By Gary Lumpp, John Oak Dalton, Heidi Martinuzzi, Jason Santo

It’s been a while, but it’s summertime and even Reviewers need a break and a chance to get away from the table for a vacation. But now that the summer is halfway over, it’s time once again to gather together the writers at MCS. This time around we’re discussing the most memorable moments in the micro-budget realm – the moments that we point to when people ask us about the scene and we say, “THAT’s why we watch and make these movies.”

GARY: One scene immediately jumps out at me, and I’m still shocked that this flick hasn’t been picked up for distribution yet. That’s the shoot out in the parking garage in The New Chapter. Expertly shot, professionally edited, and featuring enough guns and bullets to make John Woo drool, this is the cream of the crop when it comes to micro action scenes.

JASON: I can’t say I’ve seen too many action scenes in microcinema that have been worth mentioning. Maybe the final stand-off in Queequeg Films’ The Bags. There was some excellent stuff happening in that scene, much of it shockingly suspenseful considering, y’know, it was about a group of high school kids fighting off a demonic army of, ahem… plastic grocery bags.

HEIDI: What about the Mexican standoff in Reservoir Dogs? Okay, I know that’s cheesy.

JASON: That’s soooo not Microcinema.

HEIDI: Well, you suck, Jason.

JASON: (snickering) Well… it’s not!!

HEIDI: So I’ll talk about two more. There’s the “saw-off-your-own-foot” scene in Saw, which is coming out this fall, and the scene in Open Water when the couple finally realizes that no one is coming to help them. Okay. So those are both not out yet. I think I need to pick scenes from the past, huh? For my first pick I choose the scene in Project Valkyrie by Hero Pictures that has the lead hero performing shot for shot the Raiders of the Lost Ark fight scene between Indiana Jones and the Nazi strongman in front of the airplane. It was so funny, yet so well done and well shot. It somehow made me laugh out loud and sit, awestruck, at the same time. Very fun and very worth watching.

JASON: I have a real love/hate relationship with imitation. When done right, á la the Slimer-catch scene in Freddy vs. Ghostbusters, I think it’s great. When done wrong, it can be frustrating. This Project Valkyrie movie has good word of mouth going for it. I know John likes it a lot.

JOHN: Actually, I’ve thought a lot about Project Valkyrie too, but it’s the little slice of character study where the lumpy, slacker lead spends a few amiable minutes trying to teach his robot pal a childhood game. That’s where microcinema works for me - not in emulating blockbuster movies, but giving us perspectives and ideas glossed over or missing in Hollywood work.

JASON: John, you hit the nail on the head about Microcinema’s strengths, man. No budget flicks work their best when they are doing their own, original thing. Like, for instance, when the mechanic Barry in American Indian Graffiti finally admits to his young friend (an eight year-old named A’an) why he cannot be her friend anymore. The incredibly human, honest and overwhelmingly sad revelation, as well as A’an’s defiant response, proved to be one of the only (if not THE only) microcinema moment that nearly brought me to tears. (Okay… maybe it DID bring me to tears…) The originality comes from the relationship between this bitter, older man and this innocent little girl – both Native Americans – whose friendship becomes something of a wonder as the movie progresses.

JOHN: I thought I heard you sniffling during American Indian Graffiti! Though it was hard to hear because I was sniffling too.

JASON: Another startlingly original scene that I have to mention is from Esther Doorly and Hilary Cahil’s movie Sarah, a short picture with the coolest opening I’ve seen thus far in a micro-budget flick. Imagine ten superbly svelte gals in tank-tops with angel wings dancing to some funked-out disco mayhem. Then, quite suddenly, they are interrupted by a large man in a British judge’s wig who snaps his fingers. And who speaks French. And who is missing a “lamby lambkin.” Oh yeah… and he’s God, too. Anyhow, the big G is looking for the title character who was killed by her boyfriend the night before and who doesn’t realize she’s dead. While the rest of the picture is pretty solid, the opening is just phenomenal. If you visit the website from the New Media Technical College of Dublin, you can see it for yourself.

GARY: I’m going to have to go with another parking garage shoot out for my second pick, and that’s the extended tracking scene in (Brian Clement’s) Meat Market. It’s one long shot, following explosions and gunfire and zombies, and it’s an impressive set piece. It shows what good planning and timing can do for a micro.

JASON: If nothing else, we’ve learning that you really like scenes set in parking garages, Gary! But, seriously… that is such an incredible scene, and it’s that kind of ambition that made Clement’s Exhumed such a worthwhile effort.

