-
HUNDREDS OF BEAVERS Is A Movie To Restore Your Faith In Movies
It’s easy for a film lover to despair while looking at the current state of the cinematic landscape. Beyond the encroaching contentification (totally a word) of the artform driven by streaming and hastened by AI idiocy, there may never have been a more cowardly, mercenary, craven collective of studio executives as those currently in control of what gets made and how (or if) the finished work gets released.
One need only look at the slate of movies trumpeted at Disney’s recent D23 ‘fan event’ to wonder if what we’re hearing is instead the horns of Judgement Day announcing the end of the artform, fire and brimstone replaced with Uncanny Valley slop and pointless remakes and sequels and spinoffs. Human artistry and a century-old legacy replaced with soulless chum churned out as dictated by an algorithm.
But my nature bends towards optimism, and if you need a reminder of how vital and versatile and alive film and filmmaking can still be, you need only drop a couple bucks to rent Hundreds of Beavers.
Hundreds of Beavers defies easy description, but hey let’s give it a shot anyway.
In the style of silent film (black and white; no dialogue; scratchy, grain-heavy picture), Beavers details the epic contest of survival between hapless frontiersman Jean Kayak (Ryland Brickson Cole Tews, who also co-wrote and co-produced the film) and a hostile wintery wonderland. Even as he braves the terrors of the wilderness, Jean is especially put upon by a clan of aggressive beavers who have staked their own claim on the territory.
It should be noted at this juncture that the beavers, indeed almost all the animals in the film, are played by people in animal mascot costumers.
….
Yeah, I don’t know man, that’s what we’re dealing with here.
What follows is a slapstick ordeal for the ages, as Tews’s Kayak endures a Bruce Campbell-ian amount of punishment and humiliation as he grinds (and grind-quests) his way from zero to hero in the hopes of winning the hand of his lady love (Olivia Graves) and the approval of her domineering father (Doug Mancheski).
Laying out the basics of the plot doesn’t come close to capturing the infectious energy of the thing, the sheer glorious abandon with which Hundreds of Beavers merrily mashes together a vast array of mediums to arrive at something that feels almost unprecedented.
While the look of the film recalls silent cinema, the narrative structure and visual grammar are indebted to video games. And while the gag-a-second pacing puts you in mind of Airplane! and the work of Mel Brooks, the proudly DIY visual effects place Hundreds of Beavers firmly in a contemporary context alongside the zero-budget innovations found on YouTube and TikTok.
It belongs to the past, to the present, to no time besides whatever suits the specific vision of director/co-writer Mike Cheslik (in his feature debut). It contains a command of visual storytelling that is downright masterful and it gleefully indulges in the basest, most simplistic of comedy because holy crap it never does get old watching a full grown man careen head-first into another full grown man wearing a beaver suit.
Honestly, it’s difficult to name a proper precedent for what Cheslik, Tews, and all their collaborators have cooked up here. If Terry Gilliam’s animations ever sprang loose to attack the rest of Monty Python, you might be in the ballpark of the peculiar world being captured here. But how do you create a movie that sits at the exact intersection of Charlie Chaplin and Super Mario? A movie that is simultaneously a master class thesis on the evolving intricacies of the cinematic form AND a rowdy crowd-pleaser with Loony Tunes physics and a penchant for dousing the leading man in goose shit.
No one asked for this.
No could have known to ask for this, excepting of course one of those occasions when someone takes a little too much of something-something and glimpses the firmament of the cosmos and knows truths as yet unborn, but even that guy would probably sober up and go, “Guys in beaver suits? Nah.”
No one was asking these Cheslik and Tews to make this movie, but they decided they wanted it to exist and goddamnit they made it happen.
They scraped together a budget. They trekked out into the winter to shoot in the snow and the cold. They dedicated years to completing the thousands of effects shots in Adobe. Even after the movie was done, it took years to come out because the creative team decided to distribute it themselves rather than trust a buyer to give the film a micro-release before dumping it onto VOD.
After all of that, Hundreds of Beavers is many things.
It’s the funniest movie in years.
It’s a love letter to what movies have been before.
It’s an exhilarating promise of what movies will be.
And maybe most importantly, it’s a reminder that some Wall Street douchebag with a mega-yacht (or mega-yachts, as the case may be) who deletes creativity in exchange for a tax break? That asshole doesn’t get to determine the future of movies. Slick Silicon Valley fucks traipsing around in the Emperor’s latest fit, it’s not up to them either.
There will always be dedicated artists chasing mad visions and working to bring them to life. I hope for a better industry someday that will equip and foster such artists and visions, but maybe that is too much to hope for.
Even so, I trust in the knowledge, with certainty instead of hope, that however hostile the landscape, that’s not going to stop one unreasonable bastard after another from picking up a camera and making magic.
-
HELL HOLE is a Clever, Carnage-Filled Creature Feature
The latest indie effort from the Adams family brings their homemade horrors to the forests of Serbia
In the depths of rural Serbia, a fracking crew eager to hit an oil-rich deposit instead stumble upon something far more terrifying and intriguing. A dig reveals a dazed survivor from the Napoleonic wars, begging in French for the crew to kill him. Inside him, it turns out, is an ancient parasite–one that gruesomely burrows into the men of the oil crew searching for the ideal incubating host.
With a keen eye for comedy as it does for stomach-churning visuals, Hell Hole is another clever homegrown banger from the Adams family. It may tread familiar territory explored in other classic creature features, but a love for icky practical effects, rapid-fire dialogue, and a fun, skewering marriage of machismo and motherhood ensures the Adams family’s DIY spirit carries through their ambitious latest effort.
The Adamses have solidified their horror credentials through a lauded series of scrappy indie features–with the haunting The Deeper You Dig, the witchy metal mayhem of Hellbender, and the bonkers circus slasher road movie Where the Devil Roams, John Adams, Toby Poser, and daughters Zelda and Lulu Adams have proven that the family that scares together stays together. Here, Lulu, John, and Toby spread their wings far from the stateside farmland where their past features hail from–finding a bigger budget and a more polished style across the Atlantic in Serbia. For Hell Hole, they’ve assembled a crew of both classic names (including Nightmare on Elm Street: Dream Child and Slither FX-pert Todd Masters) and local Serbian indie filmmakers, and keep their bloody mayhem limited to a hell of an abandoned factory location. As the madness increases alongside the buckets of blood, Hell Hole elevates what this DIY family is capable of while sticking true to their grassroots filmmaking spirit.
At the film’s core, Adams, Adams, and Poser craft a creature feature whose structure echoes such body-snatching antics found in The Thing and The Faculty; however, what sets Hell Hole apart from the classics it pays homage to is its sharp observations regarding the gender norms of body horror. Hell Hole’s parasite, trying to find the ideal specimen to inhabit, eschews female-presenting hosts for male ones–allowing the Adamses and Poser to place this ragtag team of stoic, bravado-waving oil drillers in an experience equivalent to unwanted motherhood. As a counterpoint, Poser’s headstrong Emily is a leader who’s child-free by choice, acting as the tough-as-nails surrogate mother of the team with the bonus, as she says, of “checking out” whenever real responsibility rears its ugly head. What’s refreshing is how the film doesn’t place Emily on a journey of discovering her maternal instincts–in fact, it celebrates her choice. Rather, that maternal energy finds a natural outlet in being a leader, making tough decisions and sacrifices where necessary, something celebrated when men hold her position but one that society expects to be tied to child-rearing when the tables are turned.
