Director: H Tjut Djalil
Writer: Jimmy Atmaja
Producers: Abdul Muis Sofian, Hendry Katili, Sri Gunawan
Cast: Ilone Agathe Bastian, Yos Santo, Itje Trisnawati
Year of release: 1981
Country: Indonesia
Reviewed from: UK DVD (Mondo Macabro)

You can’t go wrong with Indonesian horror movies - they’re unashamedly bonkers. Mystics in Bali is allegedly one of the best - for some value of best - and is another terrific presentation from Mondo Macabro, purveyors of international weirdness to the discerning cinephile.

German tourist Ilone Agathe Bastian stars as American Kathy Keen. I’ll just repeat that in case you think you must have misread it - the female lead in this film is played not by an Indonesian actress, not by an American actress, not even by the director’s girlfriend but by a passing German tourist! This is the quality of film-making we’re dealing with.

Yos Santo - a skinny bloke with bushy hair and a small moustache - plays her Indonesian friend Mahendra. Kathy wants to write a book about black magic and Mahendra somehow introduces her to a master of the strongest, most primitive magic known to man - Leak (or Leyak). This turns out to be a mad old crone, all long fingernails, straggly hair and tatty clothes (not unlike the basic appearance of the evil sorcerer in Pemuja Cakar Iblis). The crone reappears in various guises, gradually getting younger, but the main thing she does is laugh. She positively screeches, over and over again (you can hear a mercifully brief clip of it at the end of the title sequence of the Mondo Macabro TV series, of which the episode about Indonesian movies is included here).

Our first touch of weirdness is when the crone shakes hands with Kathy and departs, leaving her detached hand which scuttles off when Kathy drops it to the ground. Over time Kathy learns more and more leyak magic from the ‘Leyak Queen’ and comes more and more under her power, to the consternation of Mahendra and his uncle, who once fought a leyak wizard (or something).

The young couple’s second meeting with the crone is extremely odd, and not just because we cut from one night scene to another with no indication that it’s 24 hours later. The witch is unseen this time, hiding in a bush, from which extends a slightly forked ten-foot tongue. “Have you brought the things I asked you to bring?” she asks, despite not having asked them to bring anything. And indeed they have - some small jewels and about eight pints of blood in glass bottles. No, it’s not explained...

Leyak magic gives its practitioners the ability to transmogrify themselves and we see this in action when the two women (Kathy having learned to screech with laughter properly) turn into pigs. This is achieved initially by crude bladder effects on their faces, then showing them running around wearing - I am not making this up - inflatable pig costumes. They then drop to all fours and, by the miracle of crap editing, become genuine live pigs.

That’s all well and good, but you can see crawling disembodied hands and people turned into pigs anytime (try a double bill of The Addams Family and Time Bandits). About halfway into the 80-minute feature we get what we’ve been waiting for, the image promised on the sleeve and the disc menu: Kathy’s disembodied floating head, complete with internal organs suspended beneath it.

The crone/witch/woman/thing wants Kathy’s head to do her evil work and sends it flying off through a mix of blue-screen work and a prop on a wire. Unwitting accomplice Kathy develops big vampire fangs when her noggin detaches and goes off to munch down on a baby as it’s being born - although the camera angle frankly makes this scene look more like lesbian muff-diving. Sorry, but it does.

Later we see the two women transform again - into snakes. Yes, Mystics in Bali is another snake-woman film, though it only just scrapes into that increasingly prolific genre because they’re not ‘snake-women’ per se, just women who can turn into animals, including on one occasion snakes. However, on the plus side the extras include an image of a poster for a movie called The Hungry Snake Woman (starring Indonesian horror legend Suzzanna) which clearly is a version of ‘The Snake King’s Daughter’. Another one to try and track down...

Mahendra’s uncle meanwhile knows that the best way to defeat the monster that Kathy has become is to prevent her guts-dangling head from reattaching to her body. This leads to the traditional climactic magical fight, yada yada yada.

