DOPE ART HERE: The Budget Blockbuster Edition

Remember when finding good 📺 🎥 🎵 wasn’t a second job? 

We do.

We're your plug for Dope Art Here, served fresh monthly 😘.

PS - NO SPOILERS HERE. We got you 😏

Welcome to the Dope Art Here experience: a quick mind quencher & snack for your artistic tastes.

WE CURATE ART AS DOPE AS YOU.

This month's spotlights:

• DOUBLE FEATURE | Adrienne drops us into the indie blockbuster El Mariachi that launched a legend, and the memoir about making it.
• IN "COHERENCE" | Dara takes us on the sci-fi mind trip of Coherence that starts with wine and ends in what the fuck. We're still debating in our group chat.
• HE'S A BAD MOTHER-| Andrew breaks down Shaft, the low-budget legend who kicked down Hollywood’s doors—with style.
• THE LAST WORD | For anyone who’s tired, broke, and still wants to make something beautiful - Justin made something for you.

I started in this industry by making cool shit with my friends—cheaply, scrappily, joyfully. And lately? I’ve been craving that again.

In this post-strike, post-streaming-bubble moment, I’m getting tired of collapse-talk.

The truth: many of the once-stable-ish parts of the entertainment industry are now very unstable, and many of us are feeling it. It can feel painful and devastating.

Also true: chaos cracks doors open. Some of the best work gets made when there’s “no way” it should work. I want to be close to that energy, with other people who feel it too.

That’s why this Monday, the curators—me, Dara, Justin, and Andrew—got together to do something we somehow hadn’t done before: watch a movie. Outside. We rolled through trailers for the low-budget legends you’ll read about below: El Mariachi, Shaft, then chose Coherence. The vibe was right. The sky got dark. And the chills weren’t just from the breeze.

Coherence was shot in one location. Partially improvised by a group of talented actors. The real budget might be more than the myth. But that doesn’t dull the impact. These films show what can happen when community meet vision.

I’m working on my first feature right now, and I’m soaking up every drop of inspiration I can. Watching this movie together felt like a reset. A reminder.

We’d love to do it again—with more of you. Would you be into a live event? A screening, a conversation, some great art and great people? Hit reply and let us know.

And for now—let’s get swept up in what can be made with a little budget and a lotta brilliance.

—Adrienne

MOVIE + BOOK: EL MARICHI + REBEL WITHOUT A CREW (dir. Robert Rodriguez)

How do you make a feature film with $7,000, no crew, and a camera that might break mid-shoot? If you're Robert Rodriguez, you get creative—and a little unhinged in the best possible way.

I’m halfway through Rodriguez's movie El Mariachi and his book Rebel Without a Crew, and it’s part filmmaking memoir, part guerrilla warfare manual. He literally sold his body to science for $3,000 and used the quiet hospital time to write the script.

The movie looks great because of the chaos, not in spite of it. No money for squibs? He faked gunshots with dirt and clever cuts. No dolly? He sat in a wheelchair.

This isn’t just a film—it’s a dare.

If you’ve ever said, “I just need a little more time/money/help,” this double feature will lovingly slap that excuse out of your mouth. Start now. Make something. Then make it brilliant.

WATCH: EL MARIACHI (AppleTV)

READ: REBEL WITHOUT A CREW (Bookshop)

MOVIE: COHERENCE (dir. James Ward Byrkit)

I’m a sucker for a movie where the people sound like people. As much as I love to watch Aaron Soorkin characters shout “OK” and “What’s Next” while waxing poetic about Gilbert and Sullivan, I ADORE a script that feels like you’re a fly on the wall in a real person’s actual kitchen.

So, of course, I was obsessed with Coherence, even before it got to the mind-bendy plotty bits. It’s a cosmic horror film, meaning it’s not scary scary but so deeply dread-inducing if you think about it too hard your head will throb and your stomach will fall out of your ass. It feels small and lived in. You’re immediately invested in each character and their relationship to each other, even before a reality fracturing meteor passes overhead and everything slowly goes to shit :)

Coherence is a meditation on the parts that sum up to our wholes, how time impacts our choices, and vice versa, how emotional men can be in times of trauma, and how FUCKED life would be like if Xander from Buffy were from Roswell instead.

Tell me when you’ve watched it twice, because trust me, you’re going to watch it twice.

~dara

WATCH | COHERENCE (Peacock)

MOVIE: SHAFT (dir. Gordon Parks)

“Who is the man that would risk his neck for his brother man?”

If you answered, Shaft! - I would say, Can you dig it? One of the greatest theme songs ever created, Isaac Hayes’s (what’s cooler-than cool?) ice-cold groove is one of the key reasons I love this film. Before I knew who Gordon Parks was, before I knew who Richard Roundtree was, I knew who Shaft was.

Shaft was a Black hero who felt larger than life. Brought to life by Gordon Parks - who has became one of my favorite photographers of all time - Shaft was an uncompromising Black detective, literally giving the finger to the man while looking like one of the coolest men ever to cross celluloid. The film broke through the institutional barriers of Hollywood to showcase that films starring and created by Black people could find outsize commercial success. Made for $500,00, it brought in $13m - roughly $4m and $100m in 2025 dollars. It launched a franchise included 4 film sequels and a television spin-off. John Shaft was, is and will always be a bad mother. - Andrew

WATCH: SHAFT (YOUTUBE)

THE LAST WORD: JUSTIN'S CORNER (2025)

At the risk of oversimplifying, I’d say that creative circles of all kinds are being challenged – particularly now – by downward pressures on budgets, challenges finding true patronage or sponsorship, and many aspects of life increasingly becoming absolute mf drags. So, in light of that, here’s what I’ve been thinking about this month: we all pursue works of music, film, books, other visual mediums, etc. for various reasons, but perhaps among those, to relate, to reconsider, to relax.

That said, I’ll ask: how many of our readers, present and future, are themselves creatives, whether hobbyist, amateur, or professional? For any of you who are, this message could function as a friendly poke: of the few free and available mental hours that you have per week (month?), should any be dedicated to contributing to or finishing that one project? Yeah, that one, that you’re thinking of right now. Is there any sliver of energy to put towards that? If not, is there any sliver of time that could be planned to put towards it? In my personal experience, nudging that dream forward reduces the fatigue and weight of life.

-Justin

From dinner parties gone sideways to wheelchair dolly shots to theme songs that slap harder than a film school tuition bill—these are the low-budget bangers we can't stop thinking about.

They’re scrappy, smart, and stylish. They made us feel something profound. They’re our current faves.

Got your own? Tell us. And hit reply to let us know what you’re craving in a live event—screenings, convos, vibes, snacks... we’re open.

Email me your picks at yo@dopearthere.com

Hit subscribe to join us for this ride.

Makin' bangers on the budget,

—Adrienne + The Curators