This video follows Sonny Castille, a former Vegas lounge singer who lost everything to drug addiction. He moved to Reno to settle into a quiet simple life. I met Sonny at a slot machine in the Sands Hotel at 2 a.m., and was moved by his story. It is a real story of a man who committed to the pursuit of his dreams, but was derailed by addiction. It is a story of passing the point of no return, and I felt it would be an affecting narrative for this song.

Director: Michael Maxxis
DP: Mike Okimoto
Editor: Drew Stevenson
Wardrobe/art: Melanie Swerdan
Producer: Erika Belis
Production company: DNA

The filming of this video was one of the most rewarding experiences I've had as a filmmaker. It was pure, and a true collaboration between two artists. There was no budget - literally three thousand dollars. It was a new band's first video, for their first album. I was immediately drawn to the song, and the sincerity I sensed from Tim, the band's singer, over the phone.

I flew to New Jersey, and stayed on Tim's GF's pullout couch. They had 2 cats, which clawed at the sofa all night, making irritating scratching sounds. The sofa-bed was actually sloped downwards, so I had to wedge pillows under my body, and lie at angle, in order to sleep. This was incredibly nostalgic, and reminded me of when I used to crash at my friend's band's apartment, on an inflatable mattress on the unswept floor, breathing dust mites all night.

Anyways, I flew to New Jersey without a concept in mind. The deal was that I'd do the video, on the condition that I could do whatever I wanted, and that we'd build a story around the characters and location that presented themselves to us through location scouting and street casting. In the end, this video wasn't about what I wanted - it became a real collaboration between me and Tim. We spent 8 days together, night and day, building this thing.

We spent the first two days probing the streets of Jersey City, Elizabeth, Newark, Patterson, and all the other towns in between. We scouted strip clubs, boxing gyms, old factories, crack houses, and anything else that captured our interest. We explored NJ tirelessly, fueled by cheap food, coffee, and the thrill of exploration. A few decent ideas were starting to sprout, but nothing truly exciting.... By this time, we'd already spent 1/4 of our budget on the rental car, gas, and meals.

On day 3, as we drove through another despairing New Jersey town, we were talking about movies shot in the state, and got onto The Wrestler. We googled the filming locations, and decided to go check out the strip club. It was at that strip club, which wasn't licensed to serve alcohol, where the idea for this video was born.

We sipped on flat Pepsi's, stuffed dollar bills into a Russian stripper's thong, and tossed ideas back and forth - this is when the idea of ELVIS appeared. The original idea I pitched was an old black Elvis impersonator, in a relationship with a young white girl. Tim loved it, and we had the foundation of our video! Now all we had to do was find a black Elvis.

Later that night, we figured the video should be shot in Atlantic City. Neither of us had been there, and it was a place we were both drawn to. We booked a cheap hotel on Hotwire, and hit the road in the AM.

The city was everything we'd hoped it would be. It was a character in itself, and the perfect backdrop for our video.

We were having a hard time finding a black Elvis on the East Coast, so we began searching for other Elvis'. This is when we came across Gene's website. He was PERFECT. Just enough subtly in his inflections to capture the indie absurdity of our idea.

Now we needed the girl. We scoured the streets, but found no "girl-next-door" types in Atlantic City. The locals all seemed to have an edge, that didn't suit the role. So, I emailed my GF in Canada, and had her post some ads on Craiglist, from New York, to Philly, and up and down the Jersey Shore.

A torrent of headshots and resume's flooded my inbox! Lots of cute little red heads, blondes, brunettes. Everything we were hoping for... But then a wild card arrived. A voluptuous, curvy, Dominican chick in Philly. Isabel. This was a different slant on the video, but equally as unexpected, and perhaps even more interesting! We called her in for a quick audition at a Starbucks, and were sold the second we saw her crossing the street towards us. It was a typical grey bleak day, but she blazed towards us, in a florescent orange spandex dress - like the sun had snuck down to earth to play the slots for an afternoon in Atlantic City. The thought of building a story around her and Gene was just too much! We had our idea! God, or who ever pulls the strings of coincidence and happenstance, hooked us up LARGE!

We were set! The hard part was over! We found our cast, and now we just needed to tweak the story, and find our locations. Oh, and we had to do it with around fifteen hundred bucks.

I could go on and on, about all the other miracles that fell into place, but instead, I'll get down to broad strokes - we got a Red Epic camera package FOR FREE, our DP was able to sort out gear, and a one man crew, for cut rates, and we wrangled vehicles, transport, food, and all the other shit needed to film something for pennies on the dollar.

In the end, this is one of my favorite films I have ever directed. This experience was an important reminder of why I became a filmmaker, and inspired the approach I am taking with my upcoming feature film project. It was filmmaking at it's purest.