Instead, it’s the men who place the ability to create life on a pedestal who have their patriarchal expectations subverted in a delightfully gruesome fashion. Their slimy surrogacy is fittingly messy, with the film’s title cheekily pointing to the creature’s signature method of violation, as well as the constant rank smell the creature gives off when inhabiting a human. In a year where films like The First Omen and Immaculate effectively dramatize the alienation of gestating a life inside oneself without one’s consent, Hell Hole takes a chaotic sledgehammer to idealized patriarchal demands of motherhood, seeing just how men might like having their own bodily autonomy seized from them.
It’s also worth noting that amidst Hell Hole’s love for classic creature features, its equal condemnation of fracking’s parallel violation of Mother Earth makes it an intriguing successor to Larry Fessenden’s underrated eco-horror The Last Winter. Where that film rooted its horrors in senseless destruction that was just as cultural as it was environmental, Hell Hole’s sharp insights regarding bodily consent find a natural pairing with the natural world. Whether it’s destroying the Earth via fracking or strengthening a bloodthirsty parasite, we reap what we sow, exposing the horrors of what consequences we’re forced to take to term against our will.
For all of Hell Hole’s gruesome insights, it bears to mention that the film retains the Adams family’s witty, down-to-earth gallows humor. The chemistry between the blended American-Serbian crewmembers is a highlight as they trade clever, roughneck bilingual barbs at one another in both English and Serbian. The chemistry between Emily’s nephew Teddy (Maximum Portman) and environmental scientist Sofija (Olivera Perunicic) is also wonderfully nerdy, showcasing how unexpected connections and romance can be found in the geekiest of bonds.
This exciting leap forward for these grassroots filmmakers is still a bit rough around the edges, as CGI blood bursts at times undercuts the visceral practical effects that accompany them. However, these drawbacks certainly don’t undermine the continued inventiveness of one of horror’s finest families–and signal a growing ambition that I hope carries into their subsequent projects.
Hell Hole had its world premiere at Fantasia Fest 2024. It hits Shudder on August 23, 2024.
-
SKINCARE Somewhat Manages to Conceal its Blemishes
“I don’t think it’s about the skin you start out with.”
Had Skincare been made as a feature in the 90s, it might have starred a post-Basic Instinct Sharon Stone, a post-Batman Returns Michelle Pfeiffer, or a post-Final Analysis Kim Basinger. It’s the sort of self-contained film that finds a balance between light thriller and dark comedy to create the kind of neo-noir that experienced a significant boom in the early 90s. Its aims are simple- to present a character who is at a place in her life where everything is going right and then watch her become someone she never thought she was in an aim to protect herself from a force that’s trying to destroy her. With a powerhouse performance from its leading lady, a script with just the right tonal blend, and an L.A. landscape so rarely captured on film, Skincare is an exercise that mostly works, even if it does have trouble covering up its dark spots.
Inspired by real-life events, Skincare tells the story of Hope Goldman (Elizabeth Banks), a Los Angeles-based aesthetician who seems to have everything: a roster of high-profile clients, a studio in Hollywood, and a reputation she has spent years building. With her own product launching in stores everywhere in a week, everything in Hope’s life feels perfect. But when an up-and-coming competitor (Luis Gerardo Mendez) sets up shop across the way from her at the same time that signs of sabotage towards her and her brand start to show themselves, Hope finds her world falling apart.
By far, the biggest ace Skincare has up its sleeve is its depiction of L.A. Director Austin Peters takes one of the most recognizable cities in the world and transforms it into a place of pretty desolation where shiny people may exist, but not necessarily around Hope. The L.A. of Skincare echoes that of 2012’s Maniac, or The Canyons, two films that likewise capture the city as a barren place where characters are unable to disappear into the metropolis they thought they were in and are instead forced to be left alone with their demons, both real and imaginary. Paranoia is such a big part of Skincare and grows within Hope in virtually every scene. This makes sense since the L.A. of Skincare this should be one where, in the tradition of many a noir that came before it, feels hopeless. It feels right that Hope should come across as somewhat isolated while battling the monster trying to take her down. But Peters also gives the film a true glow by way of the camera. It’s a glow he holds regardless of what is happening on the screen. The polished prettiness somehow feels true and makes for a great contrast against the plot twists, which happen in subtle and surprising ways without ever having to venture into the realm of full-on sleaze.
It would be fair to assume at this point that Skincare has done everything it needs to succeed as a black comedy/light thriller/neo-noir. While this is true for the most part, the film eventually takes the same route as many of Hope’s clients and all but abandons her. By the end of our tale, plenty of questions remain unanswered including the culprit’s backstory, the complicity of other characters, and, most importantly, the vindication Hope deserved. The biggest of all is the question of why this was all this take-down torture was done to Hope in the first place, something the real-life subject on which the movie is based must’ve asked herself countless times. I can’t speak for the real-life person, but it’s safe to say that Skincare never had a chance at finding a credible explanation either. Instead of any concrete answers, the film chooses to end on a footnote that doesn’t register the way that it otherwise could have if more depth had been given to the events of the previous 90+ minutes and the reasons behind them. Perhaps there was some nervousness on the part of the filmmakers to stray too far from the actual events that might have resulted in compromising the integrity of the story. In this case, though, it might have helped.
Although she’s given great aid by the likes of Lewis Pullman, Michaela Jae Rodriguez, Mendez, and Nathan Fillion, Skincare is Banks’ venture through and through. The actress’s career as a leading lady has struggled to find its footing at times with regard to the types of projects that seemed right for her but sold her short. With Skincare, the right vehicle has found the right actress, bringing out a tour-de-force performance that straddles a multitude of lines. In Banks’ hands, Hope doesn’t fall into many of the traditional stereotypes assigned to female characters. Hope is not conventionally ruthless, nor is she an immoral person. Instead, Banks plays her as a survivalist, whose instinct for survival only intensifies the more the walls close in around her. But the actress also wisely gives her vulnerability sprinkled with moments of humor, such as in one recurring bit that sees her offering complimentary moisturizer to anyone she encounters while flashing her camera-ready smile even amid panic and desperation.
My sole reason for watching and reviewing Skincare was because of my boyfriend. While we both enjoyed the film, my other half seemed to be more into it than me, so much so that he spent some time the following day looking up the real-life counterpart of Hope Goldman to find out her true story. According to what he found, most of the events in Skincare do stay true to life but stop short of delving into anything beyond the mere obsession factor that served as the movie’s overall theme and central reason for its events. It was then that I felt compelled to give Skincare a bit of a pass and accept that maybe the reason that any questions went unanswered could be because the answers themselves weren’t all that interesting, or at least, not cinematic. One item of consequence is that the real-life Hope Goldman is apparently now suing the producers (which includes Banks) for their treatment of her story. I’ve never been an expert on instances of life imitating art or vice versa. But this certainly feels like one of those times.
-
Fantasia 2024: STEPPENWOLF is an Earth-Shaking Apocalyptic Quest for Empathy
Adilkhan Yerzhanov’s Kazakh revenge thriller dares us to care for the year’s most chilling psychopath
A handcuffed man stands alone in a desert, coolly smoking a cigarette beneath a blinding prisoner’s hood. Is he a prisoner, enduring a last request? As we pull back, we reveal the carnage has long since stopped–policemen wash blood off of riot shields as the “prisoner” boards a nearby police van; he isn’t a captive, but seemingly complicit in what’s just happened, a wolf among sheep.
Kazakh director Adilkhan Yerzhanov’s Steppenwolf unfurls a grisly portrait of this man’s ways of coping with life amidst a bloody unnamed civil war. Berik Aitzhanov’s Brajyuk is a convict-turned-interrogator, channeling years of personal trauma into the gruesome methods he uses to extract information from whoever the authorities unleash him upon. Brajyuk is disturbingly adept at self-preservation, puppeteering those around him into taking his place against rampaging firing squads or rival gangs to eke out another day.
