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Stars: Sonny Carl Davis, Diana Prince, Israel Sharpe, Bree Essrig, Whitney Moore, Robin Sydney, Cody Renee Cameron, Christiana Cinn, Circus-Szalewski, Kaius Harrison, Noelle Ann Mabry | Written by Kent Roudebush | Directed by Charles Band

Seventeen years after the original, and four years since the last film in the franchise, Evil Bong 777, Evil Bong 888: Infinity High brings the saga of EeBee to a close. At least that’s what director and Full Moon head honcho, Charles Band is saying now, but as we all knew, he’s never met a sequel he didn’t like.

Rabbit has finally decided to turn over a new leaf and become a legit businessman, a restaurateur to be precise. While his first day in business doesn’t bring him much business it does bring him a Maître d’, or Maître Double d’ as he puts it, Thomasina “Tom” Atkins.

But there are also problems...

Arlo (Alex Dobrenko, Hell No) and Julie (Ashley Spillers, Loves Her Gun) are your typical young twentysomething Austinites. Arlo works at a software company but writes historical articles about General Grant on the side. Julie is a waitress at a restaurant that looks like Eastside Cafe. They live, love and get by in a fourplex on W. 29th. One day, Julie receives a couple of puzzle pieces in the mail.

Such is the premise for director Steve Mims' adorable mystery-comedy Arlo and Julie. Filmed around Austin -- and on a soundstage at Ut's Rtf department -- this movie is a quirky look at obsession. As Julie and Arlo become more and more engrossed in this puzzle of puzzles, their lives and goals are ignored. The script, which Mims also wrote, is filled with laughs and bits of Civil War trivia. 

Old jazzy numbers punctuate scenes of Julie and Arlo...

If you’re in the mood for something really scary — and maybe a little off beat — to watch this Halloween, you’re in luck! A terrific crop of wickedly frightening and ghoulishly grotesque horror flicks that terrorized the underground film circuit have made their way to your favorite VOD streaming service just in time for this All Hallow’s Eve.

Saturday Morning Mystery, dir. Spencer Parsons (Amazon | Itunes) Saturday Morning Mystery is one of the best, most original horror movies in recent memory. The film cashes in on both the modern obsession with paranormal investigating as well as on that classic Saturday morning cartoon, Scooby-Doo. But, this ain’t no kiddie film! Four hipsters and their (non-talking) dog look to solve a good ghost mystery and immediately find themselves way in over their heads. Gory and outrageous in more ways than one, what’s most impressive about this flick is how smart,...

One of the made-in-Austin films having its premiere at this year's Austin Film Festival is Dear Sidewalk, a romantic comedy about a mail carrier (Joseph Mazzello, Jurassic Park, Justified) who falls for an older divorcee (Michelle Forbes, True Blood, The Killing).  Also featured in the cast is one Ashley Spillers, who has acted in many buzzworthy local films of late (The Bounceback, Pit Stop, Loves Her Gun) and even appears in the viral short Hell No.

The former Austinite also stars in the horror-comedy Saturday Morning Massacre (aka Saturday Morning Mystery if you are buying it at Wal-Mart), which screens at the Housecore Horror Film Festival on, appropriately enough, Saturday morning.

Before Austin Film Festival started up, Spillers took part in this email interview for us.

Slackerwood: How did you come to be involved in Dear Sidewalk?

Ashley Spillers: Well, I auditioned! Beth Sepko was casting and she called...

Austin, Texas filmmaker Don Swaynos’s howlingly funny surrealist comedy Pictures of Superheroes is now available to rent and buy on VOD. You can stream the film on Amazon, as well as get the film via outlets such as iTunes, Google Play and other outlets.

The film stars a fantastically deadpan Kerri Lendo as Marie, a professional cleaning woman who gets dumped by her boyfriend, Phil (Byron Brown) and hired by a manic entrepeneur, Eric (Shannon McCormick), on the same day. While cleaning Eric’s suburban home, Marie discover that the businessman has a hidden, child-like roommate, Joe (John Merriman), who may or may not have romantic notions towards her.

Have You Seen This Movie? Available On: Amazon

Lendo, a stand-up comedian and filmmaker in her own right, makes her feature film acting debut here and carries the film perfectly as a stranger — riddled with her own pent-up neuroses — navigating...

Here's the latest Austin film news.

Austin Film Festival announced more panels and panelists for this year's conference: writer Ron Nyswaner, whose credits include Philadelphia and The Painted Veil; producer Ben Blacker, who will moderate The Nerdist Writers Panel; Daniel Schechter, writer/director of Goodbye Baby; and David Shore, the creator of the TV series House, M.D., as well as a writer for The Practice and Law and Order. The full Aff Conference lineup will be announced later this month.University of Texas in Austin alumnus Glen Powell is slated to appear in The Expendables 3 alongside Sylvester Stallone, Harrison Ford, Mel Gibson and Antonio Banderas, reports Austin Movie Blog. Powell got his start in movies with 2003's Spy Kids 3-D: Game Over and has appeared in more than a dozen TV and shows and movies, including Austinite Kat Candler's Jumping Off Bridges.The Austin-made horror-comedy Saturday Morning...

