Just got back from NYC! Went up there for the NY premiere of OPEN WATER.

The producer, Laura Lau, invited us out so Stef and I left the kids with our family and headed up on Monday morning. We hooked up with Gregg and Adrian and saw the film on Monday night.

OPEN WATER is really good. It’s just a simple but very cool idea that the studios would never touch. The execution was right-on, too. Just enough to get the audience where we needed to be and then left us right there in the water with the two leads. Incredibly tense at some points. Reminded me a lot of a little film we did five years ago.

But that’s all that the two films have in common. I know that OPEN WATER is being compared to BLAIR WITCH and I read some stupid stuff on the IMDB boards calling it a “rip-off” of our film, but I think all of that will stop once people see the movie. Besides the fact that it’s intense as hell and was shot for nothing on video, OPEN WATER is completely its own thing and just made me glad that these kinds of movies are still being made out there.

The whole night was kind of a nostalgia trip for us. Gregg and I were in line when we spotted Jeremy Walker, our publicist from BLAIR WITCH, doing his little publicist duties with the press. We called him over and hugged and touched and stuff. It was really good to see him. He took us over to the press area where they took some pictures of us (the photographers all yelling at Jeremy, “Who the hell are these guys?”) and then we did some quick interviews in the lobby. Everyone was asking what the hell we’ve been up to so we just made up some shit and moved on.

Super Publicist Jeremy Walker can’t help but rub Gregg’s prickly beard

After the movie we hooked up with Laura Lau and the director of OPEN WATER, Chris Kentis. Really cool people. Chris had this kind of “deer in the headlights” look in his eyes. I know exactly how he feels. They’re just starting this crazy ride of theirs. I kind of envy them but then have second thoughts when I think back on the freaking nightmare of attention we got after BW was released. Sure, it was a great time and we were all very lucky to have gone through it but would I want to go through that again? I don’t know. That shit was crazy, man. Crazy. Yeah, I miss all the wild nights, cocaine and bear whores, but who wouldn’t?

Director Chris Kentis with his daughter and a nice shot of Producer Laura Lau’s back talking to Gregg

So we headed out afterwards to BABBO to eat a very expensive meal and then headed back to Gregg and Adrian’s to watch ALI-G on HBO on-demand and that was the end of our exciting night in New York City.

Me and Gregg realizing how much this meal was going to cost us

Our ladies, Adrian and Stef, were looking expecially radiant that night

More to write about REAL soon!

Gregg, Rob (that’s right, Rob Cowie of BLAIR WITCH fame), Mike and I are cooking up a feature film project that’s going to be sweet. We should be able to officially announce something soon. Dan’s THE STRAND is moving forward. He’s on the cusp of getting four more episodes financed, but I’ll let him fill you in on that when he’s ready. And Dan Karcher is working like a dog on the MANABAL’WAK site. That thing is looking great. You haven’t seen anything like it EVER. We’ll have something new to show soon (maybe the opening of the first issue/episode) and have the whole thing ready for download by Halloween.

Thanks for reading this and keeping the faith! And go see OPEN WATER this weekend!