One word description of the film - BOLD.
Produced and written by Dean Tatulli and Mark L. Mazzeo, DIBS was able to chat with the two filmmakers about their recent project!
DIBS: Hi Dean and Mark! Thank you for taking the time out of your day to chat with me about your latest film, The Last White Man.
DIBS: I am just going to jump right in. Your one-sentence description of the film is “a dark satire thriller with a focus on race, identity, and social politics in modern-day America”….for the White Man?
Mark: With the election of Donald Trump, Dean and I noticed a resurgence of the old narrative that white men always get screwed over, they're the victims of affirmative action and political correctness etc. I've always felt that was an erroneous point of view, but with the rise of Trumpism and the Alt-Right, I started to see it as a very dangerous attitude as well. Across several conversations about this with Dean, we started using the phrase 'The Last White Man' as a sort of pejorative shorthand for the people pushing that narrative. From there we decided to write the screenplay for TLWM to paint a satirical picture of that guy and push it to what we saw as its natural and inevitable conclusion. As events in the news began to parallel our story, the film became a bit darker than we originally imagined, but we're hoping there's still humor to be found in it as well. No one has seen it, so we're curious to see how that plays at the screening.
Dean: Despite being inspired by the quick rise (and inherent darkness) of Trumpism, the alt-right, Incels, and conspiracy theorists, we decided to leave anecdotal politics out of the film. It's implied by Karl's opinions, actions, and the language that he uses he's aware and influenced by those ideologies. However, we never come out and say it explicitly, allowing the audience to draw their own conclusions about his radicalization.
DIBS: There is so much to this topic even more so now with the 24-hour news cycle, social media, and as you say “The Rise of Trumpism”. Do you think this “Rise of Trumpism” happened because of that “resurgence of the old narrative that white men always get screwed over, they're the victims of affirmative action and political correctness etc” so its like “alright fuck it then, I can’t win” so it has led to this “dangerous attitude” of The Last White Man?
Mark: I think Trump has normalized it (among other things) which has played a large part in the resurgence of that idea. But outside of a few scenes, the film itself doesn’t touch all that much on “capital P Politics”. It’s sort of implicitly there if you can make the connection between racism, sexism, homophobia, etc and the political party that currently supports those things. But it does deal a lot with identity politics, where our main character Karl is struggling in a world he feels left out of. He’s the fabled “forgotten man”. But the film isn’t designed to make the viewer sympathize with Karl, and I don’t think people will. Ultimately, the film is our critique of the “last white man” ethos and like I said we take it to what we see as the inevitable conclusion of that mindset. And it’s not a happy ending. For anyone.
DIBS: It’s funny that you say that because my next question was going to be, Could the viewer sympathize with Karl? Which you have answered. Not a happy ending for Karl then. How about what sort of perspective will the audience gain walking away from this film? I would like to add something to your response to the previous question. So the school bully is known to be a bully the bully (assuming so) is aware that he is a bully (assuming so) and maybe he is a bully for reasons unknown to others but since the bully has been titled this role they are now going to play that role. How could the school bully come back from being “the bully”? If they are known to be a bully is there some sort of redemption? I know that we are getting a little deep here, I promise there will be lighter questions 🙂
Dean: It’s interesting you bring that up, because I sort of wanted to expand on the idea of sympathy for Karl - In the writing phase, we knew we definitely didn’t want the audience to sympathize with or for Karl, he’s clearly the villain. And to Mark’s and Ryan’s credit, I think that is achieved, Karl is abhorrent. But there’s sort of paradox in the script, where if you show something from the villain’s perspective, you’re asking your audience to at least *care* about your character. Even if they’re bad. Karl, at the start of the film, doesn’t know what his place in society is, just that he feels like society left him out of the equation when it progressed. As the story progresses I think we offer him a way out, but he doesn’t take it because he’s too far gone. I think maybe that idea touches on your bully analogy. Karl eventually learns who he is in society by trying to assimilate and realizing he can’t. I don’t think it’s a zero sum game, but our story does not allow the bully to redeem himself.
One last point about that is, I think we were always aware of the risk that showing the film from Karl’s perspective was dangerous. Especially since ‘Karl learning his place in society’ is a negative thing which could carry the connotation that we think he’s the right one.
We’ve talked about intent a lot in our doing this film, and I think our intent is very clear in the final film.
Mark: As for what the audience walks away with, I want people to see this film and have something to say. I want to start conversations about something that people maybe don’t want to talk about. I want people to see this and question if they’re like Karl, if they’re enabling Karl’s in their lives etc. basically I think we want people to take a look in the mirror, both at themselves and society as a whole. And in reference to sympathizing with Karl, Dean makes a good point about asking the viewer to care about Karl. I don’t think it’s that the viewer should sympathize with Karl. I think it’s that they should empathize with him and feel horrible about it.