It’s slow to start but once it gets going Mystics in Bali is top quality trash (there’s a bit of travelogue-style footage of Indonesian dancing early on to tempt tourists, though any promotional effort is rather undone by the suggestion that the country is home to cackling witches and flying vampire heads). The special effects are surprisingly sophisticated until one realises that what looks like an early 1970s movie was actually made in 1981. The best effect is in the final battle when the witch and the uncle fire animated bolts of energy at each other, tipped with grasping claws. Which is quite cool. (For a better, CGI-based flying vampire head effect, check out the 2002 Thai film Demonic Beauty.)

The dubbing is diabolical, with Mahendra in particular falling. Into the William. Shatner school of. Unnecessary pauses. Mondo Macabro’s print comes from the original negative and looks far better than the film deserves. It’s a terrific widescreen transfer with a bit of scratching, especially at reel ends, and the colour on some of the night scenes is a tad screwy, but that really doesn’t detract from the hoopla on screen.

As extras we get the aforementioned 25-minute documentary, which includes interviews with the director, special effects bloke El Badrun (who is clearly bonkers) and various producers and actors - including the living legend that is Barry Prima. There are clips from The Warrior, Satan’s Slave (no, not the Norman J Warren film!) and one of my all-time favourite pieces of Asian lunacy, The Devil’s Sword - directed by the aforementioned Mr Badrun! There’s an excellent and very informative essay on Mystics and its place in Indonesian exploitation cinema, and even an article on ‘how to become a leyak practitioner’ which reads like it has been copied from an old book, but unfortunately neither essay nor article are credited. There’s a complete filmography of director H Tjut Djalil (Lady Terminator) too.

Mystics in Bali is the on-screen title here but the film was apparently released as Balinese Mystic in Australia, a more likely location of potential tourists. Djalil does say in the documentary that the lead character is Australian and this is reinforced by a bit of poster copy reproduced on the IMDB, although the dialogue is unequivocal about Kathy being from the USA, which raises the possibility that the Aussie retitling might indicate a completely different dub. The other title sometimes given for the film is Leak, presumably used domestically. It is based on a novel called Leak Ngakak by local author Putra Mada.

Who would have thought that a film like this, in a terrific presentation and with an excellent bunch of extra goodies, would ever be for sale on the British high street? What an odd world we live in. Anyone with a fondness for Pacific Rim insanity should buy a copy of this straightaway. It’s a truly terrible film, but it is an absolute must-see. And if it sells enough, perhaps Mondo Macabro will release a similarly well-transferred and well-packaged version of The Devil’s Sword so that I can ditch my battered old ex-rental VHS copy.

MJS rating: A-

I met British actress Lisa McAllister in Romania in April 2006 when I visited the set of Pumpkinhead: Ashes to Ashes, in which she played the role of Dahlia.

What can you tell me about Dahlia?
"She’s a crystal meth addict, a hillbilly, she’s also a goth but there’s not many goths around and she’s just doing it to try and be different and push as many boundaries as possible. She’s quite an angry character. In my opinion, she probably hasn’t had the easiest of lives. It’s just her and her brother now. I’ve built a back story that her parents have died."

Have you done any research into addiction for the character?
"I tried to do as much as possible, but I wasn’t method acting. It’s a difficult thing with the drugs, to depict, because this story’s not about her taking drugs. You don’t ever see her doing crystal meth - because of the Sci-Fi Channel and stuff like that - which is a shame because that would have made it easier to use that more. The film is way more about our interaction with this great big monster and the utter shock and disbelief. Dahlia’s way of dealing with it is to get high."

Do you have scenes with Pumpkinhead himself? Does he get to kill you?
"Yes, many scenes. He’s fabulous! He does get to kill me. I don’t think I can say how but it’s a really cool death scene. It’s going to look very, very cool."

How did you get this role?
"I auditioned for it. I have an agent in London and I go to auditions all the time and have my fingers crossed. I actually auditioned for Part IV first, or I don’t know whether it was they just gave me the script for IV. Then Jake West saw the tapes and thought I would be good for Dahlia."

