Ernie Fosselius

Backyard Blockbusters

For years, people have been making home movies, many times using pop culture properties that they may not own, but love. In recent years, these types of projects have come to be known as "fanfilms". Backyard Blockbusters looks at the history and influence of the fanfilm genre, as well as the copyright and fair use problems these films create, featuring highlights from and interviews with the creators of many popular films.

Rockin' at the Red Dog: The Dawn of Psychedelic Rock

This documentary pays tribute to the contributions and importance of the title watering hole in the creation of the psychedelic dancehalls that littered the West during the late '60s and helped launch such super groups as The Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane and The Quicksilver Messenger Service. Music by Big Brother and the Holding Company, and the Charlatans is also featured. The Red Dog Saloon had its genesis in 1964 when a group of free-thinking, LSD-enhanced Northern California students and young folks had a party and began thinking about starting up a saloon that would evoke the old West. They decided to build their saloon in Virginia City, Nevada, a once prosperous town that was by then nearly empty. The ambience of the saloon blended Old West sensibilities with modern psychedelia, go-go girls and plenty of illegal drugs. The film is comprised of interviews with surviving founders, actual archival footage, and even a performance of some of the musicians who appeared there.

Ernest Scared Stupid

Well-intentioned, eternally bumbling Ernest P. Worrell accidentally releases an evil demon from its sacred tomb. As the demon flexes its power and goes on a ruinous rampage, good-guy Ernest tries to step in to save the town from mass destruction. Trouble is, a 200-year-old curse has scared Ernest stupid, and that means hilarity all around! So, kick back and let the laugh-ridden adventures begin.

Heat and Sunlight

A man confronts jealously and rage as a love affair falters.

Return of the Jedi

Luke Skywalker leads a mission to rescue his friend Han Solo from the clutches of Jabba the Hutt, while the Emperor seeks to destroy the Rebellion once and for all with a second dreaded Death Star.

The Mediterranean

An artist dreams of his formerly-happy life ten years earlier in Antibes on the south of France where he first met his wife, fell in love and created paintings that he was proud of. Now his life feels empty and without meaning and his art is stymied. He decides a change of scenery is in order and decides to move with his wife and their young daughter to a bucolic ranch in the hills of central California. What follows is his attempt to pull together the pieces of his life into some semblance of what they had before.

Porklips Now

This spoof of 'Apocalypse Now' has health inspector Will Dullard travelling by car "uptown" with two friends to have a meeting with a certain Mertz, the owner of a meat processing shop, to "investigate with extreme prejudice."

Hardware Wars

A short film parody of the classic science fiction film Star Wars. It premiered in theaters only seven months after Star Wars and consisted of little more than inside jokes and visual puns that heavily depended upon audience familiarity with the original.