When his police station endures a deadly raid by gangsters working for crime lord Taha, Brajyuk’s unexpected savior is the dazed, stuttering Tamara (Anna Starchenko). She’s searching for her lost son Timka, who Taha’s men seemingly captured; however, Tamara’s pleas have gone ignored by the strained, corrupt police force. Bonded together, Brajyuk finds himself unable to shake Tamara’s traumatized presence–but Tamara’s search for her son may help Brajyuk get one last chance at revenge.
While the idea of finding a reason to live amidst an apocalyptic world has been well-tread territory in stories across the globe, Steppenwolf roots such tropes in viscerally realistic and contemporary territory, along with daring its audience to empathize with one of the cruelest characters of the year. Yerzhanov’s unrelentingly bleak world, part of an ongoing, disconnected saga of films, retains echoes of the fall of civilization in the first Mad Max film by way of The Searchers–yet its violence feels more cruel and unpredictable, more Bela Tarr or Cormac McCarthy than George Miller and John Ford. The desolate steppes are defined by their upended, burning cars and jarring bursts of gunfire; there’s no attempt to contextualize the carnage around us beyond one of succeeding marauders and failing lawmen. There’s no time to create an alt persona rife with found objects and ornamental imagery when you could catch a stray bullet and bleed out in a foggy field. Much like Alex Garland’s Civil War earlier this year, this deliberate muddying of social or political waters strips away our usual methods of taking empathetic sides; rather, such wartime brutality feels like the status quo of this world. Yerzhanov implies that to endure this hundred-minute ordeal of following a maniac like Brajyuk, we must, like Tamara, extract whatever humanity we can from him–even if it feels as difficult as getting blood from a stone.
What makes Steppenwolf such a remarkable film is how Yerzhanov makes us care so deeply about Berik Aitzhanov’s unrepentant psychopath. At first, it seems like an impossible feat, as Brajyuk cackles like a hyena after dispatching nameless thugs with nothing more than a paperweight and a pair of scissors. Thrust into these chance sequences of John Wick-ian violence, one can’t help but feel like Steppenwolf confronts our primal desire to live in a world stripped of law and order with the brutal acts necessary to survive within it. Yet playing off of Starchenko’s stoic Tamara, we grow to understand and appreciate the jet-black humor Brajyuk adopts to cope with countless horrors; what’s more, his abusive outbursts and relentless drive for isolation give way to reveal a psyche deeply ravaged by the terrors of war. To endure the equally cruel world around him, Brajyuk’s ethos has crystallized into the idea that “goodness is no longer necessary.” It’s a powerhouse performance from Aitzhanov, able to evoke gut-busting laughter as much as a repulsive recoil in viewers as he plumbs this leading character’s dark depths.
It’s well worth noting that Tamara isn’t just there to be a mute foil for Brajyuk’s catharsis. Starchenko plays Tamara just as much as a victim of this cruel world as Brajyuk–and her journey from passive victim to actively resisting such horror inspires viewers to believe in the faith and goodness that Brajyuk deems so useless. Tamara’s repeated demands to find Timka risk losing viewers in a blur of semantic satiation; however, Anna Starchenko imbues her heroine with impeccable comic timing, heart-wrenching loss, and unshakable courage with the barest amount to do on screen.
Yerzhanov also finds such stunning visual poetry amid the desolation and bloodshed throughout Steppenwolf. This bleak world is just so beautifully realized, from crates of illegally harvested organs appearing out of a ghostly fog-drenched field like some depraved treasure to unearthly glowing explosions against stunning sunset gradients. Such flames also play against Tamara’s and Brajyuk’s eyes to bring out her inner fire, revealing how both actors and director unearth hope from the rubble of such nihilistic depravity.
One of my favorite sentiments by Stanley Kubrick culminates in the idea that “no matter how vast the darkness, we must create our own light;” Steppenwolf is a film that follows in that spirit by way of Cormac McCarthy in truly putting such tempered idealism to the test, subjecting its audience to wave after wave of brutal violence to dramatize just how much hope truly matters. Steppenwolf is such a bloodthirsty, cruel film–yet it’s unexpectedly, magically one of the most empathetic journeys of the year.
Steppenwolf had its North American premiere at Fantasia Fest 2024. A United States premiere is set for Fantastic Fest 2024 in September, with a 2025 release planned by Arrow Films.
-
ALIEN: ROMULUS is a Gnarly Blend of Small Scale Horror and Expansive Sci-Fi
A film that mines its predecessors to great effect, but fails to offer up anything new
Oh, the venerable Alien franchise. Ridley Scott’s original ’79 horror-steeped classic and its more muscular sequel Aliens from James Cameron serve as undeniable genre landmarks. Even the later sequels, which endured heavy criticism upon release, have been reappraised over time–with a bourgeoning fanbase for David Fincher’s bleak and stripped-down Alien 3 and the weirder Euro-trash vibes of Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s Alien: Resurrection. Scott’s return to Prometheus and Alien: Covenant admirably took the series into darker, more reflective aspects of the franchise’s mythology. We’ll hopefully see that work completed one day; for now, director Fede Álvarez (Don’t Breathe, Evil Dead ’13) delivers Alien: Romulus. It’s a film that returns to the franchise’s roots, not just in terms of its era, nestling between Scott and Cameron’s one-two punch, but in crafting a similarly resonant tone and all-too-familiar narrative.
Romulus is set in 2142, on the mining colony of Jackson’s Star: a distant and bleak outpost of the Weyland-Yutani corporation, home to several thousand humans eking out a subsistent living thanks to the contracts and quotas of their corporate overseers. Among them is Rain Carradine (Cailee Spaeny), who is desperate to find a way off-world for herself and her ‘brother’ Andy (David Jonsson), a synth reprogrammed to look after Rain despite his outdated software and impaired functionality. After another dream of escape is dashed, Rain is presented with an opportunity by a group of friends looking to chart their ship to the more idyllic surrounds of the distant system Yvaga. The only problem is that it takes 9 years to get there; however, a solution arises via a derelict Weyland-Yutani station that has fallen into the orbit of Jackson’s Star. It will burn up within 36 hours–but that window of time should be enough to get on board, salvage some cryo-pods, and set the team on their way to a better life. However, this isn’t just a simple research station: it’s actually the spearhead of Weyland-Yutani’s efforts to study the Xenomorph, efforts propelled by salvaging the creature ejected into space by Ellen Ripley decades earlier. Heist turns into horror as they find themselves caught up in the remnants of a program seeking to not just revive the Xenomorph’s lineage, but to also delve into the molecular basis of their existence.
The plot delivers the basic thrust of all Alien films: throw unsuspecting people into contact with the Xenomorphs, and let the games begin. The script from Álvarez and Rodo Sayagues pulls from parts of the franchise to create an effective pastiche that veers most closely in tone to the original than any of its other follow-ups, which for many will be a key selling point. Despite the dark fate of many involved, it’s far less nihilistic than Scott’s recent endeavors. The film excels when Álvarez’s skill at set-pieces comes to the fore, notably in sequences with defrosting face-huggers, body temperature camouflage, and a zero-gravity solution to the Xenomorph’s most innate defense mechanism. These are well-spaced to ebb and flow yet sustain a constant level of tension throughout the film. Rich and considered production design adds weight and age to the visuals. Cinematography from Galo Olivares plants us back into familiar surroundings, with plenty of impressive new vistas. Benjamin Wallfisch’s score switches from soaring orchestral pieces to discordant, throbbing synths, both evocative of past sounds from the franchise. The film well-leverages the various spaces and scenarios on offer, not just within the confines of the station but the expanse of space immediately outside. What adds to Alien: Romulus’ effectiveness is the tangibility of the production, notably with practical sets and effects (albeit with plenty of effective CGI enhancements).
