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Your upcoming movie is called Hate's Haunted Slay Ride. In a
few words, what's the movie about, and wht can you tell us about its main
character Hate?
Hate's Haunted Slay Ride
is a direct sequel to September 2008's
feature film release Haunted Hay Ride: The Movie. In that movie, a cop's
abused son murders his father, sells his soul to the Devil, changes his
name to Hate, uses a drill to attach a Halloween Skull mask to his face
erasing his previous life and goes on a killing spree at Halloween which
ends up with him wiping out almost all the workers and customers at an
elaborate Haunted Hay Ride. Hate escapes at the end of
Haunted Hay Ride: The Movie, and Hate's Haunted Slay Ride
has him growing more evil and powerful
and waging a war against Christmas, Judaism and Christianity, which reaches
a peak when he surrounds a synagogue with a wall of hell fire and tries to
murder all the Jews and Christians trapped inside. Hate's Haunted Slay Ride
deals with good vs evil in a pure form.
How
explicit will the film be in terms of violence? That's
hard to answer. The Saw movies and films like
Hostel have raised the
sadistic bar. I think both Hate's Haunted Slay Ride
and Haunted
Hay Ride: The Movie are fairly violent movies with lots of blood and murders, but
they aren't as sick minded and cruel as many of the S&M movies being
sold as horror movies today. When we kill people it's exciting and
fun. I love horror movies and violence is fine with me. I just don't like
cruelty.
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Hate killing another victim in
Haunted Hay Ride: The Movie |
What
were your inspirations for both Hate's Haunted Slay Ride
and the
character Hate as such? On one level Hate's Haunted Slay Ride
is a very religious movie. Horror movies have degenerated over
the years from a good vs evil morality play into non-supernatural stories
about human monsters torturing their victims. I wanted to bring God and
the Devil back into the situation and have a more classical confrontation
between good and evil. I grew up on Hammer
films, Amicus
films, the
classic Universal horror films. They were better horror movies than what
you get today. Hate's Haunted Slay Ride
and Haunted Hay Ride:
The Movie are
a mixture of the old and the new when it comes to horror. Another
thing that sets Hate's Haunted Slay Ride
apart is that it is Jewish rather
than the traditional Roman Catholic. The hero is a Rabbi and his struggle
against supernatural evil. On another level its a redemption story about a
cop who rediscovers his faith. I think audiences will find this aspect new
and refreshing. A few words about your
cast and crew?
We had a few carry over from Haunted Hay Ride: The Movie, but most were
new people. For most of them it was their first movie and it was a
learning process. That added enormous pressure on me because I had to do
too many jobs making this movie, including writing the script,
producing, directing, handling the cinematography, doing the lighting,
editing the movie myself, authoring the DVD, doing the adverting posters
and box art, etc. Needless to say I actually ended up in the
hospital from exhaustion and stress. On IMDB I see 95 people listed for
cast and crew. If they were fully functional as a real crew my health
would have been more intact.
On the acting side Jenny Hill, Daniel Bartkewizc, Paul Kellogg, Dan
Griffin, Joann Murano and my father, Warren Disbrow Sr, all performed
well. The movie looks good and larger in scope than Haunted Hay Ride:
The Movie despite the tough shoot.
When and where will the film be out? If I
don't drop dead from exhaustion, Hate's Haunted Slay Ride
will be out in
late December 2009. It will be released by Crystal Visions
Entertainment LLC, who handled Haunted Hay Ride: The Movie. Sub
distributors will get it a world wide release in 2010. Naturally you can
get signed copies at www.warrenfdisbrow.com.
After
all that talk about Hate's Haunted Slay Ride, could you say a few
words about Haunted Hay Ride: The Movie, in which Hate made
his debut? With Haunted Hay Ride: The Movie I wanted to
celebrate the Halloween experience while introducing a new supernatural
horror guy like Jason,
Freddy
Krueger and
Michael
Myers that could stand
in that group without being a cheap rip off of them. So far I've gotten
nothing but positive responses from buyers and positive reviews in the
media. I guess it worked. Are you planning to ever do another
feature about Hate?
Yes. I think the character could spin off several sequels without
running dry of ideas. I avoided the time honored problem of how to
revive my monster by simply having Hate survive at the end of all
these movies. Hate never dies.