We’re back with another Q&A feature, this time talking with Saturday Morning Mystery director Spencer Parsons, who tells us about growing up with Scooby-Doo, balancing horror and comedy, and his time on the set of the movie:

With this movie being Scooby-Doo influenced, can you tell me about your experience with Scooby-Doo as a child? What’s one of your favorite episodes?

Spencer Parsons: Oh yeah, when I was little, it was huge to me. My little brother and I would stay over at my grandmother’s house and wake up early to watch it with my older cousins while snarfing down sugary breakfast cereals my mom never let us have. By the time Jason of Star Command came on, I’d be flying high on Count Chocula, trying to get pony rides from the cocker spaniel. So I’d call it formative.

But Scooby and any...

Saturday Morning Mystery is now available on VOD and is starting to open in a number of theaters across the Us. If you’d like a better idea of what to expect from the movie, take a look at our exclusive clip and the official trailer.

“Four professional ghost hunters, who travel in a vintage van accompanied by their canine companion (sound familiar?), get far more than they bargained for when they investigate an abandoned schoolhouse with a mysterious past.”

Saturday Morning Mystery was directed by Spencer Parsons and stars Josephine Decker, Paul Gordon, Jonny Mars, Ashley Spillers and Adam Tate. The movie was first released to VOD on July 17th and its limited theatrical release started on on August 10th. A DVD release is planned for August 20th. Here are the upcoming locations, dates, and times when the movie will screen:

Los Angeles – Laemmle Noho on Thursday, 8/15, at 7:...

Theatrical release dates, locations, and showtimes have been announced for Saturday Morning Mystery, coming out in August from XLrator Media, and we have all the info you need right here.

The film is directed by Spencer Parsons and written by Jory Balsimo, Aaron Leggett, and Jason Wehling. You can find it on VOD now and in the following theatres beginning August 10, 2013.

* Brooklyn - Videology on Saturday, 8/10, at 9:30 pm

* Los Angeles - Laemmle Noho on Thursday, 8/15, at 7:30 pm

* Seattle - Tin Room on Friday, 8/16, and Saturday, 8/17, at 10:00 pm

* Chicago - Music Box on Friday, 8/16, and Saturday, 8/17, at 12:00 midnight

Related Story: Guest Blog: Director Spencer Parsons on Saturday Morning Mystery; Exclusive New Stills!

Josephine Decker, Paul Gordon, Jonny Mars, Ashley Spillers, and Adam Tate star.

Synopsis:

Four professional ghost hunters, who travel in a vintage van accompanied by their canine companion (sound familiar?), get far more than they...

Saturday Morning Mystery is now available on VOD and will be given a limited theatrical release early next month. If you’re interested in checking out the movie in theaters, we have details on where and when it will be screening.

“Four professional ghost hunters, who travel in a vintage van accompanied by their canine companion (sound familiar?), get far more than they bargained for when they investigate an abandoned schoolhouse with a mysterious past.”

Saturday Morning Mystery was directed by Spencer Parsons and stars Josephine Decker, Paul Gordon, Jonny Mars, Ashley Spillers and Adam Tate. The movie was first released to VOD on July 17th, with a limited theatrical release starting on on August 10th. A DVD release is planned for August 20th. Here are the locations, dates, and times when the movie will screen:

Los Angeles – Laemmle Noho is confirmed for Thu 8/15 at 7:30pm. Brooklyn – Videology on 8/10 at 9:30pm.

Saturday Morning Mystery, the scare-tastic indie horror flick directed by Spencer Parsons that freaked out audiences on the festival circuit last year, is now available for home frightening on iTunes.

The film follows the exploits of four teenage ghost hunters and their pet dog — hmm, that sounds familiar — as they investigate a haunted mansion. But, this ain’t no light-hearted kiddie cartoon romp as the quartet encounter satanic rituals, cannibalism, acid trips and other forms of extreme ickiness. Genuinely scary and filled with great gore, Saturday Morning Mystery is one of the most original and devilishly fun horror movies of the last couple of years.

The official Underground Film Journal review will be up soon, but don’t wait for us. Stream/download this fantastically entertaining horror romp today!

(Previously known as Saturday Morning Massacre on the fest circuit.)

Watch the trailer for Saturday Morning Mystery:...

Along with some exclusive and really bloody new stills, we have a special guest blog on tap for you guys from director Spencer Parsons about his new film, Saturday Morning Mystery; old cartoons; and much, much more! Dig it!

Truth be known, I’m more of a Buford Files guy than a Scooby-Doo guy, probably because that one ripped off Smokey and the Bandit, and every episode took place in a swamp, with way more opportunity for moss monsters. But man alive, ‘70s TV barfed up a ton of these Scooby wanna bes about ghost-chasers-with-dogs. And all of them got repeated endlessly through the ‘80s in syndication, even the ones that didn’t last a whole season. Shows like Clue Club, Butch Cassidy and Goober and the Ghost Chasers, plus less dog-centric mystery team cartoons like Fangface, Speed Buggy, or The New Shmoo. There were more, and I could go on,...

