Jason Laray Keener Day

 

‘Jason LaRay Keener is an American filmmaker from Alabama. He is best known for his stream-of-conscious, non-linear shorts. He is related to serial killer Nannie Doss. In 2006, he founded the Jacksonville State University Film Society. In 2012, he married frequent collaborator Diane Rose (Hallelujah! Gorilal Revival, The Unreinable Compulsion).

‘In 2006, Keener founded his production company, Reining Nails. From 2006 to 2009, he directed several Southern Gothic-inspired surrealistic short films. His film Hallelujah! Gorilla Revival featured guest voice-overs from filmmakers Cory McAbee, Damon Packard, Todd Rohal and Jamie Stewart of the bands Ten in the Swear Jar, Xiu Xiu and Former Ghosts. The film won Best Experimental Short at the 2009 Nashville Film Festival, as well as Best Alabama Short Film and the Kathryn Tucker Windham Storytelling Award at the 11th annual Sidewalk Moving Picture Festival.

‘Keener’s films liken themselves to a strange, sporadic dream with trippy music, layered images and peculiar scenes that merge comedy with horror. Some shots show wonderful cinematography while others feel as if you’ve stumbled upon a random, shakey home video. Overall, the films are definitely creative and are like nothing you will usually see.

‘In 2009, Keener released a DVD+R EP of his short films entitled Catfish with Falcon Wings. Catfish with Falcon Wings has been remixed by Brighter Death Now as projection for live shows.

‘In 2011, the short films of Catfish with Falcon Wings were curated alongside films by Woody Allen, Jean-Luc Godard, Harmony Korine, and David Lynch as part of a film series on problems in contemporary society. The series was programmed by the Pavilion Unicredit Art Gallery in Bucharest, Romania.

‘The Unreinable Compulsion, described as a psychological drama about an irrational murder, is Keener’s first feature-length film. The film stars Jarrod Cuthrell and features actor/dentist Dr. George Hardy (Troll 2, Best Worst Movie) as himself.

‘Keener cites Robert Bresson, John Carpenter, Unsolved Mysteries, Flannery O’Connor, and Edward Hopper as the primary influences for the style and tone of the film, in which a young man in a small town gives in to his irrational desire to recreationally murder a stranger.’ — collaged

 

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Stills

 

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Further

Reining Nails
Jason LaRay Keener @ Facebook
@ReiningNails @ Twitter
Jason LaRay Keener @ instagram
Jason LaRay Keener @ Soundcloud
JLK @ Letterboxd
Non Films Death Archives
Podcast: Isotopica – (A Zebra In the Mailbox: (how did it get in_ How will it get out_))
JLK @ SearchMyTrash

 

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Music

new music soon?

I Made a Song with Spice Girls VHS Tapes

Splash ’96 – Our Camcorder | a 90’s house jam

Splash ’96 – Quintard Cruisin’ | a 90’s house jam

In 1995, I was obsessed with singing “Sold (The Grundy County Auction Incident)” faster than John Michael Montgomery.

Awfulizer

 

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Interview

 

Ben Flanagan: Is this your first public screening? Did you choose the Bottletree as a location? What about that venue appeals to you?

Jason Laray Keener: My films have been screened at film festivals. I really like the Sidewalk film community in Birmingham. They’ve been very kind to me, very vital to me.

Bottletree was easily my first choice. They book the kind of bands and screen the kind of films that I like. I think their demographic is essentially my demographic. The noise band Black Dice plays there on June 7th, the night before my screening. I think that’s really appropriate. If you like Black Dice, you’ll probably like these films and vice versa. I love Black Dice.

BF: How has your experience with shooting locally been? Do you intend to stay in Alabama with your productions, or might you migrate out west to pursue opportunities?

JLK: I love shooting in Alabama. I never want to leave Alabama. I have absolutely no interest in New York or LA or Austin, the three big filmmaking cities. John Waters has Baltimore, I have Alabama. When I was young, like every whiny artsy kid, I couldn’t wait to escape to Seattle or somewhere. Now, there’s no way I’d move.

I’m a big Flannery O’Connor fan. Unfortunate circumstances required her to live most of her life on a large farm in a small Georgia town but I think it benefited her literature. Her best stories take place in small Southern towns with very Southern characters. I consider her one of my strongest influences. Georgia’s gift to the world.

