SYNOPSIS:Tom and Alex made this black and white, silent film. In it, Alex is playing a geek named Howie (again) sitting on a park bench. He is approached by a drug-dealer who sells him a banana! This along with Squeal of Death are featured on the new DVD of Freaked !
HOWIE MEETS THE GHOST OF ENVIRONMENTAL DISASTERS YET TO COME
SYNOPSIS:"Howie Meets the Ghost of Environmental Disasters Yet to Come" is the full title of a short Tom and Alex directed for CBS' "Hard Rock Cafe Saves the Planet" special. Alex reprises his role of Howie from "Squeal of Death". Howie is not too environmentally correct, to put it plainly. However, Tom appears as the ghost to show him the error of his ways, ala "A Christmas Carol". Howie meets up with all of the future environmental problems if humanity continues to abuse the Earth at its present rate. Keanu Reeves makes a guest appearance as a damn hippy protester outside Howie's apartment.
SYNOPSIS:This is quite possibly Tom and Alex's most bizarre short film. This is the story of Grendel P. Ulcerous, a hideous old man and owner of a local corner store. He scares and abuses the young children which the parents don't seem to notice. Especially the parents of a young boy who is forced to return a stolen shrunken-head to the old man. Finally, a hero steps forward to "slay the dragon". Tom has a cameo as a demented school-teacher at the end who emerges as the next scourge of the little town.
SYNOPSIS: This is a short film which was included on "Impact Video Magazine". Alex has a bit part as a buck-toothed Mexican who is run over by a family station wagon. After following a sign saying "family style barbeque," the family descends into redneck hell, which is populated by the Butthole Surfers. Here they learn the true meaning of "family style barbeque"!
SYNOPSIS: This is a short film Tom and Alex directed for Playboy's "Inside Out" TV series. It stars Alex as a geeky loser who encounters a stunning, scantily-clad beauty who is riding around on roller skates, and sucking on a big popsicle. He chases her around town with little success. Each time he gets close, she takes off another piece of clothing and somethin' bad happens to him (he gets hit by a semi, accosted by a crazy man in a dumpster, bit by a disembodied head, etc.), until FINALLY he makes it up to her apartment to get his just desserts!
It's a live-action Tex Avery comedy. I play about 15 characters in this film, but I play the main character and then his entire extended family. And the whole thing is shot-it's like an acid trip. It moves at a hundred miles an hour, got a cast of thousands, it's ridiculous. It was just absurdly ambitious. It was stupid.
It's a short. It's only 16 minutes long. It's a total cartoon. It's basically taking the Bugs Bunny aesthetic and doing it live-action. And it moves at just a hundred miles an hour, it's very cartoony, it's got an enormous sound effects bed, and it did really well for us. We hooked up with Sam Raimi [director of the Evil Dead films] as a result of that and he was a big fan of it. It sort of made the circuit run-it was on cable TV and stuff like that. That got us a bunch of jobs in our early days in LA. -Alex Winter ( Source )
Its got good repeat value because it's so damn condensed. It takes you about two thousand viewings to get all the jokes. - Alex Winter (Source)
Having seen all my crap so much, the conceptual humor wears off. But what still cracks me up is the amazing physicality of some of Alex's characters: Mister Kreznick's primal scream when his wife is chopped up. Pa Howie's beady, hateful eyes squinting through his filthy glasses and the way he hoists the bucket of green slop onto his table. The way Howie looks like a cornered rat in Trump Tower and that weird twitchy thing he does with his fingers. - Tom Stern (Source)
SYNOPSIS:"Squeal of Death" was Tom and Alex's major film school project. It is the story of Howie, a meek-mannered boy, neglected at home and tormented by his peers. His only refuge is at the weekly cinema where he goes to watch Gumby Wheatly, a gangster kick ass. Howie, winds up with a gun through a freak accident and decides that he is going to take out his vengeance on the world. He plans a series of robberies, including the great paper heist, and an unprecidented bank robbery. He continues his life of crime until he is captured by an alert police officer and thrown in jail. Later Howie is sentenced to the electric chair. But for the truly great ones, death is not the end... get it on the newDVD of Freaked along along with the NYU Sight and Sound Project!
It's a live-action Tex Avery comedy. I play about 15 characters in this film, but I play the main character and then his entire extended family. And the whole thing is shot-it's like an acid trip. It moves at a hundred miles an hour, got a cast of thousands, it's ridiculous. It was just absurdly ambitious. It was stupid. 
Having seen all my crap so much, the conceptual humor wears off. But what still cracks me up is the amazing physicality of some of Alex's characters: Mister Kreznick's primal scream when his wife is chopped up. Pa Howie's beady, hateful eyes squinting through his filthy glasses and the way he hoists the bucket of green slop onto his table. The way Howie looks like a cornered rat in Trump Tower and that weird twitchy thing he does with his fingers. - Tom Stern (
