Frustrated by a stalled film career and repetitive corporate video gigs, Mockbuster sees Anthony Frith brazenly pitches himself to Hollywood’s kings of B-movie schlock – affectionately dubbed mockbusters – The Asylum, the studio behind the notorious Sharknado. Frith somehow gets the gig, and is given a 6 day shoot deadline, shoestring budget and script to a rebooted dinosaur epic ‘The Land That Time Forgot’. What follows is a madcap production to shoot a mockbuster in suburban Adelaide. But Frith was not just directing ‘The Land That Time Forgot’ for The Asylum, he also had the camera rolling on himself, as he was directing the behind-the-scenes documentary Mockbuster, lifting the curtain on the chaotic and brilliant world of B-movie filmmaking.
After an acclaimed festival run, Mockbuster is hitting Australian cinemas on August 27. To celebrate the release, Nick L’Barrow spoke with director Anthony Frith about how the idea of filming both a feature length B-movie and documentary similtaneously came together, and where his love of The Asylum films began!
Nick: I first discovered The Asylum films when I worked at Blockbuster in the 2010s. So, I’m curious to know what role the video store played in your own sense of discovering movies, especially those B-grade style ones?
Anthony Frith: Growing up, I was obsessed with Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory and Beetlejuice. They were just the two things that I would watch over and over again. Then my dad introduced me to those “dad movies” in my teens, and I became obsessed with Jackie Chan movies or the Die Hard type movies. And it was probably when I was 17 or 18 when I discovered Grizzly Man, and that was such a pinnacle moment of being like, “Holy fuck, movies can be like this!” I went down the rabbit hole of artsy things like we all do. But I still love all the more commercial things too. My friends and I every week, when we were teenagers, we would go to Video Ezy and it was like $10 for 5 movies, and we would scour through looking for the worst DVD covers possible and stay up all night watching them. That’s where my love for bad B-movies came from. But I didn’t discover The Asylum until I was like 22 or something. I remember I was at The Reject Shop, which is like the $2 shop, and I was looking for movies to watch at my friends house that night. I found this 5-movie box set that was like 30,000 Leagues Under the Sea, I am Omega, Army of the Dead and they were all Asylum films. That’s when I discovered mockbusters and that there were like 250 of them, which was amazing. I fell in love with them.
Nick: As someone who also loves bad B-movies, I’ve always held the sentiment that those movies aren’t “so bad that they’re good”, but rather they are “so bad that they’re entertaining”. I’m curious to know what your thoughts around that sentiment are?
AF: Yeah, I think that makes sense. I guess I’ve never thought of it in that sense because good in my head means entertaining. Like, when I judge a movie, it’s purely based on whether or not I was entertained. If I was, then great, the movie was successful because that’s what I like. In my opinion, movies should be entertaining. Obviously, there are different styles of things. Like, in documentaries, you want to gain knowledge or whatever. But, normally, I just want to go to the cinema and have a good time, then talk to my friends about what we saw. That’s the experience for me. So I do feel like you’re right.
Nick: In the documentary, someone mentions that there are two distinct types of Asylum film – ones that are $250,000 and ones that are $1 million Asylum films. Having watched so many of them, do you feel like you can tell the difference?
AF: As far as I know, the Tubi original ones, or like the Sharknado films, are more expensive. They’re older, sci-fi films or the ones like Danny Trejo or bigger name stars usually are the more expensive ones. But the “six day specials”, like the one I made, or Transmorphers, The Fast and the Fierce, they’re the lower budget level ones [laughs].
Nick: I guess this is sort of a “chicken or the egg” question, but how did the idea for Mockbuster first originate? Were you filming a documentary in the hopes of landing the feature film, or did you begin filming when you had landed The Asylum gig?
AF: I think I was cheeky and kind of hoping both would work. I’d say the documentary idea probably came first., When I pitched The Asylum, I pitched the idea to make a film for them first, and then when they said yes to that, we started making the documentary. I thought it was interesting to do both… but also stupid [laughs].
Nick: When did you realise during the documentary aspect of filming that you were going to focus more on your personal experience making the film, rather than it just being a behind-the-scenes look on how The Asylum films were made?
AF: Yeah, when we were starting to try and raise financing for the documentary, that was always kind of the thing. When we were writing the treatments and stuff, we tried to centre it all around that sort of journey because I think it’s an important and fun journey. One of my favourite films of all-time is American Movie, and Mark [the subject of the documentary] is just much cooler and a much more interesting guy than me! But it’s such a great story. I love documentaries where you’ve got someone to root for. You get to see their ups and downs. Like, I love David Farrier as well. I love when you get to experience something vicariously through someone else and their experience, so that was also something I was interested in doing.
Nick: Without spoiling too much about Mockbuster, you do end up getting to show The Asylum film you made at a family and friends screening. Can you take me back to that night and the feelings you experience before, during and afterwards?
AF: I was shitting myself! I was so nervous because I invited all these people – my family and friends, my Nonna! I was like, “They’re all going to find this so boring! Everyone is going to think I’m insane!’ But then people started laughing, and I could just relax and enjoy it, which was nice. The same thing happened at the Adelaide Film Festival, which was the world premiere of Mockbuster. I was shaking because this was such a personal thing, and I hate being on camera, let alone screening it in front of 400 people in my hometown! I had like a shot of tequila beforehand to settle my nerves, but I was still thinking, “What have I done?” Then in the first minute, people started laughing, and then the laughs got more consistent, and then I could tell they were enjoying it and I could relax. I enjoyed the feeling that people were enjoying something that I had poured myself into. It’s a really special thing, and it’s kind of addictive in a way too. Like, you go to these festivals and you want to stay around to see the reaction to your film, which is something I didn’t expect because after seeing the movie 50 times in the edit, I thought I’d never watch it again. But it’s nice to get that immediate feedback from people. You realise what’s working and what’s not working, which is hopefully stuff I can take to my next film, if I ever get to make something again!
Nick: Not only do you get to interview Eric Roberts in this documentary, but you chat to him so casually in his kitchen. How did Eric become involved in the film, and what was that experience like?
AF: It was the weirdest moment of my life. I walked into Eric Roberts house, and then I had to ask where the toilet was! Then I walked into a room where there are hand drawn pictures made by Emma Roberts when she was a kid. It was surreal. You’re in the house of Hollywood royalty here. Eric told me he had done like 50 to 150 Asylum films. He didn’t know how many! But he’s so engrained in that world. Basically, we were emailing back and forth trying to organise a time, and he had a few hours between movies he was filming, so we got to go to his house and chat. It was really weird and surreal! But what I loved about him was that he just loved being on set. Whether it is The Dark Knight or an Asylum movie, he just loves acting in front of a camera. There was such a warmth in that because I feel like people can think Hollywood actors are so embittered. But he didn’t come across that way.
Thank you to Anthony for his time, and to Umbrella Entertainment and NixCo PR for organising the interview. Mockbuster is in Australian cinemas August 27.