Attention fans of dark, surreal drama, there’s a new voice in town and here’s hoping she sticks around. When I came to her new film Butter on the Latch, I didn’t recognize Josephine Decker’s name but a little research revealed I had seen her before, not just in films like Joe Swanberg’s Uncle Kent and the Scooby-Doo inspired thriller Saturday Morning Massacre, but in censored photos recounting [...]...

We haven't heard much about Spencer Parsons' Saturday Morning Massacre lately, but we've learned it has a new title, revised trailer, DVD box art, and release info via XLrator Media. Now that's an update worth waiting for!

The film, directed by Spencer Parsons and written by Jory Balsimo, Aaron Leggett, and Jason Wehling, is now called Saturday Morning Mystery. A possible reaction to all the negative feelings toward violence these days? Who knows, but in any event you can find it on VOD beginning July 17th and in theatres on August 9, 2013.

Josephine Decker, Paul Gordon, Jonny Mars, Ashley Spillers, and Adam Tate star.

Synopsis:

Four professional ghost hunters, who travel in a vintage van accompanied by their canine companion (sound familiar?), get far more than they bargained for when they investigate an abandoned schoolhouse with a mysterious past.

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Austin-based actress Heather Kafka shows up in features Pit Stop, The Bounceback, Loves Her Gun, When Angels Sing, and short Black Metal which are all screening at SXSW next month. Let's just say that if you see a film with local ties during the festival, there's about a 75% chance that Kafka will be in it. You might have seen her previously in locally made movies like Lovers of Hate, Saturday Morning Massacre, Slacker 2011 (pictured above) ... and she's the woman trying to buy from the Carl's Jr. kiosk in Idiocracy.

Kafka took some time to talk to us (via email) about working in the friendly Austin film community and taking on roles that her grandma shouldn't see.

Slackerwood: You appear in a number of the films showing at SXSW this year. How did you become involved with these film projects?

Heather Kafka: Sometimes I'm lucky. When I came back...

Here's the latest Austin movie news.

Films such as Slacker and Grindhouse may have put the "third coast" on the map, but the Texas House and Senate have proposed to eliminate the Texas Moving Image Industry Incentive Program budget, which provides financial incentives for movies, video games and advertising, according to Austin Movie Blog. The state legislative bodies budget proposals include $4.2 million for the Texas Film Commission and Texas Music Office, which would not include incentives, instead of the $39.2 million the Governor's office requested. If approved, the budget cuts could cause many productions to move out of Texas.The "third coast" isn't down yet. Austin Film Festival is kicking off the return of its Audience Series with a screening of the Austin-made horror-comedy Saturday Morning Massacre (Jette's review) on Monday, February 4 at Alamo Drafthouse Village. The film, which screened at Aff 2012, is about a group of down-on-their-luck paranormal investigators and their beloved pooch,...

I'm passionate about short films -- as evidenced by my role as a programmer for Austin Film Society's ShortCase series -- and hope to see quite a few at Sundance this coming week. A record number of 8,102 short films were submitted for the 2013 Sundance Short Film program, with only 65 short films making the cut. 

You don't have to trek to Park City to enjoy some of these shorts -- a dozen of the best are now available online in The Screening Room, a YouTube channel curated by Sundance short film programmers. Austin represents with local writer/director Kat Candler's Black Metal, starring Jonny Mars (Saturday Morning Massacre, Hellion) and Heather Kafka (Lovers of Hate). This short yet powerful and evocative piece leaves viewers wanting more of the story of Ian, a death metal rocker who must deal with the consequences of a fan's actions.  

Watch Black Metal here after the jump.

Ready, Set, Fund is a column about crowdfunding and related fundraising endeavors for Austin and Texas independent film projects.

At first glance it might seem rather odd to feature English music icon Phil Collins in this month's column, but Collins has quite a personal connection to Texas history. Due to his interest in the Battle of the Alamo of 1836, his personal collection of artifacts related to the Alamo numbers in the hundreds, and he's narrated at a sound and light show about the Alamo. While on a publicity tour across Texas to promote his new book, The Alamo and Beyond: A Collector's Journey, Collins was interviewed by Texas Filmmakers Production Fund recipient filmmaker Ben Powell about his obscure collection as well as his retirement from music.

Phil Collins and the Wild Frontier, which is currently funding on Kickstarter through Sunday, January 20, focuses on Collins' attempt "to redefine his public persona.

Here at Dread Central we can never get too much horror, and the good folks over at Rhodesclosed Productions and Willow Road Entertainment are ready to deliver a one, two punch of terror!

In 2013 they'll be producing both the horror anthology I Scream You Scream and the slasher flick Released.