Is it your first film?
"It’s not my first film. I did a film called The Number One Girl in London which hasn’t been released yet. That was with Vinnie Jones and Pat Morita who were both lovely. But this is my first time in Romania and away on a film set - that was all filmed in London - and I have just had such a fantastic experience. I honestly couldn’t want for anything else. It’s all just gone so well. Everyone’s been fantastic. The crew here are amazing, I love all of the cast, Jake’s great, Erik Wilson the DP’s incredibly talented as well."

Have you seen the original film?
"I have. Great film. It was part of my research - I’ll be honest! I’m only 25 so when Pumpkinhead had its heyday I was just a baby. But I watched the film and Lance Henriksen does such an amazing job in it. You totally feel for his character and it’s so cool I’m going to get to work with him later which will be so exciting.”

I grabbed a quick interview with Ewan MacGregor when he was playing a zombie in the Tales from the Crypt episode 'Cold War' (also starring Jane Horrocks and Colin Salmon). This was shortly before he was announced as the star of Star Wars Episode One - damn! This also predates his appearance in Solid Geometry. This interview has never appeared in print.

This looks good fun. Is it?
"Yes, it certainly is. We're having a real laugh doing it."

Is this anything like Shallow Grave?
"No, it's very different. There's a bit violence in it, but that was a very real situation and this is a very unreal situation."

Are you hamming it up a bit?
"Yes, we're just having a laugh with it."

Are you familiar with the series?
"No, I've never seen any of them. I don't know if they're showing them here. I look forward to seeing this one, though."

Did you audition for this?
"No, I was just asked to do it. I don't know why, but they asked me to do it and I thought it would be a real laugh. It's a five-day shoot so it's really fast, but it's been good. It's got guns - I haven't done anything with guns in it before. It's frightening how much fun that can be!"

I hear rumours that Danny Boyle has been signed up for Alien IV. Are you hoping for a part in that?
"Well, I'm not sure if he definitely is yet."

I spoke to America and they said he was definitely doing it.
"Well, I spoke to him and he said he wasn't. I don't know if he is or not. But I don't know, it depends if there's a good part in it."

So what have you got lined up at the moment?
"I go away to the States in February to do a film called Nightwatch, a quite scary thriller about a nightwatchman. A spate of necrophiliac serial killings is going on and my character gets framed for them."

Your CV seems to concentrate on horror and dark stuff. Is that just coincidence?
"Yes, I've done lots of other things that aren't necessarily dark. But this is a laugh, this is something different, it's very quick."

Everybody seems to be having a good time.
"I think they are, yes."

Have there been any problems with any of the special effects?
"No, everything's going very well. I think there's only been one mis-aimed gun-wound, and that was this morning. But everything's worked very snappily so far. There was a shoot-out on the forecourt of a garage, with lots of plantpots and things blowing up and lots of guns firing. Everything's gone very smoothly. There's been no accidents."

Can you give me a precis of the story?
"Me and Jane are both zombies, which you don't know till near the end. We go to hold up a bank, but the bank's closed - it's not there any more. And so we end up holding up this garage. As we arrive, I'm messing around with this huge pistol and it turns out that there's three guys holding the shop up already. So there's a bit of a scuffle with them. Then our driver comes in and gets blown away. Jane shoots the guy that's holding me, then we get away and get back to the flat and have a huge argument. I've been shot in the leg; she's complaining because I'm making so much noise about it and she says, 'You've been shot lots of times before - don't make such a fuss.' So I show her that it still hurts by shooting her through the shoulder. She goes away and she's leaving, and I say that she'll be back because we're two of a kind, but you're not sure why that is. She goes away and pulls this enormous, gorgeous guy and brings him back to the flat and spends all day seeing to him. Then I come back and we have another slight argument and I shoot him.

