him play one of the henchmen and it was pleasure to blow his brains out. Jason, who has no acting or stunt experience, handled it like a veteran. Great dude, great energy, loved having him there.

And finally on Day 5, while Viel, The Hammer and Valerie Wiseman were shooting their scenes, on our end, Meghan and I prepared for a touchy scene. Can’t say much about it, don’t want to spoil it. I’ll just say lots of shit I didn’t expect came out of it and basically acted as the end of my character’s arc. At night we had a going away party for Fred (and at the same time Meghan) who wrapped their time with us on the shoot. We also had press on hand to interview us. I have to say it, I will miss Fred. I learned so much from him about acting and being an action hero and I am very thankful for that.

At the end of the night, I got home dead tired and collapsed. Today, after I slap this up,  am unplugging my phone, turning off the computer, putting a warm compress on my bum leg and watching Connery Bond movies all day. I need alone time and need to re-charge. One week left of shooting to go! Almost there!