Larry Longstreth is a rising independant filmaker, best known to us comic book fans as the man behind the animated features "The Greatest Fan Film of All Time" and "Batmans gonna get shot in the Face" He agreed to answer a few questions for me, and the result is something I am proud of 
 
1: What made you decide to get into filmmaking? a particular director or movie?

   My step-father had an enormous library of old films.   That was back in the day where each VHS tape held 3 movies.  From "King Kong" to "Indiana Jones", we grew up on the classics.   On the flipside, our real father would pick us up 
on his weekends and my brothers and him would stay up really late and watch sometimes horrible horror films.  In no way were they acceptable for children so young, but it became a weird sort of tradition.  Those definitely both influenced my love for film, but creative writing as I got older is what really attracted me.   

   Slightly off topic and just for the sake of memory, I can remember one time during one of these bad films, there was a topless woman on the far side of the screen.  She turns away so that her breast was just barely visible and her back was to the viewer.  I remember looking over at my little brother, Brandon, as he leaned further and further to the right, as if he was going to see AROUND her shoulder.  It cracks me up.  Little kids had no business watching that stuff.  

2: You have done both live action and animation, which do you find most challenging?

   Live action, without a doubt.  With our cartoons, I just write it, schedule some voice recording sessions, cast the parts, voice direct, and basically hand the wheel over to our animator, Jacob Drake ( JacobDrake.com) and he takes it from there.  With live action, there is way more work involved.  Everybody has to be "on".  For example, we drove to NYC to film our werewolf short, "The Wimp Whose Woman Was a Werewolf".   I paid the rental costs, the hotel rooms, etc.  We filmed in legendary director Lloyd Kaufman's house!  The home of the New York Film Commissioner.  It was pretty insane.  You can imagine my frustration when something went wrong with the camera and we couldn't turn the exposure down, thus making the scene extremely white and unable to be fixed.  We were on a tight schedule so we had to shoot it as it was.  All of that build up and travel and just one little thing goes wrong and it's all screwed.  With animation, if something's wrong, you just reanimate it.  With live action, you don't always get a second chance.  

3: Is there any character you wish you had put in "The Greatest Fan Film of All Time" in hindsight?  

 I don't have any regrets, but Optimus Prime originally had a part that was cut.  So did "Minute Man" from the film "The Specials", and he was actually going to be voiced by James Gunn, who played him in the original film.   No regrets, though.  Things happen the way they happen.  

4: You made a short animated feature titled "Batman's Gonna Get Shot in the Face".  What real life person would you replace Batman with if you remade it as a historical comedy?

   (Laughs) What a bizarre question.   I think the whole point of "Batman's Gonna" is that there's this guy who has been extremely exaggerated to the point of perfection when, in reality, he's very vulnerable and sooner or later that's gonna show.   So, in real life... I'd choose somebody equally hyped and maybe even over-rated.  William Wallace?   Yeah, that would work.  They painted him as a God who could do no wrong and who cried "Freedom!" as he died heroically.  

In reality, he was a big, bald, murdering bastard who died way, way, way before the war was over.  "Gonna Get Shot in the Face" basically translates as "Reality Check" so yeah, Wallace.   

5: Aside from Uwe Boll, what director would you most like to avoid being compared to?

    Probably Spielberg, just because it's the most generic comparison.   People who know nothing about film meet a filmmaker and say "Oh, he's the next Steven Spielberg".  It's silly.  Somebody once met Tim Burton before he was famous 
and said that about him.  Is it true?  No, it's not even close.  It's like hearing somebody makes icecream and saying "Hey, he's making a banana split!"  It's cliche and sort of ignorant.   

6: What is the next project for Larry Longstreth?

   First off, we just finished shooting a live-action comedy sketch show called "Dolly Oxem's Traveling Video Circus".  Shot in HD, the pilot is actually purposely bad.  It's disguised as a somewhat formulaic comedy show, but if you can read between the lines it's really about a broken down, talentless, never-was and how this show is basically his last chance at any sort of fame.  It's really funny and we just released a teaser trailer for it, though it's vague and eerie.   It's right here:   http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xa40i3_preview-do
lly-oxems-traveling-video_fun

   Also, we have an animated TV pilot in the works in the same animation style as "Greatest Fan Film" and "Batman's Gonna Get Shot in the Face".  It's called "Four Tanks and a Healer" and it takes place inside one of those online roleplaying games.  The team is terribly balanced and with just four warriors and a healer, they are forced to come up with creative ways to overcome obstacles that a normal team would easily overcome.  I have a meeting regarding the business aspects of that in a couple weeks but I'm really proud of the script and when it's finished, it'll be a hit.  

7: If you could direct any character in comic books live action movie who would it be?

   I know more about films and filmmaking than I used to, thanks to a few bigwigs in LA who have sort of mentored me... and I know how hard rights are to obtain even for the most prominent directors.  Even fifteen years from now, I know 
it'd be next to impossible to do a film about a prominent comic book character without being extremely lucky.  However, if I had my choice... there are a few I'd like to make.  I would LOVE to do an X-Men film and I know I could do it 
right, at least creatively.  I'd explore different aspects, though, instead of basically programming the audience to like Wolverine the most and ignore the others.  I'd also love to work with Batman and/or Nightwing and address the flaws 
of the characters as well as the strengths.  

Finally, and biggest of all... a Superman film is my dream project.  I would write it to be so epic and relevant to our times.  A lot of people hate Superman.  They say he's cheesy and that there's nothing interesting about stopping a threat simply by punching it and being stronger.  As a comic-book character, they may have a point.  He may be slightly lame and straight forward, but as a cultural icon or even in the heavier graphic novels, there's simply no character in the world who fascinates me more.  It's not about the specific powers.  It's about the seemingly infinite POWER, and how we're so incredibly lucky that he is who he is.  99.9999% of people 
would be bastards if given Superman's power.  They'd reshape the world the way they saw fit.  Clark Kent just happens to be the one true good guy... and we roast him for it and call him a "goody". There's a lot to be said with just that 
message.  It brings out our cynicism.  It brings out our judgements and cruelty.  It also makes you wonder just how much of it a man could listen to before finally behaving just like the rest of us.  The fact that he's unbreakable is 
what makes him ambitious and inspiring if you look at it with optimism.  It makes him unrelatable and cheesy if you look at him with cynicism.  Basically, it summarizes the world.  

8: I know you have tons of stuff you'd like readers of this to check out Larry, so plug away!

   Well, there's too much to just start posting a ton of links, so visit myspace.com/larryfilmmaker and click on my videos.  If you watch them from oldest to newest, you can watch us slowly grow up and mature as filmmakers.  If you don't 
care that much, then just watch "Nintendo: Oldschool Revolution", "Batman's Gonna Get Shot in the Face", and "The Greatest Fan Film of All Time".  Those are our nerd-favorites and there are even some celebrity cameos in "Fan Film".   

Finally, check out the far-less-popular-til-it's-released trailer for "Dolly Oxem's Traveling Video Circus".  It's our current project and I'm blown away by how good the HD looks.  Hope you enjoy!