"We get back together and I say, 'Look, you're silly. We're two of a kind - you can't leave.' And I ask her to tell me why, and she says, 'Because we're zombies.' I say, 'Yeah, we're ghouls, we're the walking dead.' Then suddenly the guy I've just shot rears up in the background and he turns out to be a vampire! With horrific eyes and teeth effects. There's a big fight and we end up all broken up. We end up getting pulled through a window by the vampire, who of course flies away. We end up broken in bits - half my head gets blown off at the end. Tomorrow I've got the big prosthetics scene. Half my face has gone; I've not seen it yet but apparently I'm not going to be able to eat for the whole day. I'll be drinking soup through a straw. The whole of half of my face has been gone - you see the grooves where the pellets have hit. It should be quite nasty."

How did you get into acting?
"I've always wanted to do it, so I was going to do it since I was a kid. I just made sure that I did. So the rest of the time was spent working out what an actor was, finding out how to do it. I left school early and went to work in a theatre backstage. i went to a one-year course in Fife, in Theatre Arts, then I went to a three-year course down in London. I left early to do Lipstick on Your Collar. That was nice, a really very lucky break."

Are you hoping to become a big movie star?
"No, just so long as I'm making good movies. I'm not interested in becoming a huge movie star, but I am very interested in making good movies. That means to work wherever the script comes from. It doesn't matter whether it's America or here, or Europe or wherever. It's good writing that's important to me."

It was back in Janury 2006 that I posted a review ofGhostkeeper, a VHS tape that I bought some time in the early 1990s. A little while after, I was delighted to receive an e-mail from the director Jim Makichuk who kindly agreed to an interview. Unfortunately my computer exploded shortly thereafter and one of the e-mail addresses that I lost was Jim’s. In June 2008 we finally re-established contact - and this is the result.

I’m really glad to get back in contact with you because I’ve wanted to find out more about Ghostkeeper for a long time now.
"Thanks a lot for the review that you did on the movie. You sort of got what we were going for - because there’s a lot of people who didn’t. I found out from some kids who were working at that hotel we shot at in Lake Louise, they all had copies of the movie and I said, “Where did you get it?’ They said, ‘There’s somebody from England who’s uploaded it. Everybody’s doing it.’ I said, ‘Well, I’m flattered.’"

That certainly wasn’t me. I have no idea how to upload a movie onto the internet!
"Me neither!"

Let’s talk a little bit about your background before Ghostkeeper. You did TV news and stuff like that.
"I started by majoring in psychology and English, and I got a job at a TV station in Ontario. I was a 21-year-old kid and I walked in there, in the mail-room, and I looked at the studio and I said this is it, this is my life. And that’s all I’ve ever done."

Was working in TV a means to an end?
"The jobs I had, I was just totally excited. I’ll tell you actually. For me it started at the age of eight, or actually even earlier. I think I was four or five and I lived in a small town with my parents and they took me to the movies. This one time I saw something on the screen and I just started screaming and crying. I was three or four and my mother, she took me up to the fellow in the booth, the projectionist. You know, a small town, everybody knows everybody. I sat there excited and I still have this image in my mind. The film was going through the projector and it was warm, it was like being on a train, it’s got that sound. And that was it. As I got older - five or six or seven and eight - I would go to see every movie that played town. So since I was eight years old, all I wanted to do is make movies and be in Hollywood."

Did you want to write or direct or what?
"Just ‘make movies’ I guess. I always wanted to do everything. I worked in TV, I worked as a cameraman, I worked as a writer for news, then I got into writing and directing commercials and documentaries and so on. I was always a film-maker. Even now, I’m still doing some documentaries on my own, just to go inbetween the movie stuff. Basically, I can do almost every job on a movie set. For me, I just wanted everything. I just wanted to learn about every sort of job that was on a movie set. Except make-up, I was never interested in make-up! I didn’t care about make-up but for shooting and editing and all that stuff, I just loved it - and I still do."