I Scream You Scream is a modern day throwback to The Twilight Zone: The Movie and Creepshow, with a darker and original twist. The producers promise fright with the upcoming anthology as well as a new spin on the genre. The producers will be attaching seven to eight directors in the fall of 2012. Directors that are currently attached include Jack Perez (director of Mega Shark vs. Giant Octopus and Some Guy Who Kills People), Spencer Parsons (director of Saturday Morning Massacre), Kris Swanberg (Empire Builder), and Frank Ross (director of Audrey the Trainwreck and Tiger Tail in Blue). Brian Levin...

Ready, Set, Fund is a column about crowdfunding and related fundraising endeavors for Austin and Texas independent film projects.

Local director Geoff Marslett (Mars) has wrapped filming in Austin and New York City for his first live-action feature film, Loves Her Gun (pictured at top), which stars several familiar Austin actors including Chris Doubek, John Merriman, Ashley Rae Spillers (Saturday Morning Massacre), and Heather Kafka (Lovers of Hate). It's about a Brooklyn hipster who flees to Austin after she's been attacked. Funding for post-production work is still needed, so the filmmakers are running an Indiegogo campaign through Wednesday, December 5. Currently the only way to get DVDs of Marslett's film Mars is as a perk at the $25 backer level or higher. Marslett says that if the campaign meets its fundraising goal then Loves Her Gun is expected to screen in early 2013.

61 Bullets is a historical documentary project that centers around a famous assassination in 1935. U.

Held back on Sept. 21-29, the 5th annual Arizona Underground Film Festival was a major blow-out event of extreme underground greatness. And, to top it all off, they handed out a gaggle of awards to both feature films and shorts alike.

The big winner was the Best of Fest award that went to Michael Melamedoff’s sly drama The Exhibitionists, about a bunch of hedonists gathered on New Year’s Eve. Meanwhile, the Audience Award went to the reality TV parody Ghosts With Shit Jobs by Chris McCawley, Jim Morrison, Jim Munroe and Tate Young; and Kenton Bartlett’s torture flick Missing Pieces won the Director’s Award.

Some other winners include Spencer Parsons’ Saturday Morning Massacre for Best Horror Feature, a film that while not reviewed yet on Bad Lit: The Journal of Underground Film we’ve seen it and easily declare one of the best horror movies of the last few years.

One more feather in the awards cap for David O. Russell's "Silver Linings Playbook": The Austin Film Festival, which ran October 18-25, announces the film as  winner of its Marquee Feature Audience Award. A full list of the festival's award winners is below. Marquee Feature Audience Award: Silver Linings Playbook Writer/Director: David O. Russell Narrative Feature Audience Award: Junk Writers: Kevin Hamedani, Ramon Isao Director: Kevin Hamedani Documentary Feature Audience Award: (Tie) Spinning Plates Writer/Director: Joseph Levy Rising From Ashes Director: T.C. Johnstone Comedy Vanguard Audience Award: The Muslims Are Coming! Directors: Negin Farsad, Dean Obeidallah Dark Matters Audience Award: Saturday Morning Massacre Writers: Jory Balsimo, Aaron Leggett, Jason Wehling Director: Spencer Parsons Narrative Short Audience Award: Asad Writer/Director: Bryan Buckley ...

When is a Scooby-Doo satire not exactly a Scooby-Doo satire? When it arrives in the form of an indie horror flick like Saturday Morning Massacre, a low-budget but clever enough little concoction from a group of young filmmakers who have little besides a game cast, a creepy location, and (fortunately) some actual skills in the filmmaking department. Here we have a group of four young adults and a loyal dog who trek across the country investigating, you guessed it, mysterious paranormal occurrences, only to finally butt heads with something horrific and inexplicable. So while it's true that the premise is pretty familiar, director Spencer Parsons and his numerous co-writers find ways to subvert convention and deliver a clever little homage that's both "in-joke" funny and, eventually, pretty darn scary.

  Don't let the phrase "Scooby-Doo satire" turn you off; Saturday Morning Massacre is not broad wackiness or cartoony sound effects. It's...

Directed by: Spencer Parsons

Written by: Jory Balsimo, Aaron Leggett, Jason Wehling

Featuring: Ashley Rae Spillers, Josephine Decker, Adam Tate, Jonny Mars, Paul Gordon

Drawing inspiration from Scooby-Doo, Ghost Hunters and scary movies of the '70s and '80s, Saturday Morning Massacre is a horror parody that's equal parts frightening and funny. Made with affection and a knowing eye, this sly film is for anyone who ever wanted to see how the meddling members of Mystery Inc. would fare if they, say, walked onto the set of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre.

In this entertaining flick, which screened last night as part of the Austin Film Festival, the Scooby gang is reimagined as real-world paranormal investigators struggling to make ends meet in the grungy mid-1990s. Teetering on the brink of bankruptcy, the team stumbles into a paying gig involving a deserted mansion with a sordid Satanic history.

This...

The 5th annual Minneapolis Underground Film Festival, which was held back on August 17-19, gave out a nine awards to seven films.

