Baghead Premiere, Interview and Giveaway

Baghead was actually shot way back in 2006. Was it completely painful to put it away for so long? Or did it work to your advantage to have a break between shooting and post?

We knew we wanted to take it to Sundance 2008, so that did leave us with about a year of post-production, which we very unwisely squandered under the guise of "let's take our time on this one... really let it breathe..." Idiots. Basically, we edited slowly for 6 months and then ended up sprinting for the Sundance deadline like we we do every year.

Most of your dialog is improvised, and I'd guess that a lot of what comes through onscreen depends heavily on the real-life personalities of the actors. Does anyone ever say or do something on camera that actually affects someone else in real life?

You're right about the dialog improv and us relying somewhat on real-life personalities, but so far no major feelings have been hurt (that we know of). We tend to surround ourselves with people who are pretty self-aware and, basically, ready to take one for the team.

A film about filmmakers is obviously gonna be self-referential. Did making Baghead feel like purging your negative feelings about the indie film scene, or did it just make you sad about the state of things? Or neither?

For us, it was really just an opportunity to make fun of ourselves up there. Aspiring filmmakers and actors are such a tragically desperate bunch (ourselves included) that we thought it would be a funny subject to mine. But, at the same time, we don't really believe in "poking" fun at our characters. We'll only put them up there if we really like them, too. And, to us, the desperate actor/filmmaker persona has a lot of heart. Kinda like Rocky. Just trying to go the distance with the champ, but knowing they probably won't make it. Classic hero stuff.

With both brothers completely behind the camera, was it harder to split the Directing duties? Who'd win if you had to judo fight over each decision?

Our grandfather used to have a bit too much "juice" on the weekends and would inevitably end up showing us judo moves at 1am with a Godzilla movie in the background. I believe Jay retained more knowledge of those moves (as he was older) but now i have a distinct height/weight advantage. I think it would be a good one.

I imagine you have the flexibility to shoot pretty much anywhere. Why come back to Austin for Baghead?

We're obsessed with Polvo's. And Barton Springs. And the Alamo. This is hard to say. We kind of grew up here as filmmakers and feel very at home doing our thing here. It all seems much more doable in Austin than, say, LA. We didn't have to mess with permits or any of that crap. We really try to make our productions as similar as we can to the way we made movies when we were kids. Us, a video camera, our friends, an idea, a bag of spicy Cheetos. Maybe some Sunny Delight.

What else are you working on right now? Are you at liberty to say anything about your upcoming big-studio projects?

Sure. We have two movies we're writing and directing for Fox Searchlight. Another we're doing with Universal and another that's based around this amazing French movie star named Alain Chabat. Lots of things going, but the studio world always moves slowly. So, we're headed to New Orleans to make THE DO-DECA-PENTATHLON... an in-depth comedic study of overly competitive brothers. Judo chop!