So how did Ghostkeeper come together? Why was that the right film to make as your debut feature?
"I was working in commercials in the western part of Canada. I was doing it for three years and I just got tired, as I used to say, of selling toilet paper. Metaphorically speaking. I said that’s it, I’m quitting the commercials business and going to make a feature. I was one of the highest-paid guys in the western part of Canada and in three weeks I got a job as a PA on a movie. I was hauling out the empties for all the teachers. I wanted to learn. I would copy every piece of paper that I got my hands on: the scripts, the budgets, everything. And I just learned. A friend of mine in Calgary said let’s make a movie and his friend had a father who owned the hotel."

So the location came first?
"Well, yes. It was the location because we thought, ‘Boy, that’s a perfect place. It’s a spooky place. Right by the Chateau Lake Louise.' It’s an old hotel and it’s a really spooky hotel. It’s on its own. So we went out there and we thought about a story and it came sort of together. At that time there was a tax shelter going on in Canada. Alberta, being the centre of the oil industry for Canada, there was a lot of guys who had a lot of money. So we had six guys who wrote us cheques for about a hundred thousand each. The tax shelter meant that if it made no money, they had the write-off. It was common in Canada from ‘75 to ‘85 and we call those the tax shelter movies. Scanners, The Grey Fox, Porky’s: those were all made under that. Basically, it was commercially driven, whereas in Canada now it’s the government who drives film and the emphasis is more on culture than it is on commercialism."

So was the Canadian film industry very healthy at the time? Were there good prospects for Canadian movies to break out internationally?
"Eventually the thing that happened to the tax shelter, as with everything, is there were some lawyers and accountants who got a little greedy. So the government said right. You know, they raise a five million dollar movie and two million would be going to the accountants and lawyers. So the government said okay, that’s enough of this - and they closed it off. I don’t think it’s ever fully recovered because from ‘85 to now they just make these obscure movies about - well, the joke is the lesbian hunchback eskimo. Because it’s government now and it’s a bureaucracy. They’ve never made good movies since the tax shelter. Yes, there’s a handful and everybody points to Cronenberg. That last one he did with Viggo Mortensen, it’s not really a Canadian movie. He’s Canadian but it was shot in England and financed in England. Canadians say ‘Well, there’s a great Canadian movie,’ and I say, ‘It’s not a Canadian movie. It’s a British movie.’ But English Canada, they’re still trying to figure out whether they’re British or American. When it comes to French Canada, French Canada makes terrific movies, but that’s because they have a culture, they have a strong identity. For us, there’s French Canadians and English Canadians - and they can be Ukrainians or Chinese.

"But it was a time of tax shelters. There were guys on street corners with fliers for movies to invest in. People were investing, it was like a gold rush, so it was the perfect time. We got the money for it and we went and shot it. The biggest problem we had is halfway through, the producer that I had, he screwed up and we ran out of money. In the original script there was a lot more in the second half. We actually shot it in sequence. just because of coincidence it was all shot in sequence. All of a sudden, halfway through the creature, the producer came in and said, ‘You’ve got him for half a day.’ I said, ‘Half a day? What do you mean?’ Because he figured a lot more in the script but that’s all we got him for. So we took the poor guy, stuck him in the costume and we shot a whole bunch of angles with him - and that was about all we could do."

So that’s why you’ve got a monster movie with almost no monster in it.
"Exactly. They told us that the money is almost all gone. We had a choice of stopping the movie, pulling the plug and I said, ‘No way, we’ve gotten over half of it shot.’ So every day I made up the scene as we’re going along, which is not the way to make a movie. That’s what made it so uneven and without a terrific ending that we had hoped for. But the thing I wanted with Johnny Holbrook, who is a great cameraman, is to have a mood. A dark sort of mood, an ominous thing going on - and I think for the most part it works. The prints that got finished were so dark but the distributors, those guys, they don’t care at all."