I think it’d be a big mistake to leave here. I have no interest in big city filmmaking.

BF: Who are you primary filmmaking influences, particularly on this project? Sometimes it’s tough to make a list of this kind of thing, but I guess I’m wondering what films you might have been watching prior to and during your shooting.

JLK: I discovered the photographer Man Ray around 2004. He was instantly an influence. When I found out he had made some films, I was quick to track them down. His films and the short films of Derek Jarman were the first abstract motion pictures I’d ever seen. I’d never realized you could make a film without a story. I mean, I’d never even realized that was an option.

Werner Herzog is my favorite filmmaker. Nearly all of his films but especially Stroszek and Even Dwarfs Started Small are very inspirational to me. I love the films John Waters made in the ’70s. I made most of the films on this DVD before I’d seen any of his, but since then his influence has certainly played a major role. I love Luis Buñuel’s surrealist films. I stand in awe of Errol Morris’ first two films but his recent work is very alien and uninteresting to me.

Then, of course, everyone loves to compare my films to Harmony Korine’s and there’s a lot of truth to that. He was definitely an influence. It’d be outrageous to claim otherwise. But it’s really irritating that he’s the only influence people pick up on. It seems like everyone thinks I merely emulate him but it happens. At one time, David Lynch couldn’t escape Buñuel comparisons. And now, everyone likes to call any dream inspired film Lynchian, much like any dream inspired piece of literature is Kafkaesque. What can you do?

Outside of film, I admire the Dada and surrealist movements in spirit. Noise and ambient music also play a major part of my views on score music.

BF: What are some themes you like to explore as an artist? Having watched the DVD now, I noticed an interesting dynamic between parents and their children. Oftentimes, the parents force their kids into things they don’t want to do. Or you just have authority figures impending their will on younger folks (although the kids do not always follow orders), like the old woman yelling at the young man sweeping the garage roof. What about these situations interests you?

JLK: Annette Wolfe, an actress I’m very fond of working with, was the first to point out this reoccurring motif and since then a lot of other people have noticed the trend, as well. None of that is really conscious on my part. I think it really boils down to the fact I have adult actors and child and teen actors and that kind of pairing is inevitable. In some cases, the characters are played by real mothers and daughters or sons so that adds an interesting dynamic. I would like to go on record as saying I love my mother, a wonderful woman, so there’s nothing literally biographical going on in those scenes.

Some of these scenarios are deliberate satires of other situations that in no way involve family but I wouldn’t ever dare to reveal my motivations for a particular scene. I much prefer an audience to take away his or her own interpretation, even if that interpretation is simply “This is funny” or, more likely, “This is disturbing.”

BF: Do you think young artists often make too hasty of decisions when they opt to immediately head to places like New York City and Los Angeles when they’d have better chances of making the films they want to make at home?

JLK: I think it’s healthy to be interested in places outside of your home, but I think people who run to New York and California solely because other filmmakers have made those places established film communities is a mistake. Some people need to be in big cities to be happy, so I guess it depends on the person. I like the potential of a small town. I think that’s what makes a show like “Twin Peaks” or a film like Stroszek so fascinating.

BF: How much of the content found in the films reflects dreams or real-life situations you’ve had or encountered before? The films seem either highly personal or intentionally abstract. Does that lean one way, or is it a mixture?

JLK: In my entire life, I’ve only tried to make one film based on a dream and it was a complete disaster. I wish my dreams conformed more to a cinematic language so I could use them. I am, however, inspired by dreams – the way you can decode some latent personal metaphors after you wake up while other things remain more mysterious and therefore, occasionally, disturbing. I do try to emulate that with my filmmaking. I code some very personal real-life situations in a way that is emotionally true, even in its exaggerated form, but never merely a retelling of something that actually happened to me. I don’t think anyone is interested in the Jason LaRay Keener story, but I do believe a lot of people can relate to some of my personal situations and enjoy seeing them completely shown for their core absurdity.