The biggest winner of the event was a short film: Barry Kimm’s documentary Tattoo Underground, which took home three awards for Best Sound, Cinematography and the Largest Audience Award. The film explores the emotional connection between three people and their tattoos.

Other winners include Spencer Parson’s Saturday Morning Massacre, which won for Best Feature and has been killing it in general on the film festival circuit this year; Go Ganges!, the travel doc by Jj Kelly and Josh Thomas won for Best Documentary; Mike Nelson’s The Retirement of Joe Corduroy won for Best Short Film; while the Audience Choice went to the short film Buffalo Shampoo, which was directed by local filmmaker Ryan Becken.

The full list of winners is below:

Best Feature Winner

Saturday Morning Massacre,...

To celebrate their 5th anniversary, the Arizona Underground Film Festival has expanded to a whopping nine nights on Sept. 21-29 for a cinematic event the likes of Tucson has never seen before!

The shenanigans kick off with the opening night film The Legend of Kaspar Hauser, an experimental Italian feature directed by Davide Manuli and starring Vincent Gallo as the hero and the villain to a strange young boy, then end with the closing night film Jason M. Solomon’s nostalgic documentary 7 Years Underground: A 60′s Tale, which profiles the legendary Cafe Au Go Go in NYC that hosted such up-and-coming acts such as Jimi Hendrix, Frank Zappa, George Carlin, Lily Tomlin and more.

In between those two films lies a twisted carnage of movie mayhem, including Spencer Parsons’ demented homage to ’70s mystery cartoons Saturday Morning Massacre; Michael Melamedoff exploitative semi-doc The Exhibitionists; Stephen Amis’ Australian WWII sci-fi...

The theme for this year’s B-Movie, Underground and Trash Film Festival, held in the city of Breda in the Netherlands, is “Apocalypse.” So get ready to watch the world end dozens of different ways on Sept. 5-9 at various venues around the city.

The fun kicks off on the 5th with the German movie Hell by director Tim Fehlbaum. If you didn’t know, “hell” means “bright” in German and, given that title, this flick is set appropriately in a post-apocalyptic future where global warming has decimated the planet and surviving tribes battle for water and food.

Other post-apocalyptic visions include Milan Konjevic’s Zone of the Dead starring legendary zombie killer Ken Foree; Davi de Oliveira Pinheiro’s Bazillian underground hit Beyond the Grave about a world where magic and madness rule the world; and Rob van Eyck’s bizarrely twisted Afterman and Afterman 2.

Not all the...

Here's the latest in Austin and Texas film news.

Austin-based film composer Brian Satterwhite has been commissioned by the Dallas Chamber Symphony to compose scores for two silent films, including A Sailor-Made Man, a Harold Lloyd film about a boy who accidentally enlists in the Navy to impress a girl, according to Satterwhite's blog. The scores will be performed live during the entire second half of the screenings on Nov. 13 and and Feb. 26 at the new Dallas City Performance Hall.IndieWire reported that University of Texas alumnus Todd Berger's film It's a Disaster, which premiered at the Los Angeles Film Festival, has been picked up by Oscilloscope for North American distribution. The ensemble comedy, starring America Ferrera and Julia Stiles, is about a group of friends who experience an apocalyptic bomb explosion during brunch. Speaking of films with local ties that premiered at Laff ... the Austin-shot movie Saturday Morning Massacre...

We chatted with the Saturday Morning Massacre cast and crew shortly before and after their well-received world premiere at the 2012 Los Angeles Film Festival. Here is a transcription of the finer points of our conversations with Spencer Parsons (director), Ashley Rae Spillers (actor), Jonny Mars (producer, actor), Josephine Decker (actor), Jory Balsimo (writer) and Aaron Leggett (writer) about Saturday Morning Massacre...

For their 5th annual edition, the Minneapolis Underground Film Festival is heating up by returning to the summer after being a winter event for the past three years. The fest will run on Aug. 17-19 with a killer lineup of films from all over the world — most of which probably will not be able to be seen in Minnesota except at this 3-day event.

Plus, there are two programming blocks of short films all made by local filmmakers, including Pam Colby’s Fertile Ashes, Ryan Becken’s Buffalo Shampoo, Janelle Sorenson & Melany Joy Beck’s Bring It 2 Peter, Jl Sosa’s Some of Angela and more.

The feature films screening this year cover an extremely diverse swath of subject matter, from every day people’s murder fantasies fulfilled — cinematically, at least — in Michal Koskowski’s German documentary Zero Killed; a tattoo comes to live to torment its wearer in...

This is the last in a series of four interviews related to the Austin-shot movie Saturday Morning Massacre (Jette's review), which recently premiered at Los Angeles Film Festival. Don't forget to read about our chats with producer Jonny Mars, screenwriters Aaron Leggett and Jory Balsimo, and director Spencer Parsons.