When you were shooting it, were there any practical problems with the isolated location and all the deep snow?
"There wasn’t actually because it’s Lake Louise. In Alberta, that’s a ski town. So the highways were perfect, there was lots of hotels and motels and lots of snow. Anything we shot of the snow was actually about ten feet off the highway. We’d stop on the road and there’d be some snow and we’d tell the actor to walk in it. He’d walk back and forth and then we’d just move on. The hotel that we shot in was empty because it was never open in the winter time. There was no heat in it actually. We had these massive heaters about the size of torpedoes. Everybody had ski outfits on - ski pants and ski jackets - and everybody had burn holes in their ski pants and ski jackets from the heaters. Because you’d stand beside a heater and the outfit is nylon and the heaters were so hot they would melt the nylon as you had it on. That hurt! The actors were not the greatest, they were basically some people we knew from Calgary. And the story got kind of screwed up because of the money. So it’s an interesting failed attempt for me. It got me started in some ways. I got the feeling and the mood I wanted and it works in a theatre especially with a terrific print. It just gives you this sort of feeling that there’s nowhere to go. Actually all the snow that you see in the movie is real, even if it’s falling. That was all real. It was amazing because every time we had to shoot outside, it snowed."

How was Ghostkeeper distributed?
"We had a guy called Alex Nassis who was at that time what they called a sales agent and he sold it pretty much everywhere. I’ve got a poster from Mexico that’s really interesting. It has got il Diablo or something. The poster from England, I saw that. I got a copy of the movie on PAL and I looked at the poster and said, ‘Who thought of this?’ There’s palm trees and there’s some kind of creature that looks like a bird..."

That company, Apex Video, I think they just had a stock of weird paintings that had probably been done for paperbacks and they just picked one at random.
"I guess so. It was just amazing. But the American one from New World was actually pretty nice. It played nearly everywhere and we made a bit of money on it. It was shot on 35mm with an IA crew. The hardest part was for the guy who did the focus because those hallways were so dark and we shot so dark. At some points we were shooting 1.4 which means that the depth of field was half an inch. And then you have actors who are moving. The focus puller guy, we used to call him the Prince of Darkness. He would do it but it was by instinct because it was impossible for him to focus so he just calculated it in his mind."

Where did Ghostkeeper take you to professionally?
"Into the feature league, the feature business. Of course, by ‘85 the thing that happened is that the shelter stopped and the industry basically collapsed, which didn’t help me at all. Because all of a sudden there was nothing in Canada. There was nothing for about five years and then these American TV shows like Friday the 13th and The Twilight Zone - I always call them third-rate American shows, they go into syndication - they started up and that started the business once more. But by that time I was out of it and had moved to Toronto and then was a starving artist for a couple of years, and then just decided to come to Los Angeles."

When you got to LA, did you find there were writing gigs for you?
"There’s a script that I wrote in ‘89 called Emperor of Mars and we’re hoping to shoot it in the next couple of years if not next year. It got me into meetings with everybody. It’s kind of like Bridge to Terabithia. I had an agent in LA before I came to LA so it was pretty easy. Then I did a bunch of movies for Paramount and some Highlander shows and then of course they hired me in Canada. It’s the old: if he’s working in LA, he’s got to be good. But if he’s from Canada, he can’t be great. It’s this Canadian thing we have of making sure that we don’t get too much of an ego."

Did you find that anyone you were dealing with had seen Ghostkeeper?
"No really, no. It was pretty much off the radar at that point."

Why did you concentrate on writing? Did you want to do that more than directing?
"I got tired of working for 14 hours a day for a while and it just came easier to me. People talk to me about talent and things and I say, ‘Well, I don’t think I have talent, I just think I’m stubborn.’ It took me a long time to learn how to write something that’s good. In Canada I’m sort of known as a director but by the time I got to the States it was a more of a writer. So I was always holding off this Emperor of Mars. This is the seventh time it’s been up."

