As SXSW 2009 approaches we’ll be asking filmmakers to spill the superficial details about their films, to tell us all the deep personal details of what makes them tick, and –– new this year! –– reveal who they had to sleep with, in the incestuous conspiracy-minded secret society that is the wider SXSW community, in order to get their film programmed at the festival.

Disclosure time! David Lowery wrote a few reviews for us last year at SXSW. This year, he will not be writing for us, but he will be at the Festival representing his first feature, St. Nick. Workshopped last summer at the IFP Filmmaker Lab, the Emerging Visions entry follows “the adventures of a brother & sister trying to survive, all on their own, out on the plains of Texas.” David answers to The 5 Questions We’re Asking Everyone involve taking inspiration from Ernest Goes to Camp and praise for SXSW spontaneity. There’s more info on St. Nick’s website, and at David Lowery’s blog.

Tell us about your movie. Who did you work with, why did you make it? Give us the reductive, 25-word or less, “It’s like [pop culture reference a] meets [pop culture reference b]!” pitch, then explain what the quick and dirty sell leaves out.

St. Nick is my first feature film. It’s about a brother and sister who have run away from home for some unknown reason and are trying to survive on their own out in the plains of the great Southwest. It’s an adventure film, in a way. It’s also sort of like a warm hug that leaves you with a bloody nose.

When I first conceived the project, I described it to a friend as Ernest Scared Stupid meets Badlands, but that sort of changed as I developed it. What it is now was inspired in equal parts by old Calvin and Hobbes comics and Bill Callahan songs. I made it with some of my best friends, who all happen to be filmmakers as well; Adam Donagehy, who I went to high school with, and James M. Johnston, who I was briefly married to, and a bunch of other intrepid Texans, all of whom I’d cut off my left hand for. The film stars a real brother and sister, with real dirt under their fingernails, by the names of Tucker and Savanna Sears - two amazing kids who had never acted before. God willing, they’ll show up for the Q&A and make me look good. Also appearing in the film are Barlow Jacobs, who some of you know and love from Great World Of Sound and Low And Behold, and Mara Lee Miller, better known as the haunting voice behind Bosque Brown.

Do you have a day job/a non-filmmaking occupation that raises money for your filmmaking efforts? Tell us about it.

We raised the budget for this film via grants and private investments, so I didn’t have to put much of my own money into it - which is good, because I have none! I do freelance editing and such when I’m not working on films, which is all the time; hence the severe lack of income. I’m trying to remedy this.

Have you been to SXSW before? If so, tell us about your funniest story from the experience. If not, what are you looking forward to re: the festival and/or the city of Austin?

I’ve been to SXSW every year since 2005 (last year, my short film ‘A Catalog Of Anticipations’ played). I love this festival and wouldn’t miss it. I don’t have any truly drop-dead hilarious anecdotes, but one story I’m fond of occurred last year, when myself and a few other filmmakers couldn’t get into some exclusive party. We started walking, looking for some other shindig, blindly following rumors as we made our way up and down the streets of downtown. Gradually, our small group became a legitimate gaggle - a who’s-who in many respects! - and we became so caught up in conversation that we just kept walking, creating a perambulatory party all our own that was surely far superior to whatever overcrowded and overloud gala we’d been barred from. I’d say we should try to make it an institution, but a lack of spontaneity might kill it.

Let’s get hypothetical: You’re on death row. The night of your execution, you’re allowed to watch any two films of your choice. What would you pick for your last-night-on-Earth double feature?

As much as I love movies, I don’t think I would choose to spend the last night of my life watching two of my own choice. There’s no way it could be truly satisfying! I’d ask for a piano to play, or just settle for silence.

There’s been some criticism that the only way to get into SXSW is by being a part of an “incestuous scene where everybody knows everybody.” So who did *you* have to sleep with to get in? Metaphorically or literally: are there any SXSW filmmaker(s) past or present that you’re close with personally and/or professionally, and how have those relationships helped or hurt the process of producing your film and getting it seen?

Why apply a pejorative? I like to think that film festivals both foster relationships with individual filmmakers, and engender a sense of community amongst those filmmakers. It’s a beautiful thing, and it’s only natural that, within a given festival lineup, there will be a few works by people who have screened there in the past, and works by their friends, and perhaps even a bit of cross–pollination in the credits. This doesn’t by any means create a veil of exclusivity. I have five friends with feature films in the festival this year whose work has screened here in years past. That is five films out of 108, meaning there are 103 other features I’ll be walking into blindly, and 103 filmmakers I’m looking forward to making friends with.