This design and execution also support some excellent world-building, with Romulus offering us a portrait of humanity in this current age–and it’s frankly one of the more dire things in the film. It’s a dystopic, industrialized future, marked by the squeezing of humanity by the capitalistic drive of the Weyland-Yutani corporation. The film excels in conveying how people are a disposable resource in service of a bigger plan, and reaffirms this corporation (and their proxies) as the true villains of the Alien-verse. This dramatically propels much of the early investment in the film and its characters, but this young crew gets short shrift after the film’s setup. Archi Renaux, Isabela Merced, Spike Fearn, and Aileen Wu flesh out a supporting cast that is too poorly scripted to endear you to them and their fate. Such missing effective characterization is something that Ridley Scott (serving here as producer) excelled at in developing the motley assembly that made up the original crew of Alien‘s Nostromo, locking in audience investment as a result. In Rain and Andy, the film finds a truly effective emotional core. Jonsson (Industry, Rye Lane) is remarkable, with a character who undergoes a transformative arc that adds needed intrigue, unpredictability, and conflict to the film. Spaeny’s Rain is strong, determined, and crucially a selfless figure in a selfish world. She’s someone to root for as much as respect, as Rain demonstrates not just common sense, but a penchant for science and its problem-solving applications. Together, they truly anchor Alien: Romulus and add depth to its themes of dedication versus exploitation.
As alluded to, Alien: Romulus is packed with plenty of nostalgic nods in its callbacks via imagery and dialogue. In a way, it’s both a strength and curse, as such elements don’t add anything revelatory or progressive to the film on deeper inspection. A third act that many have already referred to as a “WTF moment” or “big swing”, is actually reminiscent of more effective ideas and events from Resurrection and Prometheus. Even with Álvarez’s reputation for stomach-churning fare, the film is rather low in terms of body counts and even feels like it pulls some punches with the kills that are there. Its final act, in particular, feels edited to dial back some of its more perturbing imagery and acts. The ramifications of this finale, notably this new “weaponization” of the Xenomorph’s genetic legacy, feel somewhat sidelined in favor of another boss battle where the villain is frankly rather clunkily realized. The most egregious aspect of the film comes from a creative choice to digitally resurrect a deceased actor from the original film. This isn’t just a cameo, but an ongoing key component to deliver exposition and drive the film onward. The result is ethically dubious, downright distasteful, and from a sheer technical point of view, looks quite bad. In a way, this creative choice is perhaps emblematic of the larger issue with the film: it’s another look to the past, rather than the future. Planting a new face, one that could cast a new imprint on the series and recur in future guises, could have been a smarter play. Even with these missteps in mind, it’s hard to deny Romulus is damn effective, a gnarly blend of small-scale horror and expansive sci-fi. Hopefully, its success may lead to a bigger creative swing in this freaky sandbox of a franchise.
Alien Romulus hits theaters on August 16th
-
SPINEMA Issue 73: MUTANT presents Michael Giacchino Exotic Themes for the Silver Screen
An breezy, unique, and toe-taping retrospective from the composer
Image via Mutant We all mourned the Funko-fueled immolation of the Mondo brand many months ago. A loss later giving way to celebrations when many of the familiar faces behind that creative and cultural force recombined (pun intended science nerds) to give us Mutant. Bursting out of the gates with a host of movie posters, collectables, and (pertinent to our Spinema column) a new wave of vinyl releases, showcasing all new original art and design. Exotic Themes for the Silver Screen Vol. 1 is one of their new releases and is a little untraditional in nature. A celebration of Academy Award-winning composer Michael Giacchino that revisits some notable pieces from the first half of his career, with a retro-refresh thanks to inspiration from 50s Exotica. If unfamiliar with the term, you’re undoubtedly familiar with the style. Think Caribbean style, steel drums, bongos, marimbas, and other south sea instruments. Checkout the track below for an example.
It’s a playful concept, a new spin (no pun intended) on musical pieces mined from the first half of Giacchino’s career. This isn’t some computer reworking of the tracks, instead each was rearranged and re-recorded, to be true to the Exotica-style, and in tribute to the inspirations of artists like Martin Denny and Les Baxter. From video game scores like Medal of Honor, Giacchino’s foray into TV, with the stellar work on LOST and Alias, before delving into his cinematic hits from work with Disney/Pixar (The Incredibles, Ratatouille, Up), and on Mission Impossible Ghost Protocol, Star Trek (2009), and Cloverfield. A full track list is included below, but expect Enterprising Young Men and A Man, A Plan, A Code, Dubai, to get regular plays. Easy listening tunes, tempering the music so that even the more dramatic pieces take on a toe-tapping element thanks to the rearrangements, and tonal shifts the different instruments bring. A shift from big orchestral swells, to something more intimate and warm. The tunes are instantly recognizable, just given a utterly different vibe. A unique and breezy retrospective from the composer, one best played with a Mai Tai in hand.
Tracklist
- Primordial Forest – The Lost World: Jurassic Park (2:10)
- Medal of Honor (3:01)
- Bristow and Bristow – Alias (3:09)
- Secret Weapons Over Normandy (3:26)
- The Incredibles Suite (3:07)
- Take a Hike – LOST (3:21)
- Life and Death – LOST (3:52)
- Sky High (2:31)
- Space Mountain (3:12)
- The Family Stone Waltz (2:11)
- Le Festin – Ratatouille (2:20)
- Ratatouille (2:20)
- ROAR! – Cloverfield (2:04)
- Casa Cristo – Speed Racer (2:34)
- Land of the Lost (2:33)
- Enterprising Young Men – Star Trek (2:50)
- Married Life – Up (3:49)
- Let Me In (2:26)
- LAX – LOST (3:37)
- The Turbomater – Cars 2 (2:21)
- A Man, A Plan, A Code, Dubai – Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol (3:03)
- Monte Carlo (2:52)
- Super 8 Suite (3:05)
The Package
Vol. 1 comes in a bright and clean package showcasing design work from Luke Insect. Cool tones, a minimal depiction of a sunset, a hint of psychedelia, and a recurring palm tree motif. The liner work also confirms the imminent arrival of Vol. 2, presumably covering the latter half of Giacchino’s career.
The liner notes from Charlie Brigden give a chronological rundown of the track list, showcase a letter from Giacchino himself, and maintain the same tropical aesthetic on the exterior packaging.
The records themselves are pressed on 2x 140 Gram vinyl, in a Mutant Exclusive Orange/Blue color scheme.
Order/Package Details
You can stream the album on Spotify, Apple Music, and all other digital platforms.
Additionally, the physical edition, pressed on 2x 140 Gram vinyl and CD, is also available for pre-order at madebymutant.com
Image via Mutant
-
SKINCARE: A Sordid Plate of True Crime with a Side of Existential Crisis
Skincare is the latest by director Austin Peters, who’s using this poignant psychological thriller as his transition from non-fiction into the narrative space, albeit with a film “based on true events”. The film was inspired by real life celebrity facialist Dawn DaLuise, here Hope Goldman (Elizabeth Banks), who was accused of a murder-for-hire plot against a rival aesthetician, but that is just one piece of this rather dense exploration of one woman’s unraveling at the seams. Embedded in this true crime drama is Banks using Hope to explore the realities on screen of what it’s like to be a single, empowered, independent woman in the cut throat world of beauty (Dramatic Lifetime pause….) where appearances are literally everything.