JOHN: That is a great set piece, Gary, like the dizzying greasy spoon robbery that opens the Rock City crime drama The Passage or the super-charged kung fu fight that closes Shockheaded. But I have to go with the hard-rawkin’ teens of Wichita, getting chased by a vampire horde through a bleak night in Leif Jonker’s Darkness. There’s this scenes where they zip through an eerie car wash in the dead of night that just made me think, as I said in my review at this site, if this movie had come out to drive-ins in the 70’s Jonker would be a cult hero today. And (despite what is said about the power of the internet) I could rattle off a dozen others right off the top of my head that would be cult classics if people could see them at the widespread level of a Texas Chainsaw Massacre back in the day.

JASON: Hell of a point, John. There’s some great work out there that simply isn’t getting seen. But I think the more worthwhile projects that are made on digital video or 8mm and are released on DVD, the more people will see that a big-ass budget isn’t needed for moviemaking.

JOHN: One would hope.

HEIDI: True, Jason. But now we see films that don’t have a big-ass budget (big-ass in terms of Hollywood) getting to theaters and making a crapload of money. Moviemakers don’t stick with Microcinema after their first big hit, which is a shame.

JASON: Okay… we’re rambling off-topic. Here’s another scene to love – or really, a whole movie: The Magical Time-Traveling Thugtastic Jug. If I had to pick a scene out of this hilarious “movie” starring Andrew Isaac (who I’m certain is fairly magical himself), I’d probably go with the whole “inveesable money” gag that occurs when the lead character tries to buy the item of the title from a pirate. It cracks me up without fail, and I’ve seen the movie about ten times now.

HEIDI: How about the scene in Denice Duff’s independent vampire flick Vampire Resurrection that has her dancing in a very ultra-Goth romance novel way around a graveyard, with smoke and haunting music surrounding her? She’s wearing this Lily Munster-esque dress, and it’s breathtaking. It comes off as an awesome tribute to all the Hammer films of the 60’s, but adds it’s own modern appeal. Denice is basically poking fun at, while improving upon, her role in the Subspecies films. I’m really proud of her for that film, and in particular, that scene. It’s a tough one to actually pull of in a respectable way, but she did it.

JASON: Hmmm… Heidi brings to the table your favorite scenes with a Scream Queen with this last pick. I’m thinking mine would be Debbie Rochon’s great bit in Dr. Horror’s Erotic House of Idiots when she’s receiving a bit too much pleasure out of a vibrating cell phone that one of the other character’s keeps calling. It’s a well-acted (and very well-paced) scene that, like Duff’s in Vampire Resurrection, is very tough to pull of in a respectable way.

JOHN: I think the opening scene in The Evilmaker with Stephanie Beaton crouched in the bathroom holding a pistol is a knockout opening, although it devolves a bit from there.

JASON: Okay, so let’s talk scary stuff. While I wasn’t a big fan of this movie, there’s a scene with a little girl on a swing in Vengeance of the Dead that absolutely sent me out of my skin. It’s easily the best jump scare I ever experienced while watching a micro-budget movie.

HEIDI: Jason, isn’t Escape from the Dead one of your favorites too?

JASON: You’re taunting me, Heidi.

JOHN: When you talk Vengeance of the Dead, how can you pass up the scene of grandpa “planing wood” while watching his granddaughter in the shower? And before anyone thinks I’m overly clever, he really was planing wood.

GARY: I’m sure someone else might mention this, but there are several “make you jump” scenes in Hardcore Poisoned Eyes that are worth mentioning. Granted they have more to do with the audio cues that what you’re seeing on screen, but that’s the point – one can make an audience jump if they buy into the premise and think they’re about to see something scary.

JOHN: My favorite scene in Hardcore Poisoned Eyes has got that perfect 70’s scare, like a Rosemary’s Baby, chilling without being gory; when the girl has to bend down and kiss the goat’s foot. Man, that one gave me the shivers. Hardcore Poisoned Eyes would definitely be in that 70s time-warp cult classics list, and while I’m at it I might throw out there Sinyster, Exhumed, the aforementioned Meat Market and Darkness, and Shatter Dead, drive-in heroes all.

JASON: Ooooooooh… Shatter Dead. So many memorable scenes. I’m thinking the storming of the “safehouse” by the Howard Stern look-a-like and his unmerciful cronies would probably be tops. That’s, of course, the scene during which a pregnant zombie has a “shotgun delivery” in the most literal sense. But most memorable about that “zombie baby” sequence was how the entire scene ends so quietly with undead mother and newborn in the shower with the mother cleaning the blood off the baby. Chilling.

