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An Interview with Monte Light, Director of Space

by Mike Haberfelner

August 2020

Films directed by Monte Light on (re)Search my Trash

 

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Your new movie Space - in a few word, what's it about?

 

Space takes place in the year 2050. It’s about astro-biologist Dr. Ada Gray and her fellow astronauts aboard the Udo, who fight for survival after an accident leaves them stranded in deep space.

 

With Space being a space-bound science fiction movie, is that at all a favourite genre of yours, and some of your genre favourites?

 

I’ve always loved outer-space fiction from a young age. Grew up watching classic Star Trek with Kirk and Spock, as well as reading Ray Bradbury’s R is for Rocket, and enjoying movies like Silent Running (Bruce Dern’s greatest performance) and Outland (1981) directed by Peter Hyams, with Sean Connery. More recent examples would be Moon (2009) from director Duncan Jones (Sam Rockwell’s greatest performance). That’s in addition to the profound thematic influences Japanese and French science fiction had on me (Osamu Tezuka’s Phoenix series was a direct inspiration, and also writers Pierre Boulle, Moebius, and Jean-Claude Mézières).  

 

(Other) sources of inspiration when writing Space?

 

The novel The Wanderers by Meg Howrey, which everyone should check out, even if you don’t normally read outer-space fiction.

 

Do talk about Space's approach to science fiction?

 

I heavily researched the technicals of the rocketry, astro-biology, and astronomy in the film; as well as the theoretical sciences, such as the nanite technology and the VASIMR plasma-based propulsion engine. One of the biggest challenges was working with the actors to nail down the jargon spoken in the film, conveying the essentials of what was going on, without being needlessly confusing. I feel like Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey and Stanislaw Lem did a good job with that, so I borrowed a bit from them.

 

Making a movie set in outer space on a rather low budget, what are the challenges?

 

Obviously a micro-budget film of this nature limits what you can achieve, (hence why there’s a line early on explaining that the spaceship has artificial gravity, which saved us from having to do costly wire work). Originally, I wasn’t sure if we were going to be able to show any exteriors outside the spaceship, but luckily we were able to include a few VFX shots. They became essential to telling our story. The VFX shot of the landing on the Ceres planetoid might be my favorite. Also, I have a friend over in Australia who put together the spacesuits, helmets, patches, and logos used in the film. Doug Marr is his name, and he does phenomenal work. Everyone swiped a piece of it after the wrap, myself included. I believe our lead, Lara Jean, kept her entire spacesuit.

 

Do talk about your space ship set, and how was it achieved?

 

We worked with an amazing studio in Glendale, California called Fonco Studios, owned by Fon Davis, a legend in the film effects field. He’s pretty much worked on every film you’ve ever loved, from Starship Troopers to The Nightmare Before Christmas. His house has several pre-made spaceship interiors, (the cockpit used in the movie being a big one). In addition, his team came in and helped us put together the rest of the sets in a single day, which anyone can tell you is nothing short of remarkable. There was an incredible amount of talent that went into creating those sets, especially given the time constraints. Everyone should check out and support Fonco Studios, Space couldn’t have been made without them.

 

What can you tell us about your overall directorial approach to your story at hand?

 

I come from a horror background (I even worked as a horror reviewer myself for a bit). Because of that, I watched a lot of low-budget films, independent horror films, and realized the economic value of the found footage genre. The problem is that a lot of found footage films have a tendency to look alike, with a similar subject matter and aesthetics. So I thought it would be interesting to take the found footage concept to places it hadn’t really gone before (Europa Report is one of the few sci-fi found footage films I can point to). I started to research the filming techniques currently being used on the International Space Station, as well as theorize about what video transmission technology might be like thirty years from now. Some of it turned out to be shockingly prescient, like the thirty-eight minute section of Space which operates almost exactly like a Zoom call. The relationship between isolation and video chat has become a huge part of our lives, and I’d like to think Space kind of called that one a bit.

 

Do talk about Space's cast, and why exactly these people?