The film starts shortly before Hope Goldman’s personal beauty product line launch, which has her with literally everything on the line. While she’s the aesthetician to the stars, Banks is clear to ground Hope as someone who’s playing the Hollywood long game and has been working tirelessly toward her dream while teetering on the cusp of bankruptcy. The night before her big interview with the local news airs soft launching her line, a salaciously unhinged email goes out costing her most of her client base overnight. This sets into motion a series of events that exploit not only her gender, but her status as a beautiful, successful woman entrepreneur to sabotage her brand. Attempting to discover the culprit behind the attacks, she locks in on her neighbor, an up and coming aesthetician, who is a younger hipper version of herself.
While the psychological unraveling aspect of this film is completely effective on its own. It’s the performance and nuance that Elizabeth Banks brings to her character that really makes this film interesting. Her sort of exploration into what it’s like to be an aging woman in LA, still trying to have it all while fighting against the clock, adds to the uneasiness of the piece as every man she comes across has their own ulterior motives for their aid in her cause. It’s navigating the minefield of not only the sabotage arc, but also the men attempting to exploit her in this state, that makes the film just that much more anxiety inducing.
As a character study, Skincare is a fascinating glimpse of one woman pushed to the edge and how she somehow finds her way back, this all while contending with the shelf life society places on women. Banks is a tour de force here as she flip flops from girl boss people pleaser, to completely unhinged in this character that aside from the more dramatic flourishes has a very authentic center. It’s that dynamic and range that takes what could have been a lifetime movie of the week and delivers something much more impressive and engaging than I expected from the trailer.
-
The Two Cents Gang Rolls into Town with THE QUICK AND THE DEAD
In this week’s Two Cents, we grab our guns and hope we’re fast enough in Sam Raimi’s off-kilter spaghetti western.
Two Cents is a Cinapse original column akin to a book club for films. The Cinapse team curates the series and contribute their “two cents” using a maximum of 200-400 words. Guest contributors and comments are encouraged, as are suggestions for future picks. Join us as we share our two cents on films we love, films we are curious about, and films we believe merit some discussion. Would you like to be a guest contributor or programmer for an upcoming Two Cents entry? Simply watch along with us and/or send your pitches or 200-400 word reviews to [email protected].
The Pick: The Quick and the Dead (1995)
Our Women of the West series continues with Sam Raimi’s The Quick and the Dead, his riff on spaghetti westerns that combines the high stakes of that genre with his kinetic camera work and taste for madcap lunacy. Produced and starring Sharon Stone, the film boasts an amazing cast: Gene Hackman, Russell Crow, Leonardo DiCaprio, and yes a Bruce Campbell appearance. A western truly unlike any other, and one that definitely highlights our theme for the week.
Featured Guests
Brad Milne
In 1994 Sam Raimi made a wonderfully preposterous film set in the fictional town of Redemption, during the old west called The Quick And The Dead. The movie starred Sharon Stone, as well as young upstarts Russell Crowe, and Leonardo DiCaprio, and surrounded with a murderers row of character actors, including Keith David, Pat Hingle, Tobin Bell, Lance Henricksen, Mark Boone Junior, and Gary Sinese, Arnold Schwarzenegger’s running buddy LaFors himself Sven-Ole Thorsen, and capped off by screen legend Gene Hackman.
Last night was my second time watching The Quick And The Dead, and one of the things I appreciated most is the fact that it is in no way a modern take on the genre. It’s a film that feels right at home if it had been made in the genres heyday, the film stock just looks newer.
Hackman is the excellent in the film playing a corrupt and while not evil in human form, he is definitely a no good son of a bitch content on making the lives of the towns citizens a near unbearable struggle. His Harrod is the mayor of Redemption and as the blind shoe shine boy explains in an exposition dump that he gets 50 cents of every dollar.
Stone’s gunslinger arrives under the guise of a contest to win 123,000 dollars, but her real mission as we learn through a series of flashbacks is vengeance. Stone acquits herself well enough but occasionally feeling miscast. She is aided on her quest for righteous vengeance by Crowe’s former outlaw turned preacher Cort who at one time ran with Harrod’s cruel gang of outlaws.
The film nearly follows a familiar formula, but it diverges slightly, with some misdirection in the part of the Doc Wallace played with a kindly bedside manner by Robert Blossom’s. The showdown is set for Cort to get a chance at exacting revenge on Harrod. In a bombastic outburst of explosions Stone’s Ellen was hit actually shot down, and is able to satisfy her vengeance.
Raimi directed the film with the skill of a master craftsman. Trading in his usual scares for a the shoot em up fun of story that wouldn’t feel out of place in the heyday of the Western. At times, a humorous but, nonetheless, entertaining take on the tried and true genre.
(@BradMilne79 on X)
The Team
Having been a fan of both Sharon Stone and Sam Raimi, I’m not sure how The Quick and the Dead eluded me for so many years. Part of the reason, I suspect, was because it represented a time in both artists’ careers when they were seen as trying desperately to break away from the types of projects which helped make them names within the industry. It’s for this reason that I never saw Stone’s prison drama Last Dance or Raimi’s baseballl offering, For Love of the Game. It’s not that I have anything against artists venturing into new territory, but rather it’s when such moves feel more strategic than artistic that a cinephile can’t help but become sketpical.
Thankfully this is far from the case for The Quick and the Dead. Not only does Raimi manage to hold his own in this new genre, but he injects it with such electricity and vitality, it’s almost impossible to be anything but riveted. Naturally, a handful of western tropes show themselves here, but Raimi’s approach to them feels fresh and the way he weaves them into the plot (itself hard to dismiss thanks to its stellar architecture) is pure storytelling magic.
But the draw of this film (apart from what may be one of my new favorite Gene Hackman performances) upon release was Sharon Stone. Watching her take on everything her character is faced with and very rarely drop her steely gaze results in one of the most intriguing and compelling western movie heroines that ever existed. The commitment from the actress is there in every scene and both her and Raimi make sure that Ellen’s story retains as much authenticity as possible in the face of the script’s semi-campy tone and the director’s wondrous visual flair. If there’s any complaint to be had with Stone’s performance is that she can’t help but shake the modern look that’s so naturally hers to where you actually believe this is a woman who existed in wild west times. As one of the film’s producers, however, Stone was responsible not just for certain actors being cast, but also on Raimi’s hiring. So while there might have been other actresses who might have fit into the world a little more credibly, in the end, there would be no Quick and the Dead as we know it without Sharon Stone.
(@frankfilmgeek on Xitter)While I treasure Westerns and Sam Raimi’s movies like most of us, The Quick and the Dead was one of my shocking blind spots before this series. It was well worth the wait. Raimi’s classic off-kilter shots, floating superimpositions, and rapid-fire zooms imbue classic Leone-era Westerns with the heightened comic book energy he brought to the Evil Dead films, and would later realize at the peak of his powers with the Spider-Man movies. It’s a lean, dusty as hell piece rich with bloodthirsty vengeance–and I can’t think of another Western that takes the usual climax of these films and repeats it (to thrilling effect, I might add) into a central tournament-style structure. That dynamite hook allows for a gangbusters cast of iconic faces, future greats, and some of my favorite character actors. Gene Hackman returns to the devious menace he brought to Unforgiven, while young upstart Leonardo DiCaprio is in full teen heartthrob mode, at the same time showing off a flash of action chops that he’d bring to Inception. It’s so much fun doing a double-take at sudden appearances of everyone including Jigsaw/Tobin Bell, Keith David, and Gary Sinise.