Let's leave the present
behind for the moment and dive head-on into your past: What got you
started in making movies in the first place? Creature
from the Black Lagoon (1954) seen by a five year old kid on a small
black-and-white TV in his parent's house. It was magic. I was hooked. I
fell in love with monsters and horror movies and dreamed out the day when
I could make these wonderful movies for myself. I still feel the same as I
did as a kid about these movies. I collect the toys, posters, DVDs, CDs
and go to sci fi horror conventions. I was in the Peter Cushing and
Christopher Lee fan clubs. James Whale, Freddie Francis, Terence Fisher,
Roger Corman, George Romero, David Cronenberg - love them all. Musically
give me Alice Cooper and Marilyn Manson. You have
made several shorts during your college years. A few words about them?
I always saw college as a means to get my hands on the movie equipment
and skip classes to make a movie. I was very ambitious in my teens and
twenties and focused on making movies above anything else. I started
making Super 8 sound 10 and 20 minute shorts in high school. Sam Raimi
did the same things, only he made comedies! In college I moved into 16
mm production and made Pit Stop, about an alien on a college campus
which was 20 minutes. I also made Kiss of the Medusa in 16 mm color which
dealt with the Gorgon myth from Greek legends. I shot a 5 minute short
called Night Shift which was played on Manhattan cable over 100 times.
Leaving college I purchased all the 16 mm production and
post-production equipment to set-up my own company and my first
professional job was for Sam Sherman of Independent- International
Pictures called Creature
with the Blue Hand starring Klaus Kinski; I
met special effects artist Ed French on that shoot. That was my
dad's first feature film too, playing a German Butler murdered by a
psycho killer. After that I expanded into 35 mm production. Now we're
following George Lucas into the digital age!
Your
debut feature film was Flesh Eaters from Outer Space. What can you
tell us about that one and its direct sequel Invasion for Flesh and
Blood?
After working with Sam we had a bit of cash and equipment and we ended
up with the flats used for sets in Creature
with the Blue Hand (aka Bloody
Dead). I wrote a script and pulled friends together and new people came in
and it all came together. The big mistake I made on that first feature
film was believing people when they said they would do a job on it. I had
to make the monster suit from scratch in two weeks when the effects guy
failed to deliver for example. I've always had to wear multiple hats
making these movies because in New Jersey there aren't that many people
with film experience. It took less than a year to make the first one - Flesh
Eaters from Outer Space. That wasn't my title, I called it A Taste
of Flesh and Blood. Taste was stolen by a company called Legacy Home
Entertainment and I never got the master back.
We started the sequel Invasion for Flesh and Blood almost right away,
and horror fans came onboard and we made a better movie than the first
one. Creatively Invasion was the most enjoyable experience I ever had
until Haunted Hay Ride: The Movie. My vampire films Scarlet Moon
and Dark Beginnings were awful experiences and had my thinking about quitting the
business. Troma re-released
Flesh Eaters from Outer Space and Invasion for Flesh and Blood
as a double-DVD set and has had them since 2006; all I
collected from Troma
so far is $135.00 total. Whatever you don't get
up front from a distributor you'll never get.
These films seem to have a 1950's monster
movie feel to it. Was that deliberate? I love the 1950's
monster movies like She
Creature (1956), Monster that Challenged the World (1957), Them
(1954), Invasion of the Saucermen (1957) - all of them
big and small were fun and creative. I wanted to make a rubber monster
movie, only with today's nudity and gore. The first two - Flesh
Eaters and Invasion - got very good reviews and were seen world wide. I'm
being asked all the time to do sequels to them but I resist because I feel
a need to do other stories. The monster suit is still in good shape
though; the Golden Slayer rotted away.
Scarlet Moon
and Dark Beginnings were originally supposed to be one single
movie, right? Why did you chop it up into two, and what else can you tell
us about those? The working conditions were terrible.
Because of cast and crew issues I was rewriting the script daily. I kept
filming hoping to get enough footage that if I edited it down to 90
minutes it would be a functional film. I ended up with nearly a 3 hour
first cut. I edited everything to do with Scarlet Moon into a 96 minute
film. That left 52 minutes of reasonably good footage unused. Instead of
throwing it away I filmed another 50 minutes and had a prequel, Dark
Beginnings. If I had a larger budget for Scarlet Moon where I could have
hired a professional crew and more reliable actors, both Scarlet Moon
and Dark Beginnings would be very different movies from what they are. I
struggled desperately to make them good and they turned out better than
one would expect given the awful conditions under which they were made.
