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"Springer's imagination is certainly something to behold." - Film Threat "Living Dead Girl is hilarious...transcends into the arena of pure genius." - Ain't it Cool News "Jon Springer has reconfirmed his standing as our state's most audacious narrative filmmaker by far." - City Pages |
"The Hagstone Demon" horror feature starring Mark Borchardt is now complete (MySpace FILM)!
"Hagstone" Website with Trailer
"Dollface" short completed.
Springer awarded 2007 McKnight Filmmaking Fellowship
The Wood Witch voted "Best Film of 2006" City Pages Best of the Twin Cities
RAVE!!! "Ain't it Cool News" review for Living Dead Girl
Rave review for Heterosapiens on FilmThreat.com
Jon Springer teams with "American Movie/Coven" horror icon Mark Borchardt in "Living Dead Girl."
Jon Springer: 2001 City Pages Artist of the Year
Springer on the Internet Movie Database
Cricket Films began with the short film Dead Looters back in 1990. Red Eye Curator Matt Bakkom called Dead Looters a "Minnesota cult classic." Film Threat magazine called Dead Looters a "must see" in 1994. The City Pages called it "darkly funny and chilling." Filmson.com called Dead Looters "a Super-8 zombie classic."
The budding cult film director wrote and directed his first feature film The Hymens Parable in 2000. Springer's feature debut premiered at the Mpls./St. Paul International Film Festival in April of that year. The 16mm feature won the audience ballot award for local narrative feature. The City Pages called The Hymens Parable "heavy-hitting and ambitious."
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Then in 2001 came the notorious sci-fi shocker Heaven 17, raved in a Pulse review
as "leeringly seductive and poetic in its simplicity...a strange and fascinating
film." The outrageously provocative Heaven 17 soon reached a
worldwide audience on ifilm.com,
hitting the #1 "most viewed" slot in the sci-fi category on the world's most
popular internet movie site. Realizing the awsome potential of the internet, Springer followed up with another the equally outrageous dystopian sci-fi satire Heterosapiens (aka Simulated Sex) Like Heaven 17, it also soared to the #1 spot in three categories, and ended up in the ifilm.com. Raves City Pages: "Writer-director Jon Springer pulls off a politically provocative sci-fi switcheroo of near-Planet of the Apes proportions." See Heterosapiens reviews here. |
Living Dead Girl festival bows: Central Standard Film Fest, SMMASH, Minneapolis St. Paul Int. Fest (by invitation), Milwaukee International Fest, DV Cinema Showcase, Leeds Horror Fest UK. The Dead Girl will also screen in Montreal in July at the Fantasia Fesival. Living Dead Girl stars Mark Borchardt of American Movie and Coven. Springer teamed up with special make-up effects wizards Michele Kurkowski, Christian Hanson and Melinda Mauskemo plus 70+ zombie extras.
Next came another 35mm silent horror short called The Wood Witch. As in Living Dead Girl, this film featured 16fps camera motion and intertitles. A nasty witch - fashioned in the tradition of a Grimm Brother's villian - attempts to cast a spell on a pair of siblings by sending an innocent looking toad to their parentless farmerhouse circa 1830. The Wood Witch premiered at the Fearless Filmmaker Screening Event in Minneapolis and won Best Film in the City Pages Best of the Twin Cities 2006.
Springer has also lensed 6 feature films and about 35 shorts to date. Feature film credits as DP include Joel Itman's Acid Snow, Brent Roske's One Take, John Ervin's Made in Berlin, & camera operator on Mitch Hedberg's Los Enchiladas! (Sundance 1999) and Ben Bowman's PBS special Second Story Man.
In addition to movie credits, Springer has over 700 commercial credits as a freelance director and cinematographer. Springer has been recognized by IFP North as among the most talented and prolific writer/directors in the state, as well as one of the top professional cinematographers working in Minneapolis. Awards include the 2007 McKnight Filmmaking Fellowship, an A&E/History Channel NACB Gold, an ITVA Silver, and eight gold and silver Telly Awards for commercial directing and cinematography.