Hamish Downie’s Five Questions With Scott Hillman
Editor Note: Hamish has another in his series of Five Questions With…
Hamish came up with this idea because he was accumulating too much material for his Famous News Sushi column and asked if he could do these mini-interviews. Why would we say no?
Thank you Hamish for being such a trooper for us. We really appreciate all for your hard work.
Let us know what you think of these interviews in the comments below.
TGG: Could you introduce yourself and your work to our readers?
SH: I’m Scott Hillman A Filmmaker from Los Angeles. This is my second feature film.
TGG: Could you tell us about your latest film, “Magical Christmas Tree”?
SH: The Magical Christmas Tree Is about Pace, a Non-Binary accountant working in Los Angeles, trying to live their life and not caring very much about the holidays. However, when their boss has a change of heart after being visited by The Ghosts of Christmas (and/or going insane) they are sent out to the mountains to chop down a tree. However, while heading up into the hills they are followed by a mysterious Elf…
The Magical Christmas
Tree from Cinema Epoch
on Vimeo.
TGG: Sounds very interesting. What was something you learned while making the film?
SH: I learned from the entire process of how you can make movies very efficiently and that kinda of pleased me to a large extent. The movie didn’t have a super long production schedule, or big budget-but we got it done.
Working in the kind of Christmas movie vibe does teach you a lot of the basics of film-making on a day-to-day and an hour-to-hour process. How do we plan this shot when theres a TV that’s going to be a reflection, how do you make a microwave catch on fire. Its a quick but also very rewarding process.
The producer I am working with, Gregory Hatakana, has worked in film since the 80s, doing a lot of low budget genre movies. [TGG: like “Samurai Cop 2”, and Russ Emanuel’s “Staycation”] And what I found fascinating is how to apply some of that process to a LGBT film-which is obviously not very different, but good basic practice. My basic approach to making a Non-Binary Christmas movie-was to make a Christmas movie and I think we did a good job of that.
TGG: What’s next for you?
SH: I am curious to see how this movie does to be honest. While the budget of the movie wasn’t huge – it also means it doesn’t have a huge nut to cover, and I do think this could be an interesting space to live in. I have an idea for a Trans Western or Action movie. Excited to see where this leads.
TGG: How can we best support you?
SH: The movie will be on Tubi shortly. Tubi does have comericals, and if you want it commercial free you can have it either on:
Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Magical-Christmas-Tree-Socks-Whitmore/dp/B09MPLH7P3/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=the+magical+christmas+tree&qid=1638647139&rnid=2941120011&s=movies-tv&sr=1-1
Vimeo: https://vimeo.com/ondemand/themagicalchristmastree/648424641
This is also the way to see it if your not in the United States.
Here is the Facebook page for the film: https://www.facebook.com/The-Magical-Christmas-Tree-101326298991962
Tubi TV: https://tubitv.com/movies/633060/the-magical-christmas-tree?start=true
TGG: Thank you for taking the time to be interviewed today.
