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Your new film is promisingly called Slasher House. In a few
words, what is it about?
Slasher House
is basically the idea of dropping the classic 'Final
Girl' into a house with not one serial killer but four of the worst serial
killers of all time.
In Slasher House
you seem to reverse the ratio of the typical slasher by pitting one scream
queen against four killers instead of the other way round. How did you
come up with this concept?
I basically wanted to see Freddy,
Jason,
Michael,
Pinhead and
Leatherface
battle it out, and as we didn't have the rights to the
properties I decided I would go ahead and create four even better Slasher
Villains of my own. Then it was just a matter of figuring out what kind of
situation would bring these kinds of characters together and thus Slasher House
was born.
Basically, Slasher House
is a slasher film (as the title already suggests). Is
that a genre especially dear to you, and some of your genre favourites?
Slashers
have always been something of a favourite to me as a horror fan, Halloween
and its sequels are some of my favorite films of all time and that
obsession with those films runs deep in my work as I hope people can see. Halloween was the film that made me realize what I was going to do with my
life when I was 10 years old and so I feel very much obligated to carry on
many of the traditions it set.
Other
inspirations for Slasher House?
I love horror movies of all shapes and sizes and so really looked at
everything to bring to the table for the movie, although its called 'Slasher'
House, I looked at serial killers across the entire genre and tried to
capture the many different variations on that kind of character. Visually
I have always been inspired by comic books and such and also the saw
movies, at least the early ones, gave me a great reference to how I wanted
the film to look. How
far do you go in terms of gore and violence in Slasher House?
When
your on a low budget it's hard to bring together anything too spectacular,
but we pushed our miniscule budget to the limit and hit some really
horrible effects that had even myself wincing on set as we were shooting.
It's cartoon violence for the most part, as the film exists on a world that
is very hyperreal from our own, but there was then after that a lot of
attempts to bring these fantastical things back down to reality.
A few words about your female lead Eleanor James?
Eleanor is a true star, I'd
been a fan of hers for a long time so the chance to work with her was
actually a dream come true for me, and she very quickly understood the
character and what we were trying to achieve with Red and the film in
general. We're looking forward to working on something else very shortly.
What can
you tell us about her killer adversaries in the film and the actors who
portray them?
I can't really say too much
about the Killers of Slasher House
without giving away too much story
wise, but I can say that every single person gave a performance above and
beyond the call of duty. Each character is related to a Killer archetype
that we have seen in the past, but we've given each one a very new spin.
The $64-question: When and where will the
film be released?
Who
knows. The film is due to be complete in early 2012, but aside from that
it will depend on who picks it up and what they want to do with it. Any future projects you'd like to talk
about? Again its
hard to talk about what we have planned in the future without giving too
much away, but what I will say is that Slasher House
is the beginning of
something much bigger, that we are looking at as a kind of build up to The
Avengers of Horror. Its all very exciting and let's just say that some of
the Slasher House
characters will be making an appearance as we unveil a
much bigger picture.
Let's go back to your first feature, Creepsville.
What can you tell us about that one?
Creepsville was my back to
basics horror feature, we didn't have any money and very little resources
and I figured "what the hell, let's just do it anyway" ... a 14 day
shoot took 5 months in the end, with working around people's jobs and spare
time, but the film is a testament to all the hard work that the cast and
crew ploughed into it.
Before Creepsville,
you had already made numerous shorts, right? What can you tell us about
those?
There is a lot to say
really, too much to say here, but the shorts I'm most proud of would be
Eye Spy and of course the short Thorn film that we are currently
developing into a bigger project. Thorn also appears in Slasher House. But
my shorts largely varied, but almost all exist in the horror genre. I
think in the last 7 years though we've made 25 + short films under the
Mycho label. Not all of them good.
How does making a short differ from making a
feature film?
If I was to break it down in logistics, its all a matter of time. The
differences I always find is that features are more demanding of time,
which very few people are willing to give for little or no money. The main
benefit of making features though, is that if you do it well you can
potentially profit from it afterwards. Plus, in the last few years you have shot
numerous music videos. A few words about those? Although we
enjoy making them, I suppose the videos are a means to an end, they are
really there to one day bring the money in so we can survive whilst we try
and make awesome movies. But that definitely doesn't mean that we don't
enjoy producing them and some of the most fun I've had shooting has been
on these projects. What
made you go into filmmaking in the first place? Well I was
quite creative since I was very young, I always remember that. But one
day, when I was about 6 or 7, became aware that I was expected to one day
get a job and realized that if this was to not be a daunting prospect,
then I'd better make sure I got a job that was fun and creative. It was
after I saw Halloween on TV at 10 years old that everything really locked
into place and I realized that THIS was what I was going to do.
Your
films all seem to have a horror theme to them. Is horror a genre close to
your heart, and which kinds of horror do you prefer (both to watch and to
make)?
I've
been obsessed with Horror movies ever since I was a kid, I would always
read the paper to find out what horror movies were on and then set the
video recorder recording into the night, unknown to my mother, and then
get up at 5 in the morning and watch whatever I had recorded before anyone
else got up. This is how I saw most of the work of David Cronenburg and of
course I got to see The Fly for the first time. As well as dozens of other
films that have now become such a huge part of my work and who I am.
Over
time, slasher movies became my favorite to watch and so it made sense that
I would emulate that within my work, it was more finding a fresh approach,
I watch A LOT of horror movies, mainly because I enjoy them, but also to
understand what has been done in the market, so that I don't find myself
repeating what has gone before.
Filmmakers who inspire you? John
Carpenter. Robert Rodriguez. Eli Roth. Adam Green. Kevin Smith. Steve Wang
(who made the Guyver-movies and Drive). There are lots more, they are just
a few that spring to mind. I'm inspired by most things, be they good or
bad. Bad helps me learn from their mistakes and Good makes me want to work
harder.
Your
favourite movies?
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Halloween. Hellraiser.
The Hitcher. ... and of course, films you really
deplore? I hate war movies. Don't ask me why... I've just
never seen any that I particularly like. Except Predator and Jacob's
Ladder, but they don't really count as they are horrors on the most part.
Oh and gangster movies... urg. Your website, Facebook, whatever else? You
can check out what we do and get up to on a daily basis at http://mycho.co.uk. And
we're on Facebook at http://facebook.com/mychoofficial
and Twitter at http://twitter.com/mychopictures. We
also have a Web show called MYCHO TV that you can see at http://youtube.com/mychotv. Anything
else you are dying to mention and I have merely forgotten to ask? Not
massively, we have a lot of cool stuff coming out in the next 12 months and
we hope that everyone likes what we do. Thanks
for the interview!
No prob :)
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