BACK TO THE FUTURE 8/13/08

Sometimes you have to remind yourself of the past to create a happy future. JOHNNY FLYNTON was the start of my directing career. It was shot in 2002 and nominated for an Academy Award in 2003.

Dash Mihok portrays the role of Johnny Flynton and to this day I tell people that he’s the reason I have a career. His performance was just outstanding and I think he is one of Hollywood’s finest. We are still the best of friends and I will work with him whenever possible.  

It was great to see him work with Colin Salmon, another actor I love. They are both very talented, but they are also great, great guys, and you don’t find that very often. Of course they got on like a house on fire and I dream about doing a buddy movie with the two of them. That would be such a blast.

Back to Johnny Flynton. For all the budding filmmakers out there, this film was one of those lessons that taught me that you should always stick to your guts.

The amount of people who told me it couldn’t be done was uncanny. Everything I set my mind to do, some smartass had to come to tell me that it wasn’t a good idea. “Don’t go to Alabama on location for a short film,” “don’t shoot super 35,” “don’t make it over twenty minutes”……… “don’t, don’t, don’t,” that’s all I heard.

Well, I didn’t listen to any of it and needless the say, the morning of the annual Academy Award nomination announcements was a SWEET moment! The reason it worked was because it was all about a bunch of artists doing their thing. No salary quotes, no politics, no agents, no egos involved.

Due to many requests I’ve received in the past few months from people who wanted to get a copy of JF, I decided to upload it to the website. So click on downloads and check it out if you want to. It was also my first collaboration with Christopher Franke who scored the film with the Berlin Symphony orchestra (for free because I couldn’t afford even one trumpet player).

Once it was uploaded to the site, I watched it again for the first time in probably five years and was reminded of my dreams and hopes back then… before I had an agent or a resume and before my name was making the rounds, for better or worse, on the internet.

I didn’t have a major revelation or decided to quit and become a teacher… but I did write myself a note that I stuck on my computer which reads, “Always be ruled by your heart.”

Peace out
Lexi