DIBS: So what’s harder: getting started a film or being able to keep going? How long was this process from having the idea to writing it to filming it to completing it?
MARK: I’d say getting started is harder. Once you get going there’s inertia and you get into routines. But at the beginning you’re starting with nothing and it’s all ahead of you and it seems so insurmountable. Especially doing it the way we did it. Self financed and without any sort of infrastructure behind us.
We started writing in October of 2017 and we’re done writing in April 2018. (We wrote a key scene a couple of months before shooting, but otherwise the script was finished that April)
Preproduction started in November of 18 and we shot for 12 days between February 23 and March 23 of this year including an 8 consecutive day first wave at the end of Feb and early March.
I started editing on March 3 after the first wave of filming and we got to final cut on September 2.
So from the first page to final cut you’re talking a two year process. The idea is something we talked about for a while before that but in terms of actually working on it, two years.
DEAN: Anecdotally the hardest day of the whole thing for me was day 1 - we had a hard start and I remember feeling like there was no way I could do 12 shoot days.
But like mark said, you get into a routine and you get over the jitters of starting something so big and it becomes fun.
DIBS: What were some obstacles you faced making this film?
Dean: We produced the movie completely on our own. There was no one to really help us. And it’s really hard to produce a feature film with just two people handling logistics, scheduling, planning, money, problems as they arise etc.
We were incredibly fortunate to have a very dedicated team helping us actually make the movie. But most days that team only consisted of Mark, myself, a sound person, and a production assistant. With a crew that small and when you’re shooting 5-8 pages a day it becomes all about judicious time management.
DIBS: In your opinion, what sort of stories are important to tell?
Mark: I’ve always liked movies that are more character-driven than plot-driven. I feel like if you can come up with a really good character or characters and use them to drive the story, that’s always the way to go.
And that’s reflected in The Last White Man we started with Karl and built it out from there.
Dean: I also think it’s important for a story to have some sort of social or moral relevance. I understand that entertainment for entertainment’s sake has a place - i’m just less interested in it than I am in making actual statements.
And as Mark said, I believe that stats with characters who feel like real people.
DIBS: Where did you both meet?
Mark: Dean used to bully me in middle school.
Dean: That’s not true
Mark: That's how I remember it.
DIBS: LOL
Dean: We knew each other in middle school, but this is how I remember it. In the beginning of 8th grade Mark asked me if I made movies. And I said yes. He said I should make movies with him and a friend of his, and then we all started to do that together.
Mark: We continued making movies with a couple of friends of ours into the first year of high school and then kind of went our separate ways for the rest of high school and college. When I graduated I realized it was time to get serious about making movies and contacted Dean about working together again. And we've been making projects more or less annually together ever since then. We always try to make sure we learn lessons from our mistakes and get better with each project, and I think we have.
In your opinion, what defines success in filmmaking? Money? How many people saw? Reviews? Awards? All the above or none of the above?
Mark: For us, right now, it’s getting someone to want to invest in us and give us a budget to make the next one. That’s all I want, to get to make the next movie. The older you get the harder it gets to self finance. Exponentially so on feature length projects.
Dean: Agreed. I would say success as an independent filmmaker is simply being able to make films that get you enough exposure to make the next one. Being able to earn a living at it would be fantastic as well of course.There’s a famous quote that says “we don’t make movies to make money, we make movies to make more movies” I just thought that was fitting to this part of the conversation. Maybe a tad ironic because Walt Disney said it. But I do think the sentiment is true
DIBS: So explain to me the process of how it works. So as an Independent filmmaker you make the film and you submit it to festivals so that producers can have eyes on it and hopefully like it and want to invest in that film or want to invest in the filmmakers?
Mark: Yeah, that's the hope. You put it out there and try to get it in front of the right set of eyes.
Dean: Festivals also allow you to share the movie with other filmmakers who may want to network and work with you.
Meet The Filmmakers
Mark L. Mazzeo - Writer/Director
Mark is a filmmaker currently based in the South Jersey/Philadelphia area. He has made a variety of award-winning short films, as well as his first feature film, Something Better Comes Along. He is an industry professional with credits on multiple network television shows.
Dean Tatulli - Writer/Director of Photography
Dean is a filmmaker and director of photography based in Philadelphia, PA. Over the past 7 years, he's shot multiple award-winning short films, co-wrote and co-directed a web series, and produced and shot a feature film. In addition to that, he has nearly 10 years of professional on-set experience with credits ranging from branded content to documentary films.