(@Gambit1138 on Xitter)
The standouts, though, are Russell Crowe and Sharon Stone. Crowe’s soft-spoken rogue preacher running from his past is more relegated to a trapped prisoner than the Man with No Name action hero we might expect; instead, Sharon Stone blazingly steps into those nameless boots. The Lady is a reluctant action hero whose flair with a gun is undeniable, yet victory comes almost accidentally–while she’s driven by vengeance, each of her gunfights feel won by the skin of her teeth. It’s also refreshing that Raimi, Stone, and screenwriter Simon Moore are quick to dispense with needing to “prove” The Lady amidst the roster of gunslingers through a wonderful homage to The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly–an act that bonds her and Crowe’s fates together, and marks her as a quick-witted, quick-drawing force to be reckoned with. That combination of resilience and luck make her such a winning protagonist, and helps make the once-expected structure of these kinds of Westerns thrillingly unpredictable here.
James Tyler
I have long held the potentially controversial position that The Quick and the Dead is my favorite Sam Raimi film, so very pleased so many people got their first go round with it due to this series. It’s hard to pinpoint exactly why I love it so much, but mostly because there is so much to love. It’s cast is stacked to the rafters, with everyone meeting the material with the exact right amount of self-serious melodrama it needs to click. The premise of a quick draw tournament that draws many intersecting plotlines is so perfectly calibrated to just be pulled along by drama and tension. It’s Raimi at his most indulgent, giving his horror flourish to a new genre that often can feel buttoned down. That manic energy gives the film an undeniable pulse and verve that just makes it so bad ass and infectious.
(@JayTheCakeThief on Xitter)
To the topic of bad asses, it is significant that Sharon Stone holds the center of this film. It exists solely due to her love of the script, but it also a significant commentary on the multi-faceted aspects of destructive masculinity orbiting around here, as she stays at the steady hand in the center. It is a captivating performance that blends aspects of her masculine western star counterparts, the stoic quiet of Clint Eastwood most notably, but is also often unafraid to be unapologetically feminine. Gene Hackman, who can do this sort of sneering villain work in his sleep, provides a perfect foil and gives the film its much needed weight. A film that defies its genre in so many ways, and one I can come back to again and again.
CINAPSE CELEBRATES THE WOMEN OF THE WEST
Every week in August, we’ll be looking Western films with a feminine edge. Women don’t get to take center stage in tons of Westerns, but they are at the front of some truly great films in the genre. Join us this month by contacting any of the team or emailing [email protected]!
August 19th – Johnny Guitar
August 26th – Meek’s Cutoff
-
CALIGULA: THE ULTIMATE CUT – The Ultimate Interview with Editor Aaron Shaps
Philip Seymour Hoffman famously once said, “The film is made in the editing room” and nowhere has that been more apparent to me than the recent restoration of Tinto Brass’ troubled transgressive Roman epic Caligula, which is now screening theatrically thanks to Drafthouse Films. Notoriously the film’s original director Tinto Brass was locked out of the edit after production and plot was discarded altogether, for new hardcore footage that was shot to insert into the film to appease its producer Bob Guccione owner of Penthouse. It’s a project I’ve been a very vocal champion of, especially checking out the new cut, dubbed Caligula the Ultimate Cut, at its US Premiere in Austin, Texas at Fantastic Fest.
At that screening, I very briefly met the editor of the project Aaron Shaps and thought after chatting with its architect Thomas Negovan, that might be a fun discussion. Aaron didn’t appear to have a lot of credits before stepping into this project; which sounds like it wasn’t simply editing the film, but a rather eclectic mix of archival, restoration, and narrative reconstruction. Obviously Tom and Aaron succeeded in not only restoring the film elements, but the lost performances and the narrative as well delivering the film I believe audiences were promised when the epic first premiered.
Aaron was very generous in this interview, discussing not only the approach of the project to resurrect the film, but the work that went into its 3 year execution. As a fan of the film this was a fascinating discussion I am excited to share with those of you still waiting for news of the film’s release.
So the first question has to be were you aware of Caligula growing up or was it something that you found out about because of the project?
I saw the original theatrical cut for the first time on DVD in college, and it was one of those things where, if you’re a big kind of film nerd like I am, you hang out with other film nerds, obviously. So a buddy of mine came home from Best Buy or whatever, and he was like, “Hey, you guys heard of this movie Caligula?”
I hadn’t heard of it, but I looked at the box and I’m like, Malcolm McDowell and Helen Mirren and Peter O’Toole, it’s the only movie that Penthouse ever produced. Like, what is this thing? And we watched it that night and it was just like a bunch of guys sitting around drinking beers and just laughing. We just laughed at the movie, basically because how ridiculous it was, it was so over the top. Then I honestly didn’t watch it again or think about it for years until I got a phone call from Tom, who I had been friends with for almost 20 years and he said “Hey man, I think I need your help with something.”
So that was how Caligula then reentered my life.
What state was the footage in when you were brought in to edit? How much was done before you sat down and what did you have to do to sort of get it up and running?
Nothing was done. I was actually a part of the project from the very beginning of the archival process. Tom, myself and other members of the team we actually physically went and retrieved the materials from the storage units that Penthouse controlled and I was one of two people who physically cleaned the 35mm negative and supervised the actual scanning of all the negatives during the digitization process. So I was there for all the archival stuff as well.
The scanner was capable of scanning at like six times normal speed. But we were worried that if we tried to run this 40 year old negative that hadn’t really been properly stored through that scanner at a higher speed, that it would damage it. So, I literally sat there as it scanned, just sort of discovering this incredible treasure trove at 24 frames a second, just watching these performances that, you know, we had no idea even existed.
Just the emotions and the closeups on Malcolm’s face, Helen’s face and how creepy Peter was when turned up as Tiberius, who was almost a comedic figure in the original version.
How did you craft your approach to the edit? Did you watch any of Tinto Brass’ other films or that 60 minute workprint that Brass had before he was kicked out of the edit?
I did not. I had seen Salon Kitty, which I think is probably the only other Tinto Brass film I had seen years ago. I did not watch the work print. Tom and I had a lot of conversations about this and I said, I don’t wanna try to get in Tinto’s head and try to cut this the way that he would want me to cut it, because at best, then it would be a poor impersonation of a Tinto Brass film.What we wanted to do overall tonally with it is, to pretend that Tinto had just been fired, as he was back in the seventies, and I was brought in, during that time to try to do something with this movie.
I didn’t want it to feel modern at all. I wanted it to feel like this could have been maybe the movie that the seventies might have gotten in an alternate timeline. So I did look at a lot of pre-1977, 1978 movies. I looked at a lot of spaghetti westerns and I looked at a lot of other historical epics. I tried to look at things that I thought would have been an influence if I were working back then.Tom and I really wanted it to feel more like a 1970s European graphic novel version of a Roman epic, and really just lean into the visuals, and lean into the melodrama, and lean into the emotion and make it something that was very operatic.
But I purposely ignored the original cut of Caligula at that point. I tried to wipe it from my brain so that I wasn’t influenced. That’s not to say that it’s bad. I just didn’t want to be influenced in any direction by it. Like, I didn’t want to find myself trying to mimic things that I liked, but I also didn’t want to find myself sort of intentionally going in the other direction for the sake of going in the other direction. I would say my biggest influence would be spaghetti westerns. I watched the Leone stuff, some of the Enzo Castellari and Sergio Corbuccii films and some of the other spaghetti western filmmakers as well. Just because I thought, you know, those are sort of big operatic set piece based movies, from the same era produced by a lot of the same crews.
