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Thanks to the streaming media revolution of the past few years, independent filmmakers have the greatest opportunity to deliver their work to the largest audiences ever in cinema history. Filmmakers also have the greatest opportunity to make money directly from their work without giving up a portion to middlemen distributors.

So, why is it that so few, if any, indie filmmakers are able to make a viable income from streaming media services? Yes, Virginia, there still is an “underground.”

The heart of the issue … Well, the real heart is, as always, about money. But, financial concerns lead to the other heart of the issue, which is the same issue that has always plagued underground filmmakers: Crappy discovery mechanisms.

In the streaming world, though, hardly a week goes by without news of one of the major delivery services, i.e. Amazon, iTunes and Netflix, making some sort of exclusive distribution deal with a Hollywood studio.

Drug-addled Danny (Daniel Louis Rivas) could clean up his act if only the entire world wasn’t conspiring against him, including his best friend Nicky (Robert Lasardo); his father (Andrew Howard) and his dealer, Otto (Tomas Boykin).

Junkie — a bloody, brutal, surreal and deranged looking flick — is directed by cult filmmaker Adam Mason (Pig, Luster).

Rivas, who stars and produces, previously appeared in the hit underground film Altamont Now.

Learn more about Junkie at the film’s official website.

Yes, the Oscars are being held tonite and despite Bad Lit’s predilection towards underground film, we will be watching, red carpet and all. But, if you want to kill time during the commercials, then consider clicking on some extra links below and boning up on non-Oscar film.

This week’s Absolute Must Read is J. J. Murphy’s Best Indie Films of 2011 list and commentary. In general, I rarely read movie reviews, but I find Murphy’s reviews to always be so insightful, educational and entertaining, that I savor every word of them — and you should, too! I’m also 100% with him when he discusses the issues of writing about over-looked and under-appreciated movies. It can be absolutely heartbreaking work, but we do it because we love it. And the other thing about Murphy’s reviews is that they always make me want to run right out and see...

New On DVDMaximum Shame

Movies don’t get much cultier than Carlos Atanes‘ post-apocalyptic S&M musical. Filmed in a dirty warehouse filling in for the edge of the universe just as said universe is about to fall into a massive black hole, Maximum Shame plays out like an oblique chess match with a demented black leather clad Queen (the phenomenal Marina Gatell) forcing the other players to sit in barbed wire cardboard boxes and shovel pounds of spaghetti into their mouths. Atanes, already Spain’s underground master, really pulls out the stops on this happy mess of madness.

Buy on Amazon!

The Films of Bob Moricz

If you’re looking to give a special someone something absolutely out of this world and one-of-a-kind, then you can’t go wrong with a Bob Moricz hand-produced “Bobbywood” production or two. Or go for a full 6-pack of reality-warping DVDs! Whether it...

Bad Lit Press, the screenplay e-publishing arm of Bad Lit: The Journal of Underground Film, is now offering its first two publications on Barnes & Noble’s Nook device and apps for just $1.99 each. Previously, the scripts were only available for Amazon’s Kindle for the same price.

The two screenplays are:

1. Altamont Now, written by Joshua Brown and David Bucci. Richard Havoc, former punk rock teen idol, and his crew of “White Angst” agitators have taken over an abandoned nuclear missile silo and are pointing their love bomb straight into the heart of square culture.

2. The Proper Care & Feeding of an American Messiah, written by Chris Hansen and D.M. Lovic. Meet Brian B., your new messiah! Well, as long as you live within a 100-mile radius of his home, he is. With the help of his two subservient siblings, its up to Brian to figure out what God’s...

Below, please check out the first 7 pages of the screenplay of Altamont Now, co-written by director Joshua Brown and playwright David Bucci. (Embedding courtesy of the book sharing site Scribd.)

Altamont Now: The Screenplay is the first publication by the newly imprinted Bad Lit Press, which is publishing the shooting scripts to great underground and independent movies. The film version of Altamont Now can be seen via Amazon, Netflix and iTunes. If you love the screenplay sample, see the movie, then buy the full version of the script!

The script sample below includes a character list and note on the dialogue, then the first 7 pages of the screenplay that introduces the characters of Mark Clark, a documentary filmmaker tracking down the infamous “Cult of the Kids,” and one of the cult’s main members, Karen Kennedy, a former child sitcom star.

Plus, there’s the electrifying introduction to the film’s main character,...

Because great screenplays make great literature!

Bad Lit: The Journal of Underground Film is thrilled to announce the launch of its new e-publishing imprint, Bad Lit Press, which is publishing the full screenplays of underground films.

For our inaugural publication, of course we had to go to one of our favorite films of the past three years. That’s right, it’s the rock-docu-exploitation comedy hit of 2008, Altamont Now! As of today, you can download and read the original full-length screenplay by co-writers Joshua Brown and David Bucci for the Kindle for the dirt cheap price of $1.99!

And you don’t even need an actual Kindle device to read it! Download the Kindle app for your computer, iPod, iPad or smart phone, then purchase a copy of the screenplay and you can start re-staging your favorite scenes anywhere you go. In your bedroom, on the bus, in your work cubicle.

Every couple of months — Heck, every couple of days! — it seems like another nail is driven into the DVD’s plastic slip covered coffin, from major rental store chains going bankrupt to the cutting back of little red envelopes being mailed out. Someday it’s going to get to the point where you won’t even be able to get discs popping out of a little kiosk at the supermarket anymore.

We’re slowly being conditioned to think about movies as a disposable medium. Not as in you’re going to be throwing discs into the trash, but your memory of what you just watched is going to be disposed right out of your brain as the next movie streams right in.

But, if you’re a good cinephile you know that films are art and should be treated as such. (Well, make that they have the capacity to be art.

The rock apocalypse is finally upon us! The cult underground hit and Bad Lit’s 2008 Movie of the Year, Joshua von Brown’s Altamont Now, has finally been unleashed on DVD today! (Rent or Buy.) For anyone who ever believed that the ’60s were all about peace, love and understanding: Fuck you! The children of Altamont — a moment in time that embodied the true spirit of rock, anarchy and revolution — are here to recreate that rebellious era a thousand-fold.

Altamont Now delivers the unholy gospel of the true prophet of rock ‘n’ roll, Richard Havoc, played to maniacal perfection by Daniel Louis Rivas. Having shed his music television flavor-of-the-month image, Havoc has sequestered himself in a nuclear missile silo with his acolytes Karen Kennedy (Frankie Shaw) and Travis Hook (Teddy Eck). From this hidden location, Havoc plots to deliver the ultimate in generational warfare — a real live nuclear warhead aimed...

After winning prizes and praise at underground Film Festivals in Arizona, Atlanta and Denver, Joshua von Brown's "Altamont Now" is surfacing on DVD this Tuesday (you can order a copy here). To celebrate the occasion, Factory 25 has been gracious enough to stream the entire film on IFC.com all week.

The film is a discovery in more ways than one -- it claims to be a lost film that von Brown took from the clutches of a fellow filmmaker who documented a power-mad radical rocker named Richard Havoc leading a clueless band of revolutionaries (who call themselves the Cult of the Kids) to a missile silo. There, they dictate a new world order to America over their local public access channel and threaten to set off a nuclear device.

In reality, von Brown adapted David Bucci's play without ever seeing it staged, but really did find an abandoned silo to shoot the satire in,...