Austin-based actress Ashley Rae Spillers stars in Saturday Morning Massacre as Nancy, the plucky young leader of a group of amateur ghostbusters working their first paying case... and things don't go quite as planned. This is Spillers' first feature-film role, following her appearance in a few short films, including a segment of Slacker 2011. Slackerwood sat down with Spillers before the film's Laff premiere. Though this was her first feature film role, she's been busy ever since, working with a long list of Austin filmmakers. 

Slackerwood: How did you get involved with the film?

Spillers: This is the first feature I'd ever done.

This is the third in a series of four interviews related to the Austin-shot movie Saturday Morning Massacre (Jette's review), which recently premiered at Los Angeles Film Festival. Don't forget to read about our chats with producer Jonny Mars and screenwriters Aaron Leggett and Jory Balsimo, and look for the fourth interview later this afternoon.

Before he moved to Chicago to teach at Northwestern University, Spencer Parsons spent over a decade making movies in Austin. His first feature film, I'll Come Running, premiered at Laff in 2008 and also screened at Austin Film Festival that year. Despite the move, Parsons hasn't been able to escape Austin completely. His second feature film, Saturday Morning Massacre, shot locally, earned Parsons and crew a return trip to Laff earlier this month.

Jette and I sat down with Parsons and talked horror, the Austin film scene, his move to Chicago and (of course!) breakfast tacos.

Using Scooby Doo as a jumping off point, director Spencer Parsons's latest is a horror-parody of the classic cartoon series starring Ashley Spillers, Jonny Mars, Josephine Decker, and Adam Tate as questionably competent paranormal investigators. After the world premiere of Saturday Morning Massacre, we talked with director Spencer Parsons, producer/actor Jonny Mars, and stars Ashley Spillers and Josephine Decker about ghosts, Scooby Doo, and the mansion that inspired them to make a horror-parody film. This is your second time at Laff--how has your experience been different this year? Spencer Parsons: Well, it's always a different experience--different filmmakers, different films, different vibe. It's been great both times. It's fantastic to return. I really honestly couldn't be happy premiering this movie at the same festival cuz we...

This is the second in a series of four interviews related to the Austin-shot movie Saturday Morning Massacre (Jette's review), which recently premiered at Los Angeles Film Festival. Check back for the others in the next couple of days.

As Saturday Morning Massacre's producer Jonny Mars told us, the writers were brought in after the producers developed a treatment for a horror movie based around the Perry Mansion. Aaron Leggett and Jory Balsimo, longtime writing partners, have the details on how the script came together. 

Slackerwood: Tell us how you guys got involved with this film.

Aaron Leggett: We'd been writing with Spencer [Spencer Parsons] for a couple years. Spencer had a short playing at SXSW and he was crashing on my couch since he lives in Chicago now, and he came home one night and said, "I might be working on this crazy horror movie." We're like, "Hey Spencer,...

When life drops a creepy old mansion into your lap, you've got no choice but to make a horror movie out of it. And so, within weeks of the fortuitous real estate deal, producer Jonny Mars and crew got to work on the Austin-produced, Scooby Doo-inspired horror film Saturday Morning Massacre (Jette's review), which premiered at the Los Angeles Film Festival earlier this month. The ornate, menacing mansion serves as not only the primary location for the film but is one of its biggest characters.

We sat down to chat with Mars (The Happy Poet, Hellion, America's Parking Lot), a local actor and filmmaker, about how the movie came together, and what it was like acting and producing Saturday Morning Massacre. Mars discussed the intricacies of "run-and-gun" filmmaking, gave us the lowdown on some of the other locations seen in the film and talked a bit about the plethora...

Director Spencer Parsons (I’ll Come Running) introduced Saturday Morning Massacre to a packed crowd of horror film enthusiasts late Tuesday night as something you would see if you stayed up all night watching B-horror films (while possibly indulging in some “Scooby snacks”) and now the sun is coming up, cartoons are on, you are eating a massive bowl of sugar (i.e. Count Chocula), and you find yourself starting to doze off. Massacre follows four paranormal activity detectives (plus their dog Hamlet) as they try and solve mysteries that seem to be due to ghosts or other mysterious activity, but (much like the Saturday morning cartoon they seem to emulate) these amateur detectives uncover more misdeeds than ghosts on their missions. A promising job (meaning they will actually get paid) comes in, and group leader Nancy (Ashley Spillers) has the crew pile into Frankie’s (Sean Ryan) van (which has yet to prove to be mysterious...

Directed by Spencer Parsons

Featuring Jory Balsimo, Sonny Carl Davis and Josephine Decker

I was really looking forward to watching some kind (well, any kind) of Massacre. To my dismay Saturday Morning Massacre had no massacre in it.

It is another convoluted, poorly written, terribly acted, bad looking, non-scary “scary” movie wherein absolutely Nothing happens until the movie is almost over. You would probably enjoy this movie if you have lived under a rock because you are a snail and know nothing about the world.

Note to the film makers: just because you use rockabilly music and “cool” haircuts on your actors while dressing them like the “cool” poser kids doesn’t mean you are making a horror movie. Also, just because you decide these characters are going to kind of, but not really, explore sex doesn’t make it edgy or modern; it makes it stale masturbation because not once,...