 

I love everyone in the cast. I went to theater school with some of them. Others I have worked with for fifteen years. I like to say, “I don’t direct actors, I direct around actors.” Lara Jean, Kurt Quinn, Justin Michael Terry, James R. Hilton, Michael Klug, Ellysa Rose, Quincy Saadeh, Len Kabasinski [Len Kabasinski interview - click here]. They are all consummate professionals. They make my job easy. Some of the parts I wrote with specific actors in mind, Dr. Gray, Tomcat, and Mitch the Bitch being the biggest examples. But others came in and were a total revelation to me. Kurt Quinn showed up on the first day with a flawless French accent and delivered all his French lines perfectly. No one coached him on set. That was all Kurt. Michael Klug as Phil King was a one-take wonder, which was a life saver since we had so much movie to shoot on any given day. And Lara Jean in the lead of Dr. Ada Gray is next level, without a doubt. I’m a huge fan of her work, and I honestly think this is one of her greatest performances.

 

A few words about the shoot as such, and the on-set atmosphere?

 

We shot the film in eleven days, (for essentially a thousand dollars a day). That just doesn’t happen. But everyone both in front of and behind the camera put their heart and soul into it. We were fortunate enough to shoot the movie on RED cameras, so we were all constantly excited by the quality of the footage we were getting. They were long, but fulfilling days. There were a lot of logistical challenges, sure. We took our little troop everywhere, from the hills of Joshua Tree to my own apartment bedroom for the escape pod sequence (no joke, my cat sat just off camera watching the actors holler and cry their guts out). It really was just like that Red Hot Chili Peppers lyric: “Space may be the final frontier but it’s made in a Hollywood basement.”

 

I've read somewhere that you financed Space with the winnings you got from participating in The Price is Right - is that at all true, and could you elaborate?

 

That’s right! I won the $11K budget for the film playing Plinko. I am forever grateful to the producers of that show, and Drew Carey (he and I have the same birthday, incidentally). When I won, I didn’t have a script or even the story. It seemed nuts to make a movie set in outer space on such a low budget. But I knew this was my chance. Paranormal Activity was made for the same amount of money, and Christopher Nolan shot his first film Following for $6k. Limitations can really breed creativity, and I wanted to take the chance to create something unique.

 

The $64-question of course, where can Space be seen?

 

Space is currently streaming on Amazon, iTunes, and other VOD platforms. You can watch it in 4K on these sites too, which I highly recommend. The link is here: https://geni.us/SpaceMovie.

 

Anything you can tell us about audience and critical reception of Space?

 

As an independent horror film, Space has to work its way into that culture of fans. Horror fans are the best fans in the world, and they love the unique and unusual. For some who might be tired of the found footage trope, I think they’ll be pleasantly surprised by our radically different take on the formula. Critics have appreciated its slow-burn approach to outer space fiction. It’s been compared a number of times to John Carpenter’s Dark Star and Claire Denis’s High Life, which I certainly take as a high compliment. At this point, it’s really a matter of getting the word out there for more people to enjoy it, to take that spine-tingling trip to the stars.

 

Any future projects you'd like to share?

 

I’m in pre-production on my next feature film, a black-and-white, surrealistic vampire thriller called Blood Covered Chocolate. We have almost the entire budget raised, and we’re set to roll cameras at the beginning of next year. A lot of excellent talent are already involved, including scream queens Debra Lamb [Debra Lamb interview - click here] and Helene Udy [Helene Udy interview - click here]. It’s about a recovering drug-addict named Massimo, who fights to protect his girlfriend and loved ones, after he is turned into a vampire by an ancient, shape-shifting creature. It’s in the vein of Thirst and Only Lovers Left Alive, and it should be arriving late 2021.

 

What got you into filmmaking in the first place, and did you recieve any formal training on the subject?

 

My career in film began at the age of five, when I acted in films such as In the Line of Duty: Ambush in Waco, starring Tim Daly. I received my Bachelor of Arts Degree from the University of Northern Colorado, where I performed in Little Theater of the Rockies and directed for the stage.

 

What can you tell us about your filmwork prior to Space?