I've gotten good reviews for Scarlet Moon despite its shortcomings.
Dark Beginnings will be released in 2010. Mike Lee, my genius CGI
guy, took a year overhauling Dark Beginnings and it looks much better than
Scarlet Moon at this point. Any films I have forgotten you'd like to
talk about? Several aborted projects which don't matter at
this point. Any future projects? Haunting
of Holly House, the next one. With each movie starting with Haunted
Hay Ride: The Movie and going to Hate's Haunted Slay Ride, and next,
Haunting of Holly House, I've been very deliberately moving towards a more
mainstream style of filmmaking. The movies are starting to look more
polished technically and more mainstream in material. I hope to end up
making higher quality movies people think were made in Hollywood. Haunting
of Holly House I want to look like a Hollywood film. It will be shot
Hi-Def and transferred to 35 mm for theatrical release, like the last two Star
Wars-movies. Concerning
making movies, you have done it all, writing, directing, producing,
editing, makeup, special effects and whatnot. Why is that, which aspects
of filmmaking do you like most, and which could you do without? Directing
and writing are my passions. I do all the other technical jobs because I
can't find people who can do them as good as me. I would rather not
wear all these hats and work myself into exhaustion. But I can't settle
for a compromised movie by letting others who aren't as talented as me do
the camera work, lighting, etc. I have to think what is best for
the movie. I'd stop doing all these jobs if talented and qualified people
came in to take over for me. I dream of the day that will happen. I don't
mind doing any creative jobs on a movie individually but doing all the
jobs on the set at once, like I've been forced to do, is a
nightmare. Remember - George Romero did the writing, directing, camera
work and editing of Night
of the Living Dead (1968); he was stuck looking
for quality people to help him too. I enjoying sculpting and painting
too but only for relaxation. You
are making your movies pretty much exclusively in New Jersey, and have
been doing so for quite some time. What can you tell us about filmmaking
conditions in New Jersey? New Jersey sucks. As a location
you have city, country, beach, mountains, etc all within driving distance,
so it's pretty good in that respect. But you get very little cooperation
from people and businesses in NJ. Forget the cops or any official offices
being nice too. It's very movie-unfriendly here. And you don't have a pool
of experienced film crews here or dedicated people in general. The New
Jersey media runs hot and cold but basically I'm not given the respect
that I've earned; George Romero said he got that same poor treatment when he
was making movies in his home state of Pennsylvania too. If Hollywood
calls, I'd leave New Jersey in a heartbeat. You also shoot almost
exclusively with local talent. How easy or hard is it to get cast and crew
for horror films in New Jersey? I always find a cast and
crew in New Jersey, but almost all are inexperienced. I find myself running
a school while trying to make movies of good enough quality to compete in
the market place. I'm more focused and driven than most of the people I
meet in NJ. I won't take no for an answer. I find a way. If I don't know
something I go out of my way to learn it. This isn't the case with the
majority of the people I meet here. There are a few on every project that
are reliable and smart and are quick learns; the rest fall by the wayside. Your website, MySpace,
whatever else? Each movie will have its own MySpace
page, Facebook, whatever the next flavor of the month of communications
fad that shows up - Twitter? Crystal Visions Entertainment LLC has it's
own web site as well. MTV, VH1, Turner Classic Movies etc also have
pages for my movies that need updating. It's hard to keep up.
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Directors who have influenced you? Terence
Fisher, George Romero, James Whale, Jack Arnold, Freddie Francis, David
Cronenberg, John Carpenter, Roman Polanski, there are many great genre
directors who have made superb horror movies out there. I just want to
contribute a few classics of my own some day too. Your
favourite films? All horror and sci fi movies from the
silent era up to the present. I could fill a book. Maybe someday I'll
write a book on all these wonderful filmmakers and movies. And of course, some movies you really
hated?
Hostel, and other sick sadistic movies like it, with little redeeming
value, pretending to be horror movies. Horror movies for me have to have
more imagination and quality and a supernatural element for me. I'm more
demanding as a horror fan. I don't like rubbish.
Anything else you are dying to tell us and I have
just forgotten to ask? Horror Sci Fi Fantasy movies are the
best. Regular movies are boring. Iron
Man and Spiderman-movies rule too. I
don't go to movies to see real life mirrored on the screen, I want to see
fantastic, exciting things I can't see in our real world. Thanks for the interview!
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