Meanwhile, in keeping with the influence of dreams, I throw in a bunch of total nonsense that may mean something to someone but usually not me. I like these hollow images. In my experience, I find people are often most disturbed by the scenes or images they don’t understand. And sometimes, like with dreams, I decode personal influence after the fact. But again, I’d never share that with an audience and ruin their personal relationship with a film.

A lot of people do tell me they don’t understand the films. It’s an understandable reaction, but the films were never intended for anyone who can walk away from one of these films and say something like that. On the other hand, most of my friends are people who saw the films, loved them and bothered to get in touch with me. This includes my girlfriend. Those people are also the ones who become my cast. Making films has become the only way I can make friends and therefore have fresh actors.

One of these friends is filmmaker Andy Sparkman. He’s never submitted a film to a festival and I have no idea why not. His movies are incredible, even if few people have seen them, and I’ve commissioned a new film for the screening at Bottletree. Of all my filmmaking friends, I relate most to Andy.

BF: By the way, my favorite of the shorts is Hail Cracking Cobra Eggs, though I did find the final moment of Hollow Porcelain Fish Chamber quite haunting and was impressed with the title cue after the last line.

JLK: I’m very glad it’s your favorite. I believe it’s my favorite as well. It’s a combination of two short films made during 48-hour film competitions, and both of those were made during the two darkest periods of my life. The first was titled All Angels Have Rat Tails and the second was Ballerina Furnace. The titles say it all, don’t they?

Hail Cracking Cobra Eggs was like some sort of exorcism of really bitter feelings and I think that’s fairly obvious when watching it. All of my films are crazy, but I think with that one you can really tell its maker was on the verge of a nervous breakdown. That film is mostly a rant, for better or worse.

 

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Films

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The Man with Apple-Shaped Boxing Gloves (2006)
‘A series of bizarre, often funny and occasionally disturbing images.’ — IMDb

the entirety

 

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Hail Cracking Cobra Eggs (2007)
‘To tell you the truth, I have no idea what Hail Cracking Cobra Eggs is about, basically it’s a piece of Americana where everything’s a tick off, where people tell their fondest memories of dying and killing creatures, where it’s ok to chain up ballerinas and tie girls to tractors, to make one’s kids cry because of their artistic aspirations, and where you never know what meanness hides behind the next corner …’ — Mike Haberfelner

the entirety

 

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Hallelujah! Gorilla Revival (2008)
‘Now I won’t for a minute claim that I know what Hallelujah! Gorilla Revival is even about, because I haven’t the foggiest, basically it looks like found footage material (found footage from before found footage became an actual genre) strund together to fill up 5 minutes of screentime. Well, that’s what it “looks” like, but not what it feels like, as the seemingly random clips are held together by a certain feel for the macabre, from the cute girl playing her saxophone next to a dead deer to the guy telling about his stepsister drowning his dogs to a mother threatening her son’s girlfriend in a rather inappropriate way to some sound bits fitting the best of the serialkillers. It’s pretty much like that, after having watched Hallelujah! Gorilla Revival (an appropriately irreverent title by the way), your first thought might just as well be “what garbage have I just seen?” followed quite immediately by “may I see it again?” Sure, the film is abstract and at least seemingly irreverent – but that doesn’t mean it’s unenjoyable … it’s great fun, actually!’ — Mike Haberfelner

the entirety

 

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Hollow Porcelain Fish Chamber (2009)
‘Now I don’t even claim to know what this one’s about, but it has a woman and her girl collecting cans on a private garbage dump, a woman in clown makeup doing housework and later bathing in bullets, a very tired dancer doing her thing in front of an even more tired audience, a murder plan being hatched, some unicycle action and plenty of other stuff that doesn’t make a whole lot of sense thrown together …’ — Mike Haberfelner

the entirety

 

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Xiu Xiu “House Sparrow” (2010)
Music video for the song “House Sparrow” from the album Dear God, I Hate Myself.

