Blackmore Filmworks

John Benjamin and William O'Kelly are the sick brains behind Blackmore Filmworks. They've been best friends since dinosaurs roamed the earth and they've managed to avoid extinction.

I met these guys through the Flint Film Festival and they're wild, crazy, crass and can be downright asses, and that's why we get along. I am also starring in one of John's projects. Yes, I have put on my acting goggles without fear. If you've seen the acting skills in Blackmore Films such as The Game or The Collector then you'd have a huge case of acting balls too. I kid! I kid!

Bill and John are cool guys and I love 'em. Yes, I love them! Shhh, don't tell anyone. For this interview I was only able to sit down with John because Bill is the hot shot and was off in another part of the country.

Dangerous: Blackmore Films is you and your boy Bill, right?

John: Yes, ma'am.

Dangerous: So, how did you guys hook up?

John: Do you want the prim and proper story?

Dangerous: (laughing) Stop!

John: We met in 6th grade and he had just burnt up his mothers curtains. The bathroom curtains.

Dangerous: What the hell?

John: Well we were speaking about how we liked to make films at school one day and during the conversation he mentioned that he got his ass kicked hard because he took his model of the Titanic and set it on fire in the tub and in the process the bathroom curtains set on fire.

Dangerous: So, he's always been an idiot?

John: Yea, we all were. There's been so much damage.

Dangerous: So, you guys have been doing film since 6th grade?

John: Yea, I don't wanna say how long ago that was…1972.

Dangerous: What school?

John: Birch Run. There's nothing else to do up there!

Dangerous: I wouldn't think so. Where the hell is Bill right now?

John: In California on a business trip, I think. Yea, they get tired of looking at him at work so off he goes. But yea he burnt the curtains. My mom had a revolving credit at the trauma center down at the hospital (speaking in mom's voice) "Oh he had some gun powder out and he was trying to burn his miniature volcano up!"

Dangerous: Do you have any of those old films?

John: Yea, I've got a handful of them. I can't look at them though, I just cringe! People could have died. You can't mix 3 volatile chemicals together and put a firecracker in it and expect nothing to happen.

Dangerous: You're still here! You didn't go to school for film did you?

John: No, it probably shows when you see our movies.

(both laugh)

John: My dad looked liked he had a camera attached to his face when I was little. We still have bags full of movies and I started watching the stuff and learning things. I would be like Wow, OK!!

Dangerous: He didn't do horror did he?

John: No, he just done silly family things, but he'd do something where he would stop the camera and start it up again and my mom would disappear and I'm like that's really cool!

Dangerous: OK, so why the sick and twisted stuff, John?

John: Because I'm not sick and twisted! I cry at Hallmark commercials, but that appeals to me because it's interesting. Evil is interesting.

Dangerous: I know what you're saying because I'm "Dangerous Lee", but I'm the biggest wuss!

John: Oh, I am too. You can beat me down right now.

Dangerous: What makes me Dangerous is that I can talk $h!t, but I wouldn't actually do $h!t! (laughs)

John: I'm the same way. People watch these movies and then they meet me, I have the hair and the tattoos and they're kind of looking at me, but they say well you're kinda normal aren't ya? I'm like what were you expecting Charles Manson?

Dangerous: Well, you do look kinda weird. Before the tape started you were telling me how Blackmore Films got the name.

John: Do you really want the official story?

Dangerous: Yes, we can handle it.

John: It was the fall of 1978. I was in the backseat of a 1972 green Impala with my friend Bill. Not in the backseat in that sense, but we were smoking a big fat one and we were seeing Venus and Mars and all of a sudden a Ritchie Blackmore tune came on and it was like the movie 'Dude, Where's My Car'…"Dude, we should call it Blackmore Filmworks. That'd be really cool because I like this tune!" It was born out of the drug culture.

Dangerous: You have a separate film company called Anarchy, right? Wasup with the separate thing?

John: Well, we have projects that we do together under Blackmore and he runs around and does his own thing and I run around do my own thing. His company is called Hooker Productions.

Dangerous: Is that hooker as in whore?

John: No, I think it's named after some sort of machinery. You'd have to ask him, though. So, this way if I do something that's too outrageous he can say he had nothing to do with it.

Dangerous: Do you guys have anything else you're working on besides the current project that we're working on?

