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Your movie Cleric
- in a few words, what is it about, and what can you tell us about your
character in it?
I play a character referred to in the film only as "The
Heretic", who is a tortured soul, taken as a child and subjected to a
lifetime of tests by the Ministry of Control in the attempt to create a
new breed of super-soldier. A side effect of his training is that he
develops a certain prescience, that allows him to get glimpses of the
future, and made adjustments to his actions to suit. It's much like the
recent film Edge of Tomorrow or the classic Groundhog
Day, the Heretic can 'blink' back in time and change what weapon he
uses, or where he steps, and ultimately any choice he makes he can modify.
The Heretic peers into the future and sees that the Cleric Samara has come
to dominate all of the available future possibilities, and he realizes
that she is the key to his revenge and ultimate release. What were your
inspirations when writing Cleric?
And with a fictional world as complex as Cleric,
how easy or hard was it keeping track of the main narrative?
I
was always a fan of the Warhammer 40k novels and miniature games, which
portrayed a very gothic and grim future, and I've always been a fan of
Blade Runner and Apocalypse Now. In many ways, this is what I would
call "low-fi sci-fi", in which we used our disadvantages as
advantages, so our world is very dingy, grimy, and much of the aesthetic of
the film is a blend of science fiction gadgets set to a backdrop of urban
decay. What
can you tell us about your co-writer/co-director David R. Williams [David
R. Williams interview - click here],
and what was your collaboration like? And how did you two first hook up
even? Working with David is like working with a shark....
he has a goal, and if you step between him and his goal you're going to
get your arms ripped off. However, the thing about David R. Williams is that his goals
are badass. He has this "gore drenched arthouse" style of
filmmaking, whether he is making sci-fi or horror, and every film I've
worked with him on has turned out to be a bit of a grindhouse film meets
acid trip, and I wouldn't have it any other way. He is a unique voice in
micro-budget filmmaking, and I'm glad to have participated in a number of
his films, looking forward to the next one! We connected quite at random,
through distribution efforts on one of his older films, Frightworld, and
from there we just kept finding that our ideas and styles mesh. If it's a
good thing keep doing it, right?
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You're playing one of the leads in
Cleric,
a most powerful mutant ... so how do you even prepare for a role like
this, and what did you draw upon to bring him to life? And did you write
the character with yourself in mind? I'll admit that I
wrote the character with myself in mind. I'm a weird looking dude, and am
in no way the portrait of what Hollywood typically considers "leading
man" material, so when I get the acting itch and want to scratch it I
pretty much have to create roles for myself. Not being in SAG, and being
on the fringes of even micro-budget filmmaking, there aren't a ton of
auditions for a guy like me. Since I'm writing for myself, I end up
writing roles that I really want to play. In this case I was very
interested in running around abandoned buildings, shooting sci-fi guns,
and battling a gorgeous female nemesis. So, truth be told, this film was a
bit of a dream role for me. My preparation process was to stay acceptably
fit (which I did ok with, no rippling abs but I made it work) and be
mentally and physically prepared for my psycho director to put me through
a series of challenging situations. We did everything from 12 hour days of
running, jumping, climbing, and fighting to torture scenes in
sub-basements, and most all of it during a pretty cold month in Buffalo (I
wasn't always fully clothed).
You were also the
stunt coordinator on Cleric
- so what can you tell us about the stunt work on the film? Most
of it was on-the-spot kind of work. With films at this budget level you
don't have much in the way of choreography time, and often not a ton of
access to the location before you do your work. Generally we would just do
a safety scout of the location, get a general idea of the kinds of action
sequences we wanted, and then we'd let the cameras roll. Sometimes we
would get it in one take, others I'd be hurling myself into walls five or
six times before we'd nail it. Certainly not the kind of answer you'd want
from a big budget stunt coordinator, but it works for us indie guys.
You of course have to talk about your key
location for a bit, and how hard was it to create the
"Below"-feeling there - and what were the advantages and
challenges of filming there? We had two primary locations,
the Buffalo Central Terminal and the Burnwood Studios, and both are
temples to urban decay in the best of ways. The biggest challenge for the
BCT was access to power, so we had to lug a generator around all the time.