Now, was the project always gonna be rescored or when did that come into the decision process?
I don’t know if it was always going to be rescored, but definitely I remember those conversations fairly early on. There was another composer that Tom had brought in that was involved early on, and he didn’t work out for whatever reason. Tom had known Troy (Sterling) for a while and Troy had scored a short film that Tom and I made back in 2018. Once he came in, it really started to come to life. He totally got the operatic and kind of, I don’t wanna say psychedelic necessarily, because it isn’t really that, but this was definitely one of those things where we wanted it to be, again. We were all kind of trying to role play if we were doing this in the seventies.
So the idea is that people would go see this movie the same way they saw A Clockwork Orange or 2001. Where they were going for more of an experience and not just a film, something that was going to kind of bombard them with visuals, bombard them with sound, bombard them with tone and mood and atmosphere, and just kind of draw you in that way.
I think the score definitely helps differentiate it and I personally felt the score definitely works better this time around.
I think so too. I’m biased, but I appreciate that. I feel the same way.
Now you used a couple different versions of the script to sort of cut this thing together. But how did you designate your source of truth for what your decision making process was?
We tried whenever possible, and I know Malcolm talked about Gore’s script not being great. And it wasn’t great. But what I think, and Malcolm may disagree with me on this, what I think wasn’t great about it was a lot of the dialogue. I think what was great about it was the arc that Gore Vidal envisioned for Caligula and some of the symbolism he tried to work into it. So, as far as that’s concerned, Tom and I and everyone else involved on that level, we all tried to stay as close to that as possible. Just in terms of the story beats and the arc of Caligula himself.
A lot of it we weren’t really able to approximate because, the script had gone through so many iterations by the time they were in production, and there were things even in the shooting script, which was sort of closer to Gore’s vision than what they ultimately actually shot, because Tinto just kind of cut scenes at will that he didn’t feel like shooting or didn’t think he needed to shoot. Some of it might have also been scheduling issues, one thing a lot of people don’t know is that there were a lot of sets built for this movie that they didn’t actually shoot on, that were ultimately used by other productions later.
There’s things in the script that are supposed to be in different people’s bedrooms and things like that, that didn’t ever even make it in front of the camera, that are visible in other productions.
The final draft that Gore did was our north star whenever possible. And then of course, also the shooting script, which Guccione kind of rearranged scenes at will in ways that didn’t make sense and stuff like that. So, Gore’s script number one, whenever possible for the broad strokes and then the shooting script, for kind of understanding how what they did was supposed to fit together.
So speaking of the story beats, one thing that I was really surprised with is how this feels like this intended version of the film in that it’s not only with the performances, but thematically, like there’s a lot of thematic threads that basically that hold this thing together. It makes this not just a different film, but a new more coherent one.How hard was it to not only narratively put this thing back together, but also thematically and subtextually as well, because I was surprised to set it all there?
I don’t know if I’d say it was hard. It was definitely a journey of discovery. But once we saw everything that we had, and when Tom and I sat down and talked about the different iterations of the script that we were hoping to draw from.
I think there’s probably two reasons that Tom wanted to involve me so early on – number one, like I said, we’d been friends for almost 20 years, so he knew that this was gonna be a big kind of stressful, monumental, multi-year undertaking. He needed people on the team that, you know, we weren’t gonna kill each other. I do think he’s said this before, that when it comes to storytelling, I know he trusts my instincts. So, after we had watched all the footage and tried to sort of digest and absorb the scripts as best we could. We both did a ton of research and read all kinds of other materials to sort of supplement our knowledge and try to get our heads around what they were trying to do, interviews with Gore Vidal, interviews with Guccione, interviews with Tinto.
I know Tom’s been in touch with Peter O’Tooles daughter. I don’t know if we got this from her or if this was something that the university archives that maintained his papers had. But we actually got Peter O’Tooles journals, his handwritten journals from the set, so we knew what he was thinking as far as Tiberius. That was incredibly helpful and just super cool, to be able to read that stuff. But at that point, Tom and I just sat down and we sort of, we mapped it out as if we were the writer and director of the film in terms of this is the arc that we want to tell. And then after that, I went and hunted down what we might have that we could actually use to execute those ideas in, in the edit.
That was when the discussion of having Dave McKean do the animated opening. That’s one of the things Tom and I talked about, because of the payoffs in the original version.
Another thing that really impressed me, was how thematically Caligula feels very much like a product of our time, because Caligula gets tired of the bureaucracy, seeing how far he pushes it till it basically falls apart. I know Brass was sort of an anarchist, but did it surprise you at all that this movie from 40 years ago could still be so relevant today?
It didn’t, because I think a lot of that is Gore and I was more, much more familiar with Gore’s body of work than I was with Tinto’s when I came onto this project. I read a lot of his essays, saw a lot of interviews with him and read a lot of his political commentary and things like that and he was almost like the original talking head liberal TV pundit.There’s actually a great documentary about his rivalry with William F. Buckley Jr. Who’s like one of the fathers of modern conservatism, the documentary is called Best of Enemies. I highly recommend it. So it didn’t surprise me only because the cynic in me kind of already knew that we sort of trap ourselves in these same cycles of power and politics. Obviously the parallel has been drawn many times by a lot of people smarter than I am between the United States and the Roman Empire.
So was there anything you couldn’t incorporate that you wanted to that was left in the trim bin?
I’m not super regretful of this. I only would’ve wanted to put this in for the shock value and ultimately that’s why it didn’t make it in. There’s that scene in the original where Proculus is tortured and killed and his penis is cut off and fed to the dogs.That’s like one of those scenes, like the death machine scene, like the kitchen scene, that everybody talks about. ‘Cause it’s so crazy’. But the problem with that scene is it was an afterthought that was shot very late in the production. We know it was an afterthought because in the shooting script, which is obviously numbered by scene, it’s like scene 64A or something like that. It was literally inserted into the script and we also know that it was a late edition, because even in the shooting script originally Proculus survives all the way until the end and he’s part of the conspiracy to kill Caligula.
So I’d kind of be remiss if I didn’t ask this question. So there’s, there was a bit of controversy on the film Twitter, about Beyond Fest, because Beyond Fest said that it was the, it was the US premier and then they stated the cut they were screening was re-edited. Was it re-edited, are you still working on the film?
I’m a hundred percent aware of what you’re talking about, but no.
To clear this up, there is only two differences between the version that was shown at Beyond Fest, which is the sort of final, final version and the version that was screened at Cannes, and Fantastic Fest. Those differences were some tweaks that were done to the grading, that we weren’t happy with. You know, we were so rushed. We didn’t find out we got into Cannes until like two weeks before. They had watched a work in progress version back in like November of last year. We didn’t hear from them for months, and we were like, okay, well we didn’t get into Cannes, and then all of a sudden we got into Cannes. So we were scrambling to get it ready. The folks who were doing the grading just really didn’t have time to kind of push it as far as they wanted to, and as far as Tom wanted them to.
So there are some tweaks to the grading that happened for the Beyond Fest version, which like I said, is the final version. And then the only other thing is there was an intermission now, and that was something that our marketing people and some other folks had talked us out of originally, in a nod to the great old biblical epics.
So we put in a 10 minute intermission and we had Troy write some new music to play over that intermission. But in terms of actual changes to the edit, there isn’t anything. It’s just grading and then that intermission, those are the differences. So you, you saw the same version that everybody else saw. The only thing that’s different is, a few scenes are darker, a few scenes are lighter, that kind of a thing. Plus the intermission.