I wasn't at the Los Angeles Film Festival this weekend, sadly for me. However, former Austinite Spencer Parsons screened his locally shot horror-comedy Saturday Morning Massacre here in Austin last week, and I was lucky enough to be there. It's just the kind of horror movie I like -- lots of humor but not enough to dilute genuine scariness, and no prolonged graphic violence. Seeing it accomplished with familiar local talent was a happy bonus.

Saturday Morning Massacre is set in 1994, which seems random until you realize that's right before cell phones became commonplace, thus keeping them out of the picture. Four twentysomething slackers have formed a small business that videotapes and debunks paranormal activities, although it's not especially profitable. It's led by Nancy (Ashley Spillers), the short perky gal in the big pink sweater, and includes the attractive and clean-cut couple Gwen (Josephine Decker) and Chad (Adam Tate) as...

Ghost hunters are ripe for parody. There has been a deluge of horror movies about a team of paranormal investigators spending the night in an allegedly haunted house. Typically they start out skeptical but we all know angry ghosts are inevitable. There are variations but ghost hunting tales are stale at this point.

Saturday Morning Massacre, which is being called a live-action Scooby Doo (yes, there’s even a dog), establishes itself well and early on seems as if it will be a sharp and amusing horror-comedy.

The funniest scene in the movie happens near the beginning. The team of young paranormal investigators is making their way through a rundown building, and suddenly it appears as if there could be something supernatural present. Team lead Nancy (Ashley Spillers) opens a series of doors in a narrow hallway as the group grows increasingly anxious, and eventually they stumble upon a small group of adults and children.

In 2010, performance artist Marina Abramović had the attention of everybody, from snobby Manhattanites to Fox News. Her work (which includes a nude couple standing in a busy doorway, which is exactly what sent Fox News into a rage) was to be recreated by a number of assistants selected by the artist herself while, at the same time, she put on a new piece: “The Artist is Present.” The idea was simple -- Abramović would be seated in a large room, mute and still, with a patron perched across from her -- yet it proved to be intensely powerful for many (some were even moved to tears) and incredibly exhausting for the performer herself. With “Marina Abramović: The Artist Is Present,” Matthew Akers attempts to give an informative overview of her oeuvre, while detailing the extensive and strenuous Museum Of Modern Art retrospective of her work and the strangely ethereal titular performance.

I know, I know. A modern day, live action reinterpretation of Scooby Doo sounds like a really horrible Hollywood pitch. But, c’mon just hear me out… Because if any film community would be able to spin this particular pitch into gold, it would be Austin. The idea was originally hatched by Jonny Mars and Jason Wheling. They eventually brought Spencer Parsons (I’ll Come Running) on board as the director. Next, Aaron Leggett and Jory Balsimo were hired to flesh out the idea into a fully realized script. Then, the true moment of genius came — the casting. The slightly-skewed Scooby gang became embodied by Ashley Rae Spillers, Josephine Decker, Jonny Mars and Adam Tate, with masterful supporting turns by Chris Doubek, Paul Gordon, and Heather Kafka. The end result is Saturday Morning Massacre, a film that plays in dutiful homage to 1980s horror films with gory practical effects and boatloads of blood. Though...

Making its premiere at the upcoming Los Angeles Film Festival, "Saturday Morning Massacre" is a dark and bloody parody about a "Scooby Doo"-like team of paranormal investigators and their devoted dog who struggle for cash until they land a job getting to the bottom of a series of gruesome deaths in an abandoned schoolhouse. And we've got an exclusive clip from the film which you can see below.

Directed by Spencer Parsons ("I'll Come Running"), when asked about the appeal of parodying "Scooby Doo," he said, "I think a lot of kids grew up wondering what would happen if it ever turned out that the ghosts were real or if the owner of the haunted amusement park was a psychopath who’d chop them all up and then do really nasty things with the pieces. I think for a lot of horror fans, those cartoons were like the baby pool of the horror genre,...

Time to add a bit of a massacre to your afternoon as we've gotten our claws into the first stills and artwork for Saturday Morning Massacre, which will be playing as part of this year's Los Angeles Film Festival.

Saturday Morning Massacre – (Director Spencer Parsons Writers Jory Balsimo, Aaron Leggett, Jason Wehling Producers Jonny Mars, Jason Wehling Cast Josephine Decker, Paul Gordon, Jonny Mars, Ashley Spillers, Adam Tate) – Four professional ghost hunters, who travel in a vintage van accompanied by their canine companion (sound familiar?), get far more than they bargained for when they take on a rambling mansion with a mysterious past. ★ World Premiere

This year's Los Angeles Film Festival runs from June 14th-24th; click here for ticket info. Visit the official La Film Festival website for the full list of films showing.