 

Space is my feature film debut, but I’ve been making short films for the past twenty years. I started when I was sixteen and never stopped. All of my work has fallen into the horror and thriller category, even when I wasn’t consciously aware that I was gravitating to it. Through my film company, American Courtyard Productions, LLC, my work has been recognized by the Toronto Wildsound Film Festival and the Las Vegas Film Festival. A short film collection of my work was recently distributed by Meridian Releasing Group, and received awards from Women in Horror Film Festival, Sixth Sense Horror Film Festival, and the Oniros Film Awards. I won the Second Round Drama Award from Austin Film Festival, which Moviemaker Magazine lists as one of the Top 50 film festivals in the world, for a feature screenplay I wrote called Monkey Mouth, about my father’s experiences teaching music to prisoners. You can pick up a copy of my short films here: https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B07WFJ97BP/

 

How would you describe yourself as a director?

 

Coming from a micro-budget, independent film background, I think I’m a very prepared director. I storyboard every shot and scene of my movies, long before I get on set. I’m meticulous with my vision, but always open to improvisation from actors and crew, which improves the whole. I try to remain humble, and never think I know all the answers, or have all the solutions. I try to be generous and caring, because I know how much courage it takes to get in front of a camera. Long story short, I try not to waste anyone’s time. As a storyteller, I’m drawn to surrealism and absurdism. That’s one of the things I adore so much about the horror genre. It is essentially modern art gone mainstream.

 


Filmmakers who inspire you?

 

Lars von Trier, Dario Argento, Alfred Hitchcock, John Ford, Julie Taymor, Howard Hawks, John Carpenter, Wes Craven, Jean-Luc Godard, Hayao Miyazaki, Rod Serling, James Gunn, Clint Eastwood, Luis Buñuel, Mario Bava [Mario Bava bio - click here], Leigh Brackett, James Whale, George A. Romero, Ishiro Honda, Ray Harryhausen, David Lynch, H. Tjut Djalil, David Cronenberg, Mary Lambert, Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Kenneth Branagh, Akira Kurosawa, Kenji Misumi, Harold Ramis, Peter Jackson, Len Kabasinski [Len Kabasinski interview - click here] … to name a few.

 

Your favourite movies?

 

There are so many. I make it a goal to experience as much film from around the world, and throughout its hundred-some year history, as I possibly can. I will say my all-time favorite horror film is Dario Argento’s Suspiria (1977). Everything in that movie (from its lighting, cinematography, camera movement, acting, effects, music) is absolutely perfect.

 

... and of course, films you really deplore?

 

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Gosh, I know how hard it is to make any movie, so I’m always wary to formally badmouth something (my friends know it’s quite a different case in private) - but I will say Ari Aster’s Midsommar… not my cup of tea.

 

Your/your movie's website, social media, whatever else?

 

You can follow Space on its Facebook website: https://www.facebook.com/spacethemovie/

You can follow me at https://www.facebook.com/TheRealMonteLight/

And for only $5 a month, you can support my filmmaking journey and my next film Blood Covered Chocolate at https://www.patreon.com/TheRealMonteLight

 

Thanks for the interview!

 

© by Mike Haberfelner


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Thanks for watching !!!



 

 

In times of uncertainty of a possible zombie outbreak, a woman has to decide between two men - only one of them's one of the undead.

 

There's No Such Thing as Zombies
starring
Luana Ribeira, Rudy Barrow and Rami Hilmi
special appearances by
Debra Lamb and Lynn Lowry

 

directed by
Eddie Bammeke

written by
Michael Haberfelner

produced by
Michael Haberfelner, Luana Ribeira and Eddie Bammeke

 

now streaming at

Amazon

Amazon UK

Vimeo

 

 

 

Robots and rats,
demons and potholes,
cuddly toys and
shopping mall Santas,
love and death and everything in between,
Tales to Chill
Your Bones to

is all of that.

 

Tales to Chill
Your Bones to
-
a collection of short stories and mini-plays
ranging from the horrific to the darkly humourous,
from the post-apocalyptic
to the weirdly romantic,
tales that will give you a chill and maybe a chuckle, all thought up by
the twisted mind of
screenwriter and film reviewer
Michael Haberfelner.

 

Tales to Chill
Your Bones to

the new anthology by
Michael Haberfelner

 

Out now from
Amazon!!!