Grande Pictures Presents...

I've been struggling to find an entity under which to release Spirit Lake, my first feature.  Originally it was to be the flagship film from a studio that I started in Milwaukee (Studio Bib Simmons).  I got balls deep into the project and they all but abandoned me so that wasn't going to work.  I was playing with "Omanaman Pictures", which has been the guise of my portfolio (omanaman.com) for the last 10 years.  Ironically I just took down the latest version of the site and have it forward to this blog.  I couldn't give a rat's butthole about maintaining a website, or much of that work anymore.  Omanaman Pictures doesn't have much of a ring to it either.  I tried to put "A Joe Shakula Film" and leave it at that, but I don't have an inflated ego and don't like my name all over everything.  I prefer to lurk in the shadows, and once the job is done fade into darkness (or my next project).

After a year in Los Angeles I found myself turning into the type of demented clown that the town tends to turn people into.  Shallow, jaded, desperate... I had to go, that definitely isn't me.  Being trained in the hobo arts, I was quickly able to fit my belongings in a blanket tethered to knotted stick of oakwood, and I was bound for Central America.

The other day I woke up from a deep, wine aided slumber, put on my board shorts, wandered about 125 meters towards the beach, and jumped into a warm bath of crystal blue ocean water.  As shiny fish scattered around me, I lay floating on my back in the surf while tiny waves splashed over me and washed the morning away...

Playa Grande, a sleepy little surf town on the Pacific coast of Guanacaste has always been my second home. The town is like family and since my arrival my desk has been Fernando's sushi bar at the Ripjack Inn, a clear deviation from the sweat hazy, slave like working conditions of Los Angeles.  My plan has always been to make my next film down here, so it seemed like a natural choice to name my new picture label after a place that defines who I am.  Spirit Lake will be released as a Grande Pictures Presentation, with several more film projects in the works.  Below is a little video jam I put together to introduce my new baby... enjoy!

Señales | Signs from Joe Shakula on Vimeo.
music by altos
production by joe shakula

filmed in Playa Grande, Costa Rica
edited at Fernando's sushi bar at the Ripjack Inn