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I KNOW WE CAN’T YET ANNOUNCE WHICH ONE, BUT YOUR FEATURE FILM, “EARTHLING”, WAS ACCEPTED TO A MAJOR FESTIVAL. TELL ME ABOUT THAT ONE.

With “Earthling”, I made a science fiction movie about a woman in her mid-30s who is infertile and trying to deal with the fact that she can’t have kids. It’s all about her, but it’s a science fiction film, too. I wanted to write a movie from a woman’s perspective that wasn’t this annoying movie cliché, where the female hero is basically a dude who has his genitals removed. This is a real woman dealing with her life, and it’s also a sci-fi film. This movie is completely unchartered territory for me. It’s a test. I have no idea whether anyone’s going to like it. I’ve never been more nervous about something in my life.

YOU’VE ESTABLISHED YOURSELF PRETTY WELL AS A FILMMAKER AND EDITOR. YOU COULD GO TO NEW YORK OR L.A.; WHY DO YOU STAY INDALLAS?

We made “MyMom Smokes Weed” for a couple hundred bucks. You could not do that in New York or L.A. There are no unions here; it’s a right-towork state. If you wanted to film in a diner, you’d have people bending over backward for you. In L.A., you couldn’t film anywhere for under $1,000. And there’s also the feeling that, if you walk into Starbucks and you see 40 people working on scripts, it completely trivializes what you’re doing. It takes the drive out of you to see so many people trying to do what you’re doing.

NOT EVERYONE THRIVES ON COMPETITION.

I have never been a competitive person. I’ve proven — I’m not bragging, but I have proven that I can make a good movie cheaply that people will like. All my friends who go to L.A. stop making movies. They become professional pitchers. They go to pitch grab-bagLAUNCH meetings all the time. In New York, they will kick you down and “no” you to death. Everyone will tell you “no”. L.A. is worse because they “yes” you and lead you to believe that something will happen, and it never does. At least here, I’m in control of my own destiny. this is all I do. It’s all I’ve done for 10 years. You have to diversify because it’s a small market. I own a small editorial company called ND outpost. I mostly make my money as a director of photography and editor. hoW WouLD You DEScrIBE Your cINEmAtIc St YLE?

So IS thErE A prEtt Y StroNg fILm commuNIt Y IN DALLAS?

It’s not big. there are a lot of people making really, really wretchedly bad movies here. But if someone is making good movies, you find each other really fast. So it’s mostly the same people. We all work for each other. When your friends are successful, it helps everyone out. Shooting “St. Nick” got me work. It got me good work. that movie did so well that it was good for everybody involved.

Do You hAvE A DAY joB, or IS fILmmAkINg Your fuLLtImE joB?

I like that rough-around-the-edges look to things. If you have a toopolished look, you start to lose trust in the filmmaker. the audience should not feel too safe. texas chainsaw massacre is a great example. that movie is frightening 35 years later because you don’t know if that director has any boundaries. If you look at the later versions of it, they’re too polished, and it tells you that this director is not going to cross a certain line. I feel like that same esthetic can be used in comedy. We call it a horror film where nobody gets killed. It’s not going to be that annoying indie comedy thing where it’s all well-lit and the music is like [corny]. It’s not going to be like that at all. It’s going to be shot like a horror film. —RACHEL

STONE

g Watch this and tell us if you catch the faintest whiff of our neighborhood. If it’s there, we must have blinked. Search: one more thing g A lot of things have come and gone in Red bird, but c olter’s bb Q has not changed since the first time we went there in 1988.

Search: colter’s g A couple of words of advice for the creators of Fox’s upcoming t V series “ c ode 58”, which will be shot in town and tell the story of two Dallas cops.

Search: code 58