Last Friday I went to Sergio Hernandez's Hell Bound Boys Los Angeles premier at Braindead Theater on Fairfax, formerly the home of Cinefamily, in West Hollywood. I've known Surge for a while from visiting friends in San Diego, where Surge owns Pop's Tattoo shop, the de facto clubhouse for the community of artists I've gotten to know over the past few years. I heard about his plan to make a feature length movie a couple years ago, during the Covid-19 Pandemic and have been following the progress updates ever since. I was expecting to see a lot of familiar faces onscreen, knowing that Surge had cast many of his fellow San Diegans to play the main characters in the film. I knew it would revolve around graffiti and otherwise I had no idea what to expect.
The doors were open and people were everywhere when I arrived at 7:30pm, the listed start time on my event ticket. No one asked to see my ticket and I walked right in. There were people lined up to buy concessions and I turned toward the restroom, wanting to settle into a seat as soon as possible. I saw my buddy Joe Garlic using a urinal and we greeted each other with a hug. Joe works at Pop's and I knew he'd done a bunch of the graffiti that was featured in the movie. Joe and I grabbed a beer then filed into the packed theater. I searched for an empty seat and finally found one right in the middle, next to my buddy Pat who runs Gas Station Vintage, a used custom clothing retail co. Just as I sat the lights went out and the opening credits started, bright two-color graffiti letters announcing the production company with a rolling backdrop of San Diego landmarks. I was fucking psyched!
The movie was awesome. I'm not a film critic so I'll just say that knowing this was a first film (Surge wrote and directed, the actors had no formal training or theater background as far as I know), I can't wait to see what Surge and co. do next. The story was tight and believable, the characters felt real, the visuals were more than fun, and the music kicked ass. It felt like we were all a big family in that theater and the pride in our friends combined with the heartfelt themes in the movie brought a tear to almost everyone I'm sure. We piled out into the street and everyone was hugging and high fiving and congratulating. It felt nice to have that sunny San Diego energy in the usually cool and aloof Los Angeles night. I had to find Ian and Jazmyn because Ian was the one to notify me of the event and I'd told them I'd see them at the premier. Finally I spotted them in the crowd and as I walked up Jazie greeted me with a hug and a brown paper gift bag. Inside was a ballcap with an embroidered graphic of a cartoon cat riding a shooting star. "You remembered, yes!" She had promised me the last of the batch but that was almost a month prior and I hadn't reminded her to bring it. When I spoke to Surge briefly after the film he was wearing the same cap so getting my own was the icing on the cake. The crowd pressed around us and carried me in its current. I left on an Irish goodbye and hopped in a car to my next destination.
