An amiable greeting to you guys, people who always take a look on this blog to read the differents interviews I post weekly, I will post further information about upcoming films and interviews with more frequency. Now, today I post this interview I did to SETH GROSSMAN about his life and his horror film "INNER DEMONS", he told us a lot of interesting facts and advice for newbies filmmakers, enjoy it.
EFF: I always ask this question, when did you realize that you wanted to be a filmmaker?
SG: I realized I wanted to be a movie director a year or two after I graduated from college. I'd studied English Literature and creative writing at Princeton University, and planned to make a life as a novelist, and to that end moved to Thailand in 1997 to live cheaply and write copiously. I realized after about a year of that that the solitude and monotony of fiction writing didn't suit me. I wanted to collaborate and I love movies, and I decided that I was more suited to the life of a filmmaker, and the almost seasonal shifts in work, that this life entails.
EFF: I want to center
this interview on your last film, "INNER DEMONS" because this is a
horror blog haha. How did you involve into it, and what thing attracted you?
SG: My manager informed
me that a small production company was looking for a director for a project
that at the time was known as "Untitled Intervention Exorcism Movie."
Knowing that I'd produced the reality show Intervention, and that I'd directed
a horror movie already (Butterfly Effect 3: Revelations), he thought it would
be a perfect fit, and when I met with the producers, that became clear to all
of us. I was attracted to the movie because my work with drug addicts on
Intervention was one of the most profound experience of my career, and I was
eager to explore some of the darker elements of the addict-producer
relationship in this film.
EFF: The film centered
its idea over two illness if we can say that, which are drug addiction and
demonic possession, so, you as a director how connect these two worlds in
one.
SG: There are so many
connections between drug addiction and demonic possession; many addicts have
told me that the cravings are so strong that they don't feel conscious, they
feel as though another force has taken over their minds. There's also a
connection with mental illness - drug addiction often stems from untreated
mental illness, and is also considered a form of mental illness. Before modern
psychology, many cultures considered mental illness to stem from supernatural
forces -- demons, witchcraft, etc
EFF: What problems did
you face in this project and do you have any anecdotes that can tell us?
SG: There are myriad
challenges when you're trying to make a feature film on a micro-budget,
especially when you start to involve special effects. For example, when we used
fake blood, we often had only one or two takes, because after we splattered
blood all over the set, it would take our art department an hour to fully clean
it, and we were always fighting the clock.
EFF: How much was the
budget and what stage was the most expensive and complicated too?
SG: The budget was around
$100,000, and the hardest part was probably post production. We had a few
visual effects that we needed to produce for very little money, so there wasn't
a lot of time to get it right.
EFF: How you handled
the casting process, what aspects you looked for at the moment to choose the
casting?
SG: I worked with a
casting director who had a good pool of non-union actors, since we couldn't
afford to work with Screen Actors Guild actors. Over the course of two or three
weeks, she videotaped auditions, and then I chose the top five or six actors
for each part and met with them in person. I discussed the role with each of
the actors, and played around with them to see their take and to see how well
they could make adjustments. The main thing that I always look for in actors is
realism in the performance, commitment to the reality of the scene.
Scenes from "Inner Demons"
EFF: What advice would
you give to those newbies filmmakers?
SG: I would tell newbie filmmakers to develop a craft that allows you to support yourself while struggling to make movies. Editing or special effects are great day jobs. The way you shoot should reflect the type of story you want to tell, and the most important things that separate amateur work from professional work are the quality of the acting, first and foremost, and the sound mixing. A poorly mixed movie stands out as amateurish from the beginning.
Seth Grossman
EFF: What is the best
and worst to be the director of a film?
EFF: What directors
has influenced you on your style directing?
SG: My favorite
filmmakers are Fellini, Kusturica, and David Lynch. For Inner Demons, because
it's a "found footage" style movie, the biggest influences were a
movie called Lake Mungo (excellent Australian film) and The Last Exorcism.
EFF: What
equipments, cameras you used for "INNER DEMONS?
SG: We shot Inner Demons
on the Red Epic camera. Lately I've been using the Red and Alexa cameras a lot,
although I also use the Canon C300 on smaller projects.
**Seth Grossman's | Twitter | Imdb |**
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