Solutions

Hi. My name is Dan Peruzzo and I love making films.

Some may ask, “What’s your schtick, Dan? Comedy? Drama? Horror? Action? Science Fiction?”  Solutions—that’s my schtick. I don’t believe there’s an official category called solutions, but there should be. As much as I love all the different genres out there, I can’t think of one that is more important than this.

We are living in crazy times, and we have been for quite a while. We follow patterns of harm and destruction that, by any standard, would seem insane—but the cycle continues. Whether it’s worldwide poverty, devistating corporate policies, never-ending wars, deficient healthcare practices, environmental challenges, capitalistic economics, government overreach—you name it, you’ll find a problem. We wait four years or more for the next election cycle to bring in a ‘leader’ to make it all better, only to find society falling into the same self-destructive patterns and making minimal progress, if any.

I spent a good chunk of my life asleep, not even realizing how crazy things were. Watching TV, drinking beer, or catching the game were my top daily activities. I used to think (or was taught) that we learned our lessons about the detrimental effects of warring after WWI and WWII…even as the threat of WWIII loomed over our heads. A quick look around at the world over the last 80 years, and it seems clear that WWIII has been in play for some time now, but the type of warfare has evolved. Yes, we are still shooting guns, dropping bombs, and threatening nuclear annihilation, but the digital age has brought us a new type of warfare: a war for our minds, and by proxy, our souls.

Back in the day, the news cycle motto was “If it bleeds, it leads,” keeping the viewer in a subtle state of fear, wondering what new dangers lurked around the corner. We anxiously awaited tomorrow’s news hour to deliver the next series of horrible events that had occurred the day before. Fast forward to today, the advent of smartphone technology brings bad news literally to our fingertips at a moments notice. Doomscrolling has become an effective way of keeping people stuck in a perpetual state of trepidation.

We are connected to world events now more than ever…but what are we tethered to? Is it fear or love? How many media outlets (legacy or alternative) offer a fresh viewpoint on solutions rather than problems? Not many, as far as I can see.

It was four years post-9/11 when I had a personal epiphany about the overall mechanics of how the world operates. Researching that event with clear eyes and emotional distance, I gained a clearer picture of how society is being controlled through media manipulation on many levels, both overt and subtle. This is where my filmmaking journey began, as I felt compelled to counter this media manipulation with unbiased reality. The 2020 pandemic reinforced my epiphany on many other levels, including personal censorship within my profession as a Producer in broadcast television; of which I am no longer a part.

To make a long story longer, the instances above, coupled with many more life experiences, have ingrained a passion in me to create media that reflects solutions rather than problems—planting seeds in our collective consciousness that will hopefully inspire creative ideas to solving some of the world’s biggest challenges.

I hope you will join me on this personal endeavour to bring about change to the world, so that all who inhabit this planet may live a happy, healthy, and prosperous life…now and for generations to follow.