John: Oh, I'm so thrilled to have Dangerous Lee in this movie. Dear Readers: She's doing a wonderful job and she will go far! I have a pile of scripts here. I write just to write. I have a dull job, but I work for really good people. They give me a ½ hour break and access to a computer so I just type.

Dangerous: OK, so you know you have to tell everyone about the movie that we're working on, right?

John: Fatal Charade: The Executioner's Tale 3. Yes, what would you like to know?

Dangerous: You're doing episodes now, but what was the beginning?

John: The first one we didn't have a script. I have some really good friends that have a good sense of humor. I told them that I rented this building and it's got a crazy atmosphere. We made it up every step of the way and it shows. It's creepy and it's got some amateurish stuff to it, but people got a grin out of it. Their jaws were dropping!

Dangerous: Who did you have watching this stuff?

John: We actually had a room at the second Flint Film Festival. They shouldn't have done it. It looked like Chuck E. Cheese in there. People were throwing stuff at the screen and hollering. I was like wow we got something here! These guys get it. It's just fun and it's not bad to have a lil' blood and some pretty women.

Dangerous: Right! A lil' T & A doesn't hurt. So, is it about bondage or is it about something else?

John: No, people say that they're bondage movies and bondage to me is a ball gag and a ??? (some freaky word I can't understand) lil thing in the bedroom, but no it's just…I don't know I have to think about it.

Dangerous: I think to those that have a freaky mind it is bondage and I am a lil' freaky so I see it as a bondage thing, but….

John: It's more torture. People get horrified watching it. They jump and squirm in their seats!

Dangerous: Where do you find all your bad actors?

John: Friends, family, girlfriends, writers at newspapers, other people I know.

Dangerous: Ok, so why am I the first sista to be in a Blackmore Film?

John: I hate to bring ya down, but I never looked at it that way you're just a woman.

Dangerous: I know, but I like being the first!

John: We're open to everybody.

John didn't quite get my over his head joke in reference to there being MORE BLACK in Blackmore films. Get it, the name? Moving on…

John: You came into a Flint Film Festival meeting looking so cute one day and I was like Ooh, she's gotta be in my film. We've had an Asian woman does that count?

Dangerous: Yes, of course! I'm just saying I'm that crazy sista that will do this type of stuff.

John: If someone comes up to me and says they want to be in it I'm like OK you're in it! They're like don't I have to audition? No!

Dangerous: Are you looking for more people?

John: Yes, of all races, sizes, shapes…

Dangerous: Stop! (laughing) As far as sizes and shapes go yea, you're open. You got my fat ass in there!

John: I couldn't get in front of the camera.

Dangerous: But you have.

John: When I'm forced to and I hate it. You, Trish, and Aleah have my respect because I could not do….I don't know, I don't have Robert Redford looks. Brad Pitt maybe.

Dangerous: The movie we're doing now reminds you of ummm….

John: Hostel! Which by the way they stole my movie.

Dangerous: I haven't seen it yet. Where have you been doing the filming for this film?

John: We have a back room in a dog grooming place called Margie's Menagerie. I've been renting from her for 8 years now. She's very supportive. I also use the streets of Flint.

While on the set the other day a lady stopped by and asked what we were doing and wanted to know where Margie was as she took photos of our cars. She thought we were robbing the place and came back later with her son to check on us. What the hell can we steal from a pet grooming place?

Dangerous: You're also a photographer?

John: Yea, I had a photography business for 15 years called Classic Designs and I just kinda went straight to pay the bills. I do it now just for fun or for friends or promotional stuff for our movies.

Dangerous: You do a lot of Black and White photography.

John: Yea, I love moody stuff. I do color too. I love Black and White films like the old universal horror movies.

Dangerous: I hate Black and White films!

John: Do you? There isn't one black and white movie you can sit through?

Dangerous: (after thinking) Probably The Bad Seed or the ummm, damn! Ummm, Imitation of Life! I like that, so there are two. I lied.

John: Wanna know what my two all time favorite movies are? Don't laugh. The Original Texas Chainsaw Massacre.

Dangerous: That makes sense for you.

John: Ok, don't laugh, The Bridges of Madison County.

Dangerous: I love that movie!

John: It brings a tear to my eye.

Dangerous: Me too. I'm a sucker for that movie. I can see it a thousand times and cry each time. Why are we such punks and come off so tough?

John: It's just a persona.