As somebody who watches the 10 Commandments every year, that intermission would’ve hit perfectly for me.
-
NOW ON VOD! – #AMFAD: ALL MY FRIENDS ARE DEAD – A Chat with Star Jade Pettyjohn and Director Marcus Dunstan
#AMFAD: ALL MY FRIENDS ARE DEAD the latest by Marcus Dunstan, premiered at Tribeca and was just released in select Theaters and On Demand. Dunstan not only wrote/directed the excellent Collector duology, but wrote the Feast trilogy and a bunch of the Saw films. Here with a script by John Baldecchi, Jessica Sarah Flaum and Josh Sims, Dunstan is tackling a film premise that is fast becoming a genre unto itself in indie horror, the social media slasher.
In a meta take on the current obsession with true crime and dark nostalgia. The film takes place two decades after Karmapalooza, a fictitious music festival that was tragically marked by the deaths of seven college students that spawned a podcast, a netflix true crime series and a feature film. In a morose cash grab the notorious fest is back to cash in on that notoriety and #AMFAD follows 7 friends who book an airbnb in the woods on their way to the fest.
We, the audience, are then paired off with the final girl-esque Sarah (Jade Pettyjohn), the newcomer to the group of long time friends who harbor a terrible secret. Jade was in the School of Rock TV show and will no doubt be more in demand after this film.
I really dug #AMFAD and got to chat with both Marcus and the film’s lead about not only this film, but Jojo Siwa who has a surprising role to play and also got some great news The Collector 3, spoiler alert, I might be FINALLY happening. Enjoy!
First off congrats on the film, Marcus you’re a pretty prolific writer and director with some of my favorite franchises under your belt. Normally you write your own films, so what drew you to this script and its take on the toxicity of social media?
Marcus Dunstan: Well, I had never been able to take the helm of a murder mystery, and I love that. We were ghost writers on the reboot of My Bloody Valentine, and I loved the architecture of it, because what I found is if it was a straight, “we know who the evil person is and we’re watching bodies pile up” okay? Those movies, you can cut ’em down to about 80 minutes and you get it.
But the murder mysteries had character development, it had suspicion, it had the closeup of, is that the same boot as the killer? It had the characters, and layers. And often I found them to be just more engaging and more realistic to watch. That’s what was really fun. So that was the inspiration to get into that.
And in terms of social media, it’s kinda like the mantra of this that I was keeping in my head is, well, this is modern voyeurism. Voyeurism used to be on the shoulders of the person standing far away. And with social media, we’ve invited the voyeur in.
The influencer slasher is starting to become a subgenre unto itself in horror, why do you think we enjoy watching bad things happen to influencers?
Marcus Dunstan: I think that there’s wish fulfillment and there’s nightmare fulfillment. (laughs), I would say the wish fulfillment is when you’re driving your beloved puppy to a doctor’s appointment and someone broadcasting on their phone, nearly t-bones, you. That’s when you want something to happen. We want a karmic hand to come down and well bam, wake up (laughs).
Then the wish fulfillment is, well, don’t we all want to create the best version of ourselves? Don’t we wanna hide our vulnerabilities and keep them in the dark? But what if someone knew about them? What if someone wanted to exploit them? What would we do to keep fake living, in order to hide and revel in our inner bats (laughs)?
Jade, I love Sara’s journey in the film as an actor that has to be a great script to get, what kind of prep did you do for the role, physically or emotionally and where do you find the tools to play a character like that?
Jade Pettyjohn: So my prep for this particular project was a little bit different than my normal sort of prep when it comes to a project. Sarah is a really interesting character. She’s very nuanced, and I think within the first two acts of the film, you really explore how she is this outsider in a group of friends and she’s trying to find her footing in this world. And she acts as sort of the fly on the wall, as all of these extreme things are happening and she’s just sort of trying to discover her place in that.
I think that is a very sort of quiet rooted moment that Sarah gets to have. And then when everything hits the fan and the chaos ensues in the third act. How Sarah breaks and how what she turns into and evolves into under very heightened intense circumstances, was very physical.
So my prep work was a lot more physical and primal than it had been in the past, and it was so much fun to collaborate with Marcus too. I mean, we had so much fun on set discovering all of the highs and lows and volumes that we could turn up and down for the character of Sara, because her journey is very interesting and erratic, and not something that is easily predictable, you know?
So I have to ask both of you about Jojo Siwa. I am honestly a low key fan. How did she come to the project? I know Jade, you’ve worked with her before. I honestly have to say, I didn’t know she was in the film when I first saw it and I was really surprised at how great she is here.
Marcus Dunstan: I want to give a shout out to Jessica Schwartz and I believe Jessica Schwartz started the ball rolling to even approach the team representing Jojo. From that, I would just have to fast forward to the result of all those efforts. I am not privy to how it happened, but I’ll tell you who showed up for us as an outgoing, soulful, caring, dedicated, wonderful collaborative entity that just said, push me. I’m here to win and let’s go.
Thank goodness, because we could have done what was just on the pages with that character, but because it was her, because of Jade, because of everyone really just giving beyond the norm, there’s so much more there.
Jade Pettyjohn: I think what she did really was the haunting heart and throughline of the story, and she is so dedicated. I mean, there’s really something to say about someone who comes in and, and does this performance and she’s never done a project like this before or a role like this before. There was a lot that was required of her to be able to do something like that and she didn’t complain once.
And not only did she not complain, she loved it and was such a joy to work with, she was so warm. She was so game. She was like, bring on the fake blood, bring on the tears, bring on all of it, and was such a team player. I think her performance gives such a heart to the story. For me also personally, because I worked with her when we were kiddos back in the day, to work with her as an adult now was really fun. To reunite in that sense with a completely different story and such a full circle moment with, for the both of us.
Jade, the film sort of digs into how we’re all sort of playing a role rather it be on social media or with our friends and family, being not only a celebrity, but a woman, what do you think this film has to say that maybe some folks aren’t ready to hear?
Jade Pettyjohn: Yeah. It can be a hard pill to swallow, but I think that we can fall into the trap of feeling like we need to play a role or to be something, other than ourselves. Obviously we’re saying this within a horror film and the horror genre, so it’s a lot more fun, bloody and colorful.
But there’s some real dangers I think in trying to feel like you need to fulfill a certain role or stereotype or identity in order to exist in this space. I think ultimately at the end of the day, people are people and social media is a hard thing for a lot of people, but particularly young people to navigate.
I think it’s an important thing to know, that we’re a lot more nuanced and dynamic than what we feel like we need to portray on a screen with people that you don’t know. We wanted to highlight how toxic and dangerous it can get if you’re stuck trying to be interesting rather than being interested in life.
Marcus – Any Sequel Plans for #AMFAD, I know that post credits scene definitely got me?
And speaking of sequels…
I also have to ask any update on The Collector 3 I am a huge fan of that series?
Marcus Dunstan: Bless your heart for asking.
When it comes to the universe of All My Friends are Dead, we’re gonna satiate the appetite, if the appetite’s there and we’re ready to launch.
When it comes to The Collector there’s a Gordian knot of things to untie, and I wanna say, the last hurdle was just jumped. So what I’m hoping to do, if I’m so fortunate, Josh Stewart (the star of the Collector series), and I are intending to hang out and watch this movie together in New York this Saturday. I want nothing more than to just send out a thumbs up at some point and be like, guess what? Miracles can happen twice in one night, but we’ll see <laughs>. Sometimes the legalese of stuff moves a little bit slower than the optimism <laughs>
