Todd Verow

Biography

Todd Verow was born on November 11th, 1966 in the town of Bangor, Maine. He started acting and writing short plays at the age of ten. He started making movies while attending the Rhode Island School of Design which he helped pay for by hustling the mean streets of Providence, Rhode Island. During this time he made several short experimental films including: "V IS FOR VIOLET", "THE FLESH IS WILLING", BUILT FOR ENDURANCE" and "THE DEATH OF DOTTIE LOVE". He also studied acting and directing at Brown University and Cinematography at the American Film Institute. He worked as a cinematographer on several films before making his first feature the controversial film version of Dennis Cooper's novel "FRISK". After "FRISK" Todd started his own production company, BANGORFILMS and made several feature films including: "LITTLE SHOTS OF HAPPINESS", "A SUDDEN LOSS OF GRAVITY", "ONCE & FUTURE QUEEN", "ANONYMOUS" and "VACATIONLAND".

Todd is now preparing for his next feature "BETWEEN SOMETHING AND NOTHING" about his life on the streets while attending art school. Todd Verow currently resides in New York City.

FILMOGRAPHY:

V IS FOR VIOLET (short film) - 1989

THE FLESH IS WILLING (short film) - 1990

THE DEATH OF DOTTIE LOVE (short film) - 1990

BUILT FOR ENDURANCE (short film) - 1991

FRISK - 1996
Todd Verow's controversial first feature film is based Dennis Cooper's infamous novel "FRISK". A first person narrative of the exploits of agay serial killer in deeply disturbing, controversial drama aboutviolence, sexuality, and the imagination.
Dennis, the main character, whose lead we follow on this path between what is real and what we can only hope is surreal. His friends attempt to determine if he's truly a psychopath. The story, is told in the form of a succession of ritual-like murders, comes to life through the letters he writes to his sometime lover and best friend Julian and the object of his desire, Julian's younger brother, Kevin. The film is set in an erotic world of sado-masochism and portrays the sexual appetites of a young man for whom killing and engorging the victim become the ultimate thrill.
www.bangorfilms.com/frisk/frisk.html

LITTLE SHOTS OF HAPPINESS - 1997

SHUCKING THE CURVE - 1998

THE TROUBLE WITH PERPETUAL DEJA-VU - 1999
Cape Cod is a lonely place in the winter. The tourists are gone, the cottages are shuttered. Danielle, a Cape Cod native, lives there with her husband Vince, who sells real estate. They are a young couple, but Danielle has a need to go astray. She finds an old boyfriend Joe, and proceeds to act out sexually right under Vince's nose. Is this marriage tenable?
www.bangorfilms.com/dejavu/dejavu.html

A SUDDEN LOSS OF GRAVITY - 2000

ONCE & FUTURE QUEEN - 2000

AGAINST - 2001

TAKE AWAY - 2002

EX-VOTOS - 2003

FACE FIRST (short film) - 2003

FLUFF (short film) - 2003

ANONYMOUS - 2004
A man's sexual addiction threatens to take over his life, costing him his lover, his apartment and possibly his job. After five years, Todd escapes from his stale relationship by secretly prowling public toilets and the Internet looking for anonymous sex. When his boyfriend John catches Todd in flagrante in the bathroom at his workplace, he beats Todd up and throws him out of their apartment. Homeless, Todd is forced to live at his office, but his compulsion for sex also throws his job into jeopardy.
"A sexy and original psychological portrait, Todd Verow's provocative feature maps the region between monogamy and sexuality free of constraints. It's a precarious zone, especially when happiness is assumed to be lurking behind the scenes.
Todd (played by Verow himself) should know. He's got a steady lover and a steady job at a movie theater, but sometimes his life resembles a gilded cage. His relationship with John, which evolved from a sexually charged roommate search to a capital-R Relationship, has become stale and rote. His job is largely spent in a deathly still office. To make up for the deficit in his fantasy life, Todd finds release as he always did: in casual sex with fuck-buddies and strangers, using the internet and public restrooms as havens of easy connection. But when John gets wind of Todd's dalliances, danger looms. Can Todd have a life of sexual and emotional fulfillment, out in the open? The elusive answer is a matter of trial and error.
Verow poses this dilemma in an austere production that skillfully uses silence and camera placement to emphasize Todd's isolation. Handily upending bourgeois promises of blissful coupledom, the film simultaneously posits an inner, private life that deserves respect - and demands to be fed! Compact and elemental, featuring engrossing performances by a cast that includes queer film favorites Shawn Durr and Craig Chester, ANONYMOUS quivers with dramatic tension and speaks volumes about the intersections of public and private sexuality."
www.bangorfilms.com/anonymous/../index.html

SWALLOW OR SPIT - 2006
A documentary of sorts about Todd Verow's attempt to make a porn movie and also an essay about the history of gay porn and how it has evolved over the years.

VACATIONLAND - 2006

BULLDOG IN THE WHITE HOUSE - 2006
The horny, plotting and evil Bush Administration stars in a modern adaptation of Choderlos de Laclos's classic story of power and deceit, Dangerous Liaisons, comfortably splitting the difference between political commentary and gay porn. Bulldog in the Whitehouse is faithful to the traditional decadence of 18th century French aristocrats slutting around, but Verow adds insult to injury, deeming that these new players are all gays, and ensnared in incestuous webs of diabolical seductions and random hook-ups. Bulldog is a super-saturated narrative fueled by the fascinating charm and vulgarity of a community theater troupe on poppers.
Karl Rove is the grand dame Marquise, who puppets a washed up hustler, Bulldog (our transposed Valmont) to obstruct an impending alliance between his ex, the twinky Religious Leader (noted performer Michael Burke), and the doe-eyed, dopey George W. Bush.
Verow casts himself as the tenacious Bulldog, a seldom-clothed power broker plowing a path of clammy bedsheets en route to acquiring the coveted "hard pass" from a virginal White House Press Secretary. If granted, such clearance would give the Bulldog no holds-barred access to getting in bed with the President. Along his way, machinations of desperate love and false promises bring ruin to all those involved, and we encounter the sole lady of the house: Laura Bush, who plays W's domineering mommy. She lords over him the control of his midnight rendezvous like Lady Macbeth, but is devoted to the ideals of Republicanism with the sterling fidelity of a faghag.
One might misunderstand some of Bulldog's sex couplings that did not occur in the French novel as errors in consistency. No, no; it is only because the characters in the original Dangerous Liaisons were not gay and the Bush Administration that they did not fuck every last person. Here you can expect cocks, spit and ass to be swapped willy-nilly, all to the detriment of democracy and ultimately for the entertainment of a gurgling Jabba-the-Rove.
"Cheerfully obscene... the semi-coherent narrative tracks as a burlesque revue of Bush II scandals." The Village Voice
www.bangorfilms.com/bulldog.html

HOOKS ON THE LEFT - 2007
Shot entirely with a Nokia cellphone all over the world, HOOKS TO THE LEFT is based on the journal of a male hustler named "NAIL" who re-enters the world of male prostitution after being in a relationship for 10 years. The film examines how the world of prostitution has changed since the advent of the internet.