So on your seventh attempt, twenty years after you wrote it, why are you confident you’re going to get it made now?
"I’m not that confident! At this point I have some producers in Canada who have made about 38 movies. It sort of fell through from this American who was supposed to finance it. I guess that you just have to be confident. It seems like the right combination of people. It seems like the right timing and everything else. It’s intuition but at the same time I’m not excited. My friend said, ‘Are you excited?' I said, ‘I’ll be excited when there’s a cheque that clears.’ Because I’ve been in the business for thirty years. It seems like this is the best scenario I’ve had. At this point I’m beginning to be apprehensive about this happening in October but these two guys from Alberta, they have done this in the past. There’s a trick to financing movies in Canada; I guess maybe it’s a bit like England. Because there’s all these government agencies you have to go through and broadcasting agencies and things. It’s a paper maze, you get lots of paper - and they know how to do it, probably better than a whole bunch of people up there. So I’m not sure. I’m not buying any kind of a house on the possibility of an income from it but I think it’s the right combination of people.

"Also, I’m working on a whole lot of stuff. The secret for me is always to have at least four or five things in the air at the same time. It’s one thing that I learned from working as a writer. There are people who write A Script and they hang on to it. They wait and they wait and they send it out and they wait and they wait. I’m always working on about four or five things. Right now I’ve got a movie that might be going with the people at Nu Image. It’s called Deadhead. It’s about an old aeroplane that’s returning and all of a sudden it’s taken off course and starts heading towards the northern part of the Pacific. There’s an alien virus on board. It was inspired by this movie, I don’t remember the name, this movie was made in I think Yugoslavia with Telly Savalas on a train."

Horror Express.
"Yes, I saw that and I thought, ‘This is a great idea.’ Except that I put it on an aeroplane. I’ll be honest - I stole the idea!"

Do you like making and watching horror and fantasy stuff?
"Yes, I like both. There’s a lot of reading I do. This movie I did on Roswell, it’s kind of a Roswell movie. The people from Paramount, they changed it a whole lot, but I went out to Roswell and I hung out there for a week. I just spoke to people. And I’m a sceptic, you know. I don’t think there’s aliens. If there’s one that shows up on CNN, I’ll believe it. But at the same time, a sceptic is probably the person who will write a story that’s good. Ever since I was a kid, I was always interested in sci-fi because of all the potential for all the worlds that you can create. There’s a movie I’ve been trying to get off the ground for years called Anyone Else That’s Like Me. The author Walter Miller wrote a classic book..."

A Canticle for Leibowitz.
"Phil Borsos and I were friends until he passed away. He actually bought the book and was planning on making it just before he died. And there’s another story from Miller, this one, that I’ve had for twenty years. I’m just arguing with this agent in New York who’s very old now and I hope he goes soon because he’s so stubborn. So I’ve got that story and there’s a director called David Winning who I’m going to see tomorrow. He was actually my protégé in Calgary. He was this kid who would hang around my office all the time. He’d bring me stories all the time: ‘No, that’s no good... That’s no good...’ Him and I are still friends, we’re going for lunch tomorrow and he has bought a script of mine. I squeezed some money out of him. I said, ‘I can give this to you as a friend but I think that you should pay money. It’s more of a commitment.’

"So he said okay. It’s called Beneath, about a Russian submarine that sinks in the Pacific. It’s based on a true story. I don’t know if you remember, in the ‘70s, there was a story about this Russian sub that sank. The Americans they disguised a freighter, hollowed out the inside, they went over to where the Russian sub was and inside was a huge crane. Their intent was to hook it up and pull it up. So I took that story and added an experiment on humans to turn them into aquanauts. And of course the experiment goes wrong so there’s the Americans that go into the ocean and they go down to the submarine, they enter it but they realise they’re not alone. So I seem to like those kind of stories."

What is the state of play of Ghostkeeper in terms of rights? How likely are we to see a special edition DVD?
"Actually, somebody told me that what I’ve got to do is get it out again and then do the sequel. I said, ‘I don’t have a sequel,’ and they said, ‘Who cares?”"

