There will be no screening of Wayward Traveler--The show is over.

This is indeed a screening post. Therr is a link at the end

I am 35 years old. I am legally disabled. All I wanted was one shot at making something out of my talents. I almost did it. We finished filming the pilot episode and the first half of the first season of the show.

We rented a car from Dollar Rent-A-Car to film the second half. We rented the car on a weekly basis but the lady only wrote the contract for two days. This means that everyday after the two days we get charged an addtional ten dollars a day. They also told us that they would not bill our creidt card until the end of the rental. Since she only made the rental 2 days to pad her commission and maximize the amount they would make off of us they billed our card at the end of two days for way more than it was supposed to billed. The crad declined. I'm not even supposed to make a payment for another 2 weeks on the card.

We've posted youtube videos trying to fight back. We've posted here asking for the assistance of the film community in getting our story out. Really, no one cares.

NOw, we have had to take our last money and rent an apartment 1,400 miles away from home because we have no way to get back to Sacramento. This means no show.

I was paralyed. I relearned how to walk and use my hands and I fount an uphillbattle making sacrifices that only someone who is legally disabled would have to make to have my chance. Dollar Rent-A-Car crushed my dreams. The lack of support from people in this country crushed my dreams. A woman trying to add a couple extra bucks to her paycheck crushed my dreams.

Now, I have nothing. I will go back to sitting in my house sponging off the system. I don't want to hear about people taking advantage of our welfare system, or soaking up funds from social security, or the American dream. It doesn't matter.

A giant faceless corporation just crushed the spine of a former paralytic. I would rather go back to not being able to use my hands and feet than to be tied up in this way unable to move.

This is a screening post. Here is my video I would like you to screen. My last film: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-DFIpg6kcKE
 
Did you contact the police or a lawyer? Because I'm pretty sure you could file a lawsuit against the corporation, you don't have to just sit back and watch your life turn to shit.
 
I'd call the card company first. Credit card companies have polices against charges for items/services not received. Dispute the charge with them as well as with Dollar Rent A Car.

And keep dreaming, for heaven's sake. Don't suggest that anyone can take away your dreams. They only can if you let them. They can piss on them, sure, but they can only take them away if you let them.

Hell, turn this into your story...it might have better potential than your original plans.

I have no idea how you can rent an apartment for less than a bus ticket back home, but it sounds like killer story potential.
 
I have a lawyer. Our only recourse is a lawsuit. No matter what my life has already gone to shit. It's all over. All the sacrifices we have made. Everything is lost

We just got a letter at erics moms house telling us if we get pulled over we are going to have felony charges pressed against us for grand theft auto.

We are returning the car. All the suffering and hardship was for nothing. Even if Dollar was to say go ahead keep the car it would not matter.

I had only one option. Reach out to the American public for support, reach out to my peers., at my wits end. No one reached out to help us.

Now I go back to being just another legally disabled person in the income bracket "poorest of poor" which is the literal term the IRS uses for my income level.
 
Consult an attorney, and, if you have a case, sue the hell out of them. This is what tort law is all about, or maybe its civil law cause there is a contract involved?? That's why you want to consult an attorney.
 
I'm sort of an advocate for the disabled and a filmmaker . . . I'm not sure why you're letting a bump in the road derail your project. People are shafted by faceless corporations all the time, disabled or not. We deal and move on. Filmmakers, especially, are faced with one kind of hurdle or another throughout our projects. The ones who succeed are the ones who come up with solutions to bring a project to completion.

There are many successful disabled filmmakers, all of them, likely had to over come hurdles.
Good luck to you though.
 
@ guirillaangel

are you kidding me? A bump in the road? WE just had to take every penny we had to rent an apartment, we have to sell our camera for food. Everything was fine until Dollar fucked us. They want $2000 for a car that supposed to be $140 a week. I have no idea what world you live in but i live in a world with no money and without money you can't hire attornies. We can't even afford a damn dollar cheese burger after all of this. If you are an advocate then advocate, dont minimize the situation or assume I have not tried everything in mu power.


I have zero dollars and half an apartment in denver now. we can move in until we come up with the rerst of the money. I am going to go stand in a gas station and bum money with a sign to get the rest.
 
Wayward Traveler said:
I have a lawyer. Our only recourse is a lawsuit. No matter what my life has already gone to shit. It's all over. All the sacrifices we have made. Everything is lost

We just got a letter at erics moms house telling us if we get pulled over we are going to have felony charges pressed against us for grand theft auto.

We are returning the car. All the suffering and hardship was for nothing. Even if Dollar was to say go ahead keep the car it would not matter.

I had only one option. Reach out to the American public for support, reach out to my peers., at my wits end. No one reached out to help us.

Now I go back to being just another legally disabled person in the income bracket "poorest of poor" which is the literal term the IRS uses for my income level.
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Hey, congatulations on being able to WALK again. Jesus Christ, I just read where you said you would rather be paralyzed again. I have an idea: How about you close up the "Pity Party Shop" and get to doing whatever you need to do to straighten this out. Its noone's responsibility but yours. YOU(or whomever) signed the contract. The leaser is in business to make money. So you signed a contract to their advantage. Tough shit. If you didn't like the terms you shouldn't have signed.