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The 2012 Los Angeles Film Festival will run June 14-24, 2012, and included in the schedule are more than a few movies with ties to Austin or Texas. As Matthew Odam points out in his Tuesday post on Austin Movie Blog, the feature films Saturday Morning Massacre and Magic Mike are both in the lineup. Magic Mike is a Steven Soderbergh film starring Austin actor Matthew McConaughey.

Saturday Morning Massacre was directed by former Austinite Spencer Parsons and was shot locally. Cast members include Jonny Mars and Paul Gordon from The Happy Poet, Heather Kafka and Chris Doubek from Lovers of Hate and veteran character actor Sonny Carl Davis (The Whole Shootin' Match, Bernie). It's a horror movie that references a popular 70s cartoon about crime-fighting teens in a van with a dog.

Here are some more films with Austin/Texas connections scheduled to show during this year's fest:

Big Easy Express,...

Meet the meddling kids behind Saturday Morning Massacre via a new trailer and a series of photos that have been released to Shock Till You Drop this morning.

Spencer Parsons' film is going to make its debut at the L.A. Film Fest next month.  The story follows a crew of young paranormal investigators and their dog struggle for cash until they land a job getting to the bottom of a series of gruesome deaths in an abandoned schoolhouse.

Associate producer Adam Donahey tells us, "Imagine if all the meddling kids from Saturday morning cartoons really did go out and try to solve crimes, uncover murders and get in the middle of really sticky situations? I can assure you, they wouldn't get out unscathed if even alive.  Saturday Morning Massacre is a bloody parody of mystery cartoons and the consequences of meddling with the supernatural."

Head inside for the trailer and photos.

The lineup of the 2012 Los Angeles Film Festival was announced today, and while there are a lot of impressive entries heading to the West Coast, not many of them are horror films. But there are a few that caught our eye so read on for the details.

This year's Los Angeles Film Festival runs from June 14th-24th; click here for ticket info. Below are the horror and horror-ish sounding films on the fest's slate; visit the official La Film Festival website for the full list.

Vampira and Me – (Director/Producer R. H. Greene) – Before Elvira there was Vampira, the playfully ghoulish host of a local L.A. late night horror movie show who became a national celebrity, then disappeared. This loving, personal portrait reveals the remarkable woman behind the chalk-white mask. ★ World Premiere

P-047 – Thailand (Director/Writer Kongdej Jaturanrasamee Producers Soros Sukhum, Kongdej Jaturanrasamee Cast Parinya Kwamwongwan, Aphichai Trakulphadejkrai) – Part meditation,...

The opening night movie of the Los Angeles Film Festival — Woody Allen’s To Rome with Love — was announced three weeks ago (along with screenings of Sundance winners Middle of Nowhere and Beasts of the Southern Wild), but today the rest of the line-up was unveiled, with the headline news being that Steven Soderbergh’s male stripper romp, Magic Mike, starring Channing Tatum and Matthew McConaughey, will close out the June fest.

In the narrative competition, there are notable entries from Cory McAbee (The American Astronaut), Jared Moshé (a familiar name as a producer, making his first film as director), and Alex Karpovsky, whose other 2012 effort, Rubberneck, just premiered at Tribeca. Among the other premieres are the Uganda-set Lgbt doc Call Me Kuchu, the star-studded directorial debut of screenwriter Alex Kurtzman, People Like Us, and indie stalwart Spencer Parsons’ Saturday Morning Massacre.

A full list of the newly announced screenings...

HollywoodNews.com: Today the Los Angeles Film Festival, in conjunction with Presenting Media Sponsor the Los Angeles Times and Host Partner L.A. Live, announced the Closing Night film and official Us and international selections for the 2012 Festival. Guest Director, Artists in Residence and Conversations with special guests will be announced later this month. The 2012 Los Angeles Film Festival will screen a diverse slate of nearly 200 feature films, short films, and music videos, representing more than 30 countries, along with signature programs such as the Filmmaker Retreat, Poolside Chats, Coffee Talks, music events and more. As previously announced, Woody Allen’s To Rome With Love will be Opening Night, sponsored by Virgin America, and Lorene Scafaria’s Seeking a Friend for the End of the World, Ava DuVernay’s Middle of Nowhere and Benh Zeitlin’s Beasts of the Southern Wild were selected for the Galas section.

Returning to downtown Los Angeles and headquartered at L.

"…and I would have gotten away with it, too, if it wasn’t for you meddling kids!. Just how many episodes of "Scooby Doo" ended with that line? And did anyone ever wonder why the criminals were able to bamboozle the entire town and police squad with their schemes only to be foiled by a dog and four stoner kids who rolled into town two days earlier in a van that had to smell like malted hops, bong resin and dog farts? We’ve got some info on a new movie where the meddling kids don't necessarily fare so well.

Directed by Spencer Parsons and starring Ashley Spillers, Josephine Decker and Jonny Mars, Saturday Morning Massacrefollows some meddling paranormal investigators trying to make a buck. From the information we've managed to glean thus far, there is no talking dog in this film.

The film is currently in post-production and the official website titsandaxe.