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.

Eileen Yaghoobian’s Died Young, Stayed Pretty delves deep into the subculture of indie rock poster artists. According to the film’s synopsis, its stars have “created their own visual language for describing the spotty underbelly of western civilization and they’re not shy about throwing it in the face of polite society. Along the way, they manage to create posters that are strikingly obscene, unflinchingly blasphemous and often quite beautiful.” Answering The 5 Questions We Ask Everyone, Yaghoobian talks about BBQ, Badlands, and whittling down 200 hours of footage about posters.

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.

My movie is about rock posters! I love the images in rock posters: teddy bears with their arms cut off doing stuff to little kids in cribs. It’s some twisted stuff, you know, and it’s all to represent a rock band for a show. The whole thing is really funny to me and I love the music. When I started, I had a little crew for four days only (a DP and sound mixer). But I lone-wolfed this project, traveling solo for three years filming on location in Austin, Seattle, Chicago, Rhode Island and all across the USA and Canada.  I was lucky in post-production to have Mark Greenberg, the music composer, make 19 original tracks to my film! On watching the first cut he said this: “Out of these dirty, murky places comes this shining art and community.” And his music compliments it perfectly! And Pete Dionne’s mad skills as a visual effects artist shine on the screen (he did all the visual effects for the posters!) We have like 250 poster cutaways in the film and he got THE look for the posters, animated with great energy!

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

I freelance but I’m looking for a day job! My family, friends have been just amazing. I owe so much to them. I made this film out of my pocket money for three years and it was hard, really hard.  After filming for three years and 200 something hours of footage, I was lucky to get a Canada Council for the Arts Grant to cut my film and finish it.

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?

Not to the film festival and I can’t wait! I want to watch movies, meet filmmakers, and have fun. I shot during SXSW in 2005 for my movie.  There is a poster convention and DMBQ played at Emo’s and a funny scene at Sam’s BBQ.  I would love to go back to Sam’s BBQ, it’s a great place.

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?

Terrence Malick’s Badlands. Sissy Spacek’s tone in narration in this film is brilliant; I want to hear her narrate before I go.  It’s a great comedy with great timing and a great tone for death row! And Akira Kurosawa’s Stray Dog. I want to see the show girls dance. I can watch that scene on a loop. And, of course, the chase at the end is great, both dark and funny. They would be lovely last movies

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?

Well, my movie is about posters, music and film and it’s seems like a perfect fit for a festival about posters, music and film!