Here's another idea: I bet your friends you are with are able bodied. Go get jobs and save to get back home. What are you gonna do? Sit and cry until you get evicted. And since you are legally disabled(how can you be illegally disabled??) you probably get a check. I don't care how much it is.

SHort answer: Buck up and get to it, whatever IT is that you need to do.
 
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As far as the bus ticket home comment goes, how do I get a bus ticket home when i dont have a home? my home is an RV sitting in storage in Sacramento in need of a muffler. We are homeless, and people do rent apartment by the week. You can sit back and make all kinds of suggestions but all of this already happened.

Just for the record I am not trying to be famous and nor do I care to monetize mny suffering. I just wanted to make art. I do not want to be known as the filmmaker who suffered. I just wanted to share my travels and my life with the world. That was it. Now, it's all gone
 
Hi Wayward Traveler. I'm very sorry to hear of your misfortune.:( Please don't let this deter you from your goals.

I read your other thread in regards to finding a grantwriter. I am not a professional grantswriter, but I've had a few successful personal projects funded where I've had to submit grants proposals. I just viewed your trailer for your road series and think this project may be something to submit for ITVS' Commissioned Funding program: http://www.itvs.org/funding/edf

If this sounds like something you'd be interested in submitting for, let me know and I may be able to help with the application process. As I've said, though. I am NOT a professional grantswriter, but between all the great peeps here at Indietalk, you, and myself, perhaps we can get a a great trailer/rough cut submitted for you. (It's a rolling deadline)


EDIT: Okay, so I just read your response to GA, I understand you're desperate but please, peeps are just trying to help, no need to get testy. Having said that, my offer still stands (but far from a guarantee of positive results).
 
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@ murdock xspoken like someone who never endured a moment of haship in their life.

Just so we are clear here you can say what you THINK you know about contract law but I have a lawyer and I have been advised that the moment she issued a contract that was different than what we verbally agreed to the contract that you seem to think is gold was null and void. we dont owe them a nickel. we are in the right here.

and I am not looking for pity. I don't need pity.

If stating simple facts about the details of my story invokes pity in you then I don't know what to say.
 
NOw, we have had to take our last money and rent an apartment 1,400 miles away from home because we have no way to get back to Sacramento.
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I must have misunderstood this statement...I took it to mean you had the choice between going home or renting a house far away from home. My apologies for not understanding what you meant by "home."
 
If you didn't expect to gain profit from the series, then why did you spend all the money you had on it? There's a reason large production companies risk assess before helping with funding. Most indie film makers tend to ask for donations, or wait until they've got the money to spare as opposed to just spending all they've got.

I'm not saying that you deserved this, or that it's somehow not the company's fault, but it kind of seems reckless to do what you did. Also, for the future, here's an idea - you have internet access, so teach yourself how to make websites and the like and get an online job doing so. Good money for an at-home job and it's fairly simple to do. I'm not saying give up on the dream, but that having the expensive series without first having some form of income is very, very dangerous, as you're now seeing.
 
I'm sorry if I am testy right now. I am sitting in the middle of Devner with bronchitis. I just lost everything I haver worked for and no one can bring it back. Even the desire to do the project has been crushed. We have to return the car right now. We are homeless. I have people telling me i am looking for pity and to buck up. This is really really stressful.

If you think thast someone that had to relearn how to walk and use thier hands, and lost everything: my house, my children, my job, my savings, my investments, my car doesn't have some psychological issues from all of that then i have no idea what to say. All I know is that I am just down, low down, and people saying buck up or stop looking for pity is just purelu hurtful


again I am sorry for being rude, really I am. Pleasse accept my apology
 
I should say that I do speak from experience. I've never been paralyzed. I did have a business tank, and was on the verge of bankrupcy with an 8 months pregnant wife. What did I do? I sure as hell didn't sit and cry, waiting for a hand out. I found whever I could to make ends meet. That meant working in a dog food packing plant that had no form of automation. I still have trouble with my hands from that time. I don't know if its nerve damage or what. But who cares I did what I had to do for my family. Now here I am, a couple years later, back on top. Well not completely on top.:) But I'm doing okay. I'm the number 2 guy at the company I work for, have money in saving, college fund for the kids, and am piddling around in movies. Guess what will NOT get you there. Waiting for hand outs.

You relearned to walk. Well that got you back to more or less normal. That is not the end of the road. You have to keep going. And an attitude of entitlement, like it reads you have, is the biggest turn off for guys like me.

Sorry if I seem calloused. Maybe I am.

EDIT: funny, I started writing this before I read your last post to me.:P
 
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there are a lot of assumptions being made right now. I did expect tyo make a profit. I have merchandise, DVD sales, and everything else that comes along with a production. All I said was I dfidnt want to be famous. I never said i didnt want to make money
 
@ murdock could you please go through my comments and repost where i asked anyone for money? Ive never asked for handout in my life. Yes, you are callous.All I did was post my story and ask for people to repost it. that is not handout. Thanks for making my day 100 times worse by being the person who has to rub salt in the fresh wounds
 
You expect pity for spending all of your money on a single project, expecting it to make the money back despite not being that well-known - planning on merchandise for an unknown franchise is incredibly risky. Not many people buy merchandise for indy projects unless it's really amazing.

I'm not quite sure what you were expecting to happen when you spent all of your money on this.
 
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