The disadvantage of Burnwood is this thing we call "the pit",
which is the basement level of the building. It is vast, dark, wet, and
filled with a variety of junk piles and molds. In other words... it's
perfect for filming. The problem with the pit is that once you go down
there everything is harder and takes longer. What would normally take you
three hours to shoot will take you all day, and it will be difficult. The
pit has a price, but it's worth paying to get the kind of footage we get
down there, for Cleric
and other films we've done there.
Seregon O'Dassey, Aaron Krygier |
Do talk about your key cast
for a bit, and why exactly these people? The two people I'd
like to talk about the most are Seregon O'Dassey (Samara) [Seregon
O'Dassey interview - click here] and Aaron
Krygier (Sholokov). Seregon had worked with David and I on our previous
collaboration (Fable: Teeth of Beasts) and after that she'd always had a
place in our imaginations. It's tough, in my opinion, for film (esp
micro-budget films) to find an actress who is able to be convincingly
badass while also being (let's face it) a sex symbol, and Seregon has both
in spades. When David R. Williams [David
R. Williams interview - click here] and I started kicking around ideas she became the
natural choice in a very organic way as the story unfolded, in fact we had
her on board several months prior to the script being completed. Aaron is
a strong actor who I felt I had underused in my last Buffalo film, and I
wanted to pull together a character that would allow Aaron to really show
his stuff portraying a character that is a complex blend of father figure,
adversary, and mentor. Aaron and Seregon both actually worked hard on the
set to write much of the dialog for their pivotal interrogation scene.
Honorable mention should go to Bob Bozek, who played the Rat Shaman. Bob
is a versatile actor capable of just about anything you throw at him,
however he has established a bit of a brand delivering a specific sort of
frenetic madman performance, and is so blasted good at it that everyone
wants him for those kinds of roles (I've used him 3 times as that guy, and
lots of other Buffalo filmmakers have as well).
What can you
tell us about the shoot as such, and the on-set atmosphere? My
favorite thing about micro-budget filmmaking is the camaraderie, it's like
being on a summer camp with friends and strangers all at the same time. On
larger budget films there are good times of course, but with the paychecks
things can sometimes be a bit, well, overly professional. When you
are working for peanuts, or usually free, you're there For The Love Of The
Game, and that is guaranteed, so everyone on the crew and the cast is
there to tell the story, and the story becomes the priority. It feels good
to be part of a team that is coming together, through thick and thin, to
tell the story, because that's the point (if the paycheck is the
point, then story takes a backseat). From
what I know, Cleric has
actually been shot about 5 or so years ago - so why the delay?
Without
pointing fingers, let's put it this way... we have had several editors
(including yours truly), several audio designers, soundtrack producers,
and VFX artists all work on this film, and it's still not done. Some folks
didn't get it across the finish line because their work sucked, others
just did half the job and ran off with their paychecks, others did what
they could but after awhile couldn't donate any more time (I'm one of
those). At the end of the day this film was never going to be a big
money-maker, and the longer it burned in post-production-hell the less and
less inclined anyone was to put more money into finishing it. I'd put in a
little here and there when I could, but at the end of the day it wasn't
until David Williams got his hands on it (5 years after he directed it)
that it got done. He is the reason (and his team) that this film is
finished. When
and where will the film be released onto the general public then? David
knows this juicy secret. Any
future projects you'd like to share? As of now I don't have
any new projects on the table. I've been writing fiction novels mostly for
the last few years, my latest being The Wasteland Survival Guide and
Gladiators vs Zombies. I'm a storyteller, and when I don't have a film
budget I just sit down and start typing. Now that Cleric
is nearing the
end of its journey I've actually re-kindled my filmmaking bromance with
David and am hoping to get up to Buffalo (really that town is my
filmmaking second home) and dive into another blood-soaked arthouse film
one of these days soon. Your/your movie's
website, Facebook, whatever else?
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The Cleric FB page:
https://www.facebook.com/pages/
Cleric/108832542829 Anything else you are
dying to mention and I have merely forgotten to ask? I have
a great day job that allows me to have a wide open calendar during
the spring/fall/winter on an annual basis. I want to shoot guns,
swing swords, battle monsters, get stabbed, thrown through things,
and generally abused for low/no pay on indie films. Get in touch,
send me a script, and let's have an adventure. Thanks
for the interview!
Thanks for the chance!
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amazon.com
amazon.co.uk
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find Sean-Michael Argo at adultvideouniverse.com