This video was made with absolute conviction to my tastes as an artist. This is perhaps the most fitting piece of music for my directing style that I’ve ever worked with, and I committed myself entirely to making a piece of film that I would always be proud of. This is my unvarnished view of the world - contradictory, absurd, and mysterious.

The song is inspired by the film Bad Lieutenant, so everyone wanted to have a cop element, but I did not want to do ANYTHING like the films. I love both movies, and felt that the original story had already been served perfectly - no need for me to do a cheap four minute version. I flushed any inclinations to reference the movies, and did my own thing.

I flew to Toronto the week before the shoot without a concept at all. The idea came to me the first night in my hotel room after a long flight and a few cocktails - the idea of a cop sleeping with his partner’s wife (or fantasizing about it). I knew the idea was good when I woke up the next morning and still remembered it. Then it was time to go to work. First and foremost, I needed a cast.

The first person cast to the video was the leading lady - Jaqui Childs. I came across Jaqui Childs through my dear friend Andrea Berg - a make-up artist I’ve been working with for years who is now in the internet porn business. I knew she’d know some characters, so I headed to her basement suite apartment, drank some bad wine, and looked through her IG friends with her. Within a couple minutes I saw a picture of Jaqui, and immediately knew I needed to work with her. Andrea reached out, and the first member of the cast was booked.

The producers had arranged a casting session the next day, but the turnout was dreadful. The group that auditioned were completely uninteresting to me. Nothing is worse than a forced performance, and that’s what the actors were offering up. So, I decided to get out of TO, and head to a real town an hour south - Hamilton, The Steel City. I booked a hotel, and searched for real people in the streets who captivated me. I wanted to capture both the authenticity and the absurdity of the real world. I’d never been to Hamilton before, but quickly fell in love with the look of it. We ended up moving the entire shoot down there.

The video is cast entirely with real people. There isn’t an actor in here. I spent five days street casting in Hamilton, ultimately finding the rest of the cast in malls and at a Black Sabbath concert.

The concept evolved organically as I found interesting locations and cast. I’d spend the days scouring the streets looking for locations and cast, and then I’d spend the nights in bars and my hotel room continuously revising the concept.

The next actor I found was Dave (the older cop). I spotted him in a downtown Hamilton mall. He looked like a dirty cop to me right off, so I cut him off, and told him I was casting for a video. At first, he thought I was bullshitting him, and tried to brush me off, but I persisted. He reluctantly took my business card, and went on his way. I approached a few more people that day, but nobody was as perfect as Dave. Later that night, Dave called me back, said he was interseted, and I booked him. Two cast down, and two to go.

The next couple of days were a grind. I was striking out. Lots of rejection and lots of uninteresting people. I was running out of options, and the shoot was just a couple days away. The producer was stressing big time, but I wasn’t willing to settle for the cheap actors they were try to hawk on me. Then as fate would have it, I learned that Black Sabbath was playing a concert in Hamilton the next night. GOLD. I knew there would be cast there, and I wasn’t wrong.

I bought a ticket, and headed to the arena with a stack of cards. I actually cast the video 20 times over at that concert! I met several people that would have been great for any role in the video. Ultimately, I chose Paul as our hero cop, and Tom as our crook.

It’s a cast that I love, and really they make the video.

I need to thank The Sheepdogs, their management, and their record labels for their open-mindedness and patience with me. - Each day I was sending them revisions for approval, and every time they welcomed the changes - the stranger and edgier the better.

With that said, this video is not about being weird for the sake of being weird. It’s an excavation into the human psyche, and the impulses that are bubbling under the surface.

The story was fully realized once it got into the hands of the editor Jason Grebski. Simply put, he took the footage, and enhanced every possible aspect. He created a tone and a pace that was beyond what I had ever hoped.

My favorite thing about this video is the cast. This is a real group of friends, so their interactions are completely genuine. We ended up having to shoot this whole video in a half a day - several logistical issues delayed the shoot by over 5 hours, so the concept had to be substantially scaled back. With that said, I think there's something really honest and engaging about this video's simplicity. For me, Kygo's music is the perfect score for an afterparty, and I wanted to create the perfect afterparty for his music.

During lunch, Kygo stayed on the set, playing new songs on the piano - everyone had disappeared to the food truck, except for me and a couple others. Sitting there, all I could think of is how lucky I am to be directing these things... The experiences I'm afforded are priceless...

I got an email very unexpectedly from Elle at around 2 in the morning in early Feb - she asked me if I was crazy, and if so, would I like to direct her video. It was the most interesting first contact I've ever received, and I immediately went to work on a treatment.

Elle was a great collaborator, and was very involved in the evolution of this idea - men as cats.

We cast the video together as well, so the video is stacked with her all her types. 175 men stripped down to their underwear at the audition, where they danced and tried to do headstands. Only one of the 175 hurt himself.