 

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The Unreinable Compulsion (2013)
‘After loner Dewayne Sykes (Jarrod Cuthrell) gives in to his irrational desire to recreationally murder a stranger, he begins his search for a random victim and finds one in “Miss Fit” (Jen Stedham), a young jogger he spies at a park. After briefly familiarizing himself with her neighborhood and schedule, he puts his plan into action and commits a murder that will haunt him in ways he couldn’t anticipate.’ — JLK

the entirety

 

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Collinsville Trade Day (2014)
‘In 1988, Paw Paw Charles took his video camcorder to Collinsville Trade Day to document the popular outdoor market for posterity. 26 years later, I found the tape buried in a box in his living room closet. “…as good as an early Errol Morris short. It’s really quite touching in a very subtle but powerful way.” – Adam Wingard (director, The Guest, You’re Next).’

the entirety

 

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Huntsville Space Center, 1986 (2016)
‘In 1986, Paw Paw Charles took his camcorder to the Huntsville Space Center in Alabama and documented a lot of strange-lookin’ stuff. Yideography & commentary by Charles Keener. Editing by Jason LaRay Keener.’

the entirety

 

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The Best of Nanny Pat (2016)
‘In loving memory of my grandmother and favorite actress, Patsy Smith (1946-2016).’ — JLK

the entirety

 

 

*

p.s. Hey. ** David Ehrenstein, Ah, well, I hope they’re out there thriving, coupled up or not. ** Bill, Hi. Have you been to the Market? I haven’t. I’ve never even been to Mexico City, which is ridiculous. Good, I’m looking forward to that doc then. ** Dominik, Hi!!! I shared the SCAB news on Facebook, and it seemed to generate a bunch of excitement. Yay! Today’s my ultra-busy day, and then tomorrow will get at least partly devoted to bettering myself the SCAB way. Don’t worry, I don’t think sailormoonn will believe you. Well, if love finds it helpful to squeeze the hand of someone who’s also very creeped out, I’ll do my very best. Love giving the workers who were at my apartment all day fixing my working but messy water heater only to discover they brought the wrong replacement heater and broke the old one that worked when removing it and can’t come back to replace it until the end of next week thereby leaving me with no hot water until then very bad dreams tonight, G. ** Misanthrope, That’s very true. I’m making my busyness work for me so far, thanks. You too, I pray. Doc Martens, wow. Stylin’. Assuming they’re still stylish. I guess Doc Martens are eternally stylish. Happy strutting. ** R R R R RYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAN (explosion), Hey. Cooler name than ever. My projects are mostly being well behaved. Oh, cool, those glasses suit you, I think. Good choice. Mine are too blah to even bother showing anyone who isn’t forced to see them by looking at me. I miss toast. The French don’t really do toast so much. I know those Ordeal By Roses photos, yeah. Romantic to say the least. I’ll try to download those because it would be nice to have them in storage. Thanks! I too don’t get gunge so much, especially the kind where the gunge looks like a cartoon. All power to him, though. I looked younger than I was until about, uh, my late 30s, I think. Maybe slightly longer. I didn’t moisturise or anything. They say that does help, so … If I could stay youthful and sexy, believe me, I would, ha ha. Oh, yeah, Zoom. Not this weekend because I’ll be out all the time working on stuff and seeing stuff. But soon, maybe next week? Happy … christ, what day is it … Thursday! ** The Bic, Hi, The Bic. Good to meet you, Thanks a lot, or, I guess thanks to JFuentes wherever he may be. Wow, that video you made is great! It’s hilarious and spooky. Props, great job. I’ll go look at the other ones too. Yeah, thanks, that was a treat. Everyone, Go check out this video that The Bic made for a song by a band of a friend of his. It’s kind of brain damaging in a good sense and hilarious. Take care, sir, and come back any old time. ** Geoffrey Cruickshank-Hagenbuckle, Hey, Geoffrey. Ha, thanks a lot. Always a thrill to disorient. ** cap’m, Whoa, cap’m, I haven’t seen you in ages! How are you? Warmest greetings from over here. ** Brandon, Hi, Brandon. Nice to hear, and score on the two week break. I feel pretty sure you’ll find some treasures out there. I’m good, busy, a bunch of good stuff is happening in quick order at the moment. If there are any knock out great things happening in these parts that I stumble upon, I’ll let you know. Hope your Thursday has a big pay off. ** Right. Today the blog either introduces you to or reminds of you of the very curious and generally wonderful films of the young American filmmaker (and musician) Jason Laray Keener. I hope you find inspiration therein. See you tomorrow.