My current favorite filmmaker is this guy named Giuseppe Andrews... he creates experimental films with his cast of trailer park friends...
www.giuseppeandrews.net
He funds his films with money he makes from being in Hollywood films. He was in Independence Day and Detroit Rock City and such. He writes, edits, directs, acts in, does the music for, produces, etc. all his own movies, usually on cheap-ass digital cameras. Occasionally, he collaborates with Adam Rifkin/Rif Coogan (Psycho Cop 2, Invisible Maniac, Night at the Golden Eagle, Dark Backward, etc... all great films). He's won some awards for his films, mainly Garbanzo Gas, a hilarious pro-vegetarian film where a gigantic cow man lives in a hotel and invites people who are about to kill themselves to stay with him and they all order steak while a killer with a talking orthopedic shoe tries to kill them after they find happiness in life, from steak.
Period Piece is like 5 or 6 hilarious/ridiculous stories interconnected... one in particular is about this old man alone in a hotel room where he has fake sex with an invisible porn star, and he purchases a dead pig and chops it in half with an axe. Great stuff. Here's some clips:
http://www.youtube.com/results?searc...e&search_type=
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uitXR...eature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FCS5C...eature=related
He's by far the most inventive, original, and forward-thinking filmmaker working today. His films are the most surreal and hilarious I have EVER seen. More info at
www.giuseppeandrews.net including a detailed essay calling him the trailer park Godard.
He has a a small but loyal cult following but with his films getting rave reviews at film festivals and such, in a few years he'll be huge. He has some films released by Troma but he releases films through his website now. About a month ago I bought all his films for $100 and watched all of them in a day. They were just THAT good.
Think Jodorowsky meets early John Waters and you'll be on the right track...