The video was shot in one day, just outside of Palmdale California. I actually flew into LA on Sunday, and we shot 5 days later, on Friday. The prep was insane. We had to find a DP, location, cast, find those colored campers, custom order wardrobe, and do fittings, all in only 4 weekdays! What made it especially intense was that we found out that our chosen location had a film ban on it from LA film, so on tuesday, we were back out in the desert, scrambling for a new place to shoot.

I was fortunate enough to work with a very veteran crew on this, which truthfully is the only way shooting this in 12 hours was possible. Oh, and I was also lucky enough to have another director from A.N.D. shoot 2nd Unit - Thom Glunt, who's work is incredible, shot all the b-story, where the guy is journeying back to Elle, through the desert.

We shot with a Sony F55, a Sony F65, and a bolex (16mm).

The cast was great to work with, except one guy who was upset that he had to touch other men in the big pile up scene at the end... You'll find him on the edge of the pile, looking tentative ;)

The video was colored at Ntropic, by Marshall Plante

Director: Michael Maxxis
Producer: Paul Bock
DP: Vance Burberry
Prod Design: Brandon Mendez
Editor: Lauren Horn
Production Company: DNA

A short film written and directed by Michael Maxxis

Starring Morgan Williams, Andrew Misle and Joey Zazza
Shot: Christopher Walters
Editor: Keith Hamm

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All images used with permission from Anna Wahlgren.

Any time I have an opportunity to make a piece of film for City and Colour, I'm excited. Dallas is a Canadian icon, and his music evokes a unique emotion that really elevates any visual image. This project was different than the last two I did with him - the other ones were more traditional in terms of commissioning and production. I pitched a formal treatment, and then once awarded, we went back and forth for a while, refining the concept.With Love Come Back, the label literally emailed me and said we have some money and want you to do this video. Are you interested? They wired me the cash, and didn't ask any questions. It was an incredibly liberating situation for me. I didn't have to worry about writing a script for approval - I could just confidently go and make whatever I wanted. So, I took the cash, and went to Mississippi - a place I've spent a lot of time in, that I knew was rich with locations. I also knew an incredible dancer in New Orleans who we could build this around. And that's pretty much it. I spent 6 days scouting and assembling a crew, and then 2 days shooting. In the end, I believe we created something really powerful and really raw. We filmed from the southern tip of the Mississippi Delta in Vicksburg, MS, to the top, just south of Memphis, TN. Locations also included Clarksdale, Greenwood, Yazoo City, Alligator, and Tutwiler Mississippi.

Director: Michael Maxxis
DP: Cale Finot
Editor: Jason Grebski
Producer: Paul Bock
Production Company: DNA

Shooting a hockey themed Canadian Beer commercial in my hometown with a bunch of my friends in it was about the most Canadian thing I've ever done.

Music video directed by Michael Maxxis

Director: Michael Maxxis
DP: Adam Marsden
Editor: Dave De Carlo
Producer: Rory Halsall

Director: Michael Maxxis
Shot: Cale Finot
Cut: Drew Stevenson
Producer: Paul Bock
Colouring: Tricia Hagoriles@ Alter Ego

Director: Michael Maxxis
DP: Cale Finot
Editor: Dylan Atkinson
Producer: Sarah Park
Executive Producer: Paul Bock
Production Company: DNA

Director: Michael Maxxis
DP: Cale Finot
Editor: Jason Grebski
Producer: Eddy Sizz

Director: Michael Maxxis
Producer: Paul Bock and John Nadaline
DP: Cale Finot
Cut: Rouzbeh Heydari

Director: Michael Maxxis
Shot: Brian O'Carroll
Cut: Dave De Carlo
Producer: Tim Young

Director: Michael Maxxis
DP: Adam Marsden
Editor: Dave De Carlo
Producer: Chris Cunningham

Director: Michael Maxxis
DP: Bernard Evans
Editor: Keith Hamm
Colorist: Shane Reed
Producers: Jacob Halajian and Paul Bock
Production Company: DNA

Director: Michael Maxxis
DP: Cale Finot
Editor: Dylan Atkinson
Producer: Sarah Park

DirectOR: Michael Maxxis
Shot: Brett Van Dyck
Cut: Kurt Richie
Producer: Blake McWilliam

Starring Jimmy Gnecco and David Carradine
Director: Michael Maxxis
Narrative Shot: Brian O'Carroll
Performance Shot: Martin Wojtunik
Editor: Dylan Atkinson
Producers: Tim Young and Rory Halsall

Directed by Michael Maxxis
Shot: Christopher Walters
Cut: Keith Walters
 

Director: Michael Maxxis
Shot: Cale Finot
Cut: Dean Gonzalez
Producer: Paul Brock

Directed by Michael Maxxis
Shot: Jule Fontaine
Cut: Keith Hamm
Producer: Paul Bock