HEIDI: Okay, I can’t ever discuss good Microcinema without talking about Razor Eaters, my favorite Australian film ever. There is a scene with an exploding house, and its all real. No cheesy CGI for Shannon Young, the director. He actually waited eight months to shoot that scene cause he knew what a difference it would make in his film, and he was right. Having the actual explosion not only was fun, but also brought the film up to a higher level. You must respect that kind of dedication. Plus, Heidi likes explosions. Funny. Go Boom.

JASON: Okay, Heidi’s gone bye-bye. What do you got, Gary? (Whoever can name the movie and the actual quote I’m riffing on and post the answer in the forums will get a free copy of Escape From the Dead!)

JOHN: I’ll throw in my copy too!

GARY: I know I might get some flack for this, but the final scene in The Blair Witch Project stuck with me for some time after watching the movie. It was like when a kid tells you this long rambling set up for a joke, and when the punchline comes it’s actually funny. That’s how BWP was for me – lots of boring black screen and screaming and wandering, just to turn around and in one image truly become frightening.

HEIDI: The Blair Witch Project rocked, Gary, with that guy standing in the corner like that. It’s been beaten to death, but I will go ahead anyway; Blair Witch was so innovative in so many ways in terms of the storyline and camera work, that the ending was a perfect balance to the rest of it. I have to admit though, that the best is Blair Witch. Other films that involve people exploring an old legend in the woods with cameras…man. That’s lame. And we’ve all seen them. Off the Beaten Path for instance. But I digress… we’re supposed to be talking about GOOD films here….

JOHN: I think people sort of forget what Blair Witch meant to audiences when it first came out, as opposed to later, when everyone had heard about it and every micro-hack was ripping it off. I saw it the first weekend, and it was dead silent in the audience at the end, except for crying. I didn’t quite get the ending until I was in the lobby and my wife explained it. Then a cold chill ran down my spine, seriously.

JASON: That cold chill that you felt down your spine was the same chill I felt when you explained the ending to me recently, John. Even years later, it carried a tremendous amount of power. Originally, I found it creepy, but when you informed me as to your interpretation, I was stunned by it. And despite the fact that it grossed a butt-ton of millions, The Blair Witch Project certainly is a denizen of Microcinema – albeit one many of us wish we could have thought of ourselves. Admittedly, The Last Broadcast (also from our humble ranks) came out first, pioneering that whole first person documenting doom idea, but I found The Blair Witch Project far more engrossing (and more consistent, since The Last Broadcast breaks the first person rule as it closes). An excellent scene, undoubtably.

GARY: I know I’m going to be a bit of a homer with my last pick, but the final sequence in the Polonia Brothers’ Among Us (written by MCS staffer John Oak Dalton) is done very well. Maybe it’s because my expectations weren’t that high for a PoBros production, but when Bigfoot finally does show up it’s a great moment and it’s shot in such a way that the seams aren’t showing (if you know what I mean). The attack at the end shows that a monster movie is possible on no budget – it’s just a matter of knowing how to show (or not show) the big guy.

JOHN: Well, thanks for the homer!

JASON: I guess my last pick will continue with the largely horror-themed second-half of this roundtable as it is truly horrific – though the movie is not a horror picture. Alas, I must be careful as this is a spoiler. Let’s just say that something very shocking happens at the end of current microcinema flavor-of-the-year Red Cockroaches that makes entire audiences collectively gasp at once. It involves a pyramid-shaped necklace. Seeing that movie in a crowd made this initially very startling scene that much more powerful. If you get the chance to catch this movie with an audience at a festival, do so. You’ll see what I mean. In fact, there’s another movie with a scene that carries a similar impact to the one in Red Cockroaches­ – the climax of the domestic abuse period piece Tom’s Wife. It’s only a moment, but it’s a moment that knocks the wind out of the viewer, resulting in the very same collective gasp everyone participated in with Cockroaches.

And I guess that’s what this is all about. Great scenes in any movies, Microcinema or otherwise, result in the audience understanding the overall meaning of a moment. There’s no confusion, and the feelings felt by one person are the same ones felt by the next person, and the next and the next. Great moments in cinema transcend personal differences, and I think many of these, whether they are simply impressive due to scale, or due to emotional impact, feel the same for most viewers because the moviemakers understood how to reach their audience. That’s a tough part of moviemaking to get right.