Well, then do a remake.
"I would like to do the movie it should have been, with my experience now. I talked with the investors in Calgary. Because the thing I’m trying to do is release it to people over here like Netflix and give them a print that’s good, as opposed to that horrible print that they have now. Even the one that somebody from England has uploaded, it’s like magenta. It’s really awful. I don’t mind that somebody’s taken it, I just wish it was a good print. So there’s a strong chance that something is going to happen again, just because it’s there. I’ve still got the original script somewhere. That’s one of the projects that’s on the board."

It could have a whole new lease of life if you can get a decent print onto DVD.
"I think so too. It’s not that hard. I’ve got a print on 3/4” and they took it into one of the labs here. They stuck it on one of their machines and played with their little scopes and things - and it looked beautiful. It looked amazing and this is just off a 3/4”. I have a print in 35mm and a print in 16mm so it certainly is possible. It’s something we’ve been talking about for a couple of months. I’ve just spoken to some people from Netflix so I’ll see what they say. If they show an interest then I will certainly go to the guys at the lab there, see what kind of deal I can make. The problem is that very few people among the investors have contracts any more so there’ll be some arguments, as there always is.

"One thing that I don’t think you mentioned in your review was the guy who actually edited Ghostkeeper, who was Stan Cole. And Stan Cole was arguably one of the best editors in Canada. He did all the movies for Bob Clark; Murder by Decree he cut and the famous Christmas one with Darren McGavin. He was probably the most experienced one on the crew and he was hard as hell to work with but he taught me a lot. For Emperor of Mars, he’s the editor I’d like to use. He’s in his seventies now but I told the producers, ‘For an editor, I want somebody who’s under thirty or somebody who’s over seventy.’ Those are the two most interesting people around. Somebody in their forties - I don’t want to see them any more. Some hot kid who’s got some crazy ideas or somebody who’s seventy who’s so smooth that they can make it just look like silk."

Chris Manabe is one of a new breed of hot young visual effects artists in Hollywood, having grown up with 3-D animation and knowing exactly how to use it to best effect. I first came across Chris’ work in the movie Spiders 2, for which he animated some of the titular oversize arachnids, and in April 2002 Chris kindly granted me this e-mail interview.

How did you get started in visual effects/animation?
“From a very young age I've always known that I wanted to work on visual effects for TV and films, whether it be make-up effects, practical effects, matte painting, or anything visual. At age 15 I got an Amiga 500 for Christmas and it came bundled with software that included Agesis VectorScape 3-D which was my first experience with a 3-D package; it later became Lightwave 3-D. I upgraded from the Amiga 500 to a 2000 and eventually to a 4000, learning all the paint and animation software available for it (Lightwave, Imagine, Deluxe Paint, etc...).

“When I graduated high school, 3-D animation was not really being offered in any real programs for college but I knew (especially after Tron) that 3-D artistry was my calling. So I got a job at a company called Color Systems Technologies and coloured black and white movies and did colour effects for commercials and TV shows. Although they paid very cheaply, working there was a great break for me because it gave me experience in working with SGI computers and helped me to gain a basic understanding of Irix, not to mention getting to work on some popular shows at the time (Star Trek: The Next Generation, Green Day music videos, and a show called VR.5). While working at CST, I was always developing both my artistic ability and 3-D animation skills. After CST, I started landing jobs as a cartoon colourist and landed a job at a company in Hollywood called US Animation (now Virtual Magic in North Hollywood) using their software of the same name.

"Eventually I landed a job at Creative Capers, which was awesome because there, with two others (Jeff Vacanti and Paul Grant), we started a 2-D cartoon ink-and-paint and compositing department. What a great experience! Capers gave me an opportunity to use my 3-D knowledge for some projects they had been working on, also the use of their equipment. I made my first real demo reel at Capers and with it landed a job at Foundation Imaging! Working at a place like Foundation you start to make connections for other work; hence landing the Spiders 2 job through my friend David Matherly who introduced me to Scott Coulter, the effects supervisor for that film.”

How does one go about animating something as complex (and icky!) as a spider?
“The spiders were rigged so that when you move the spider forward the legs would walk, but for just about every shot I worked on, this was not useful. For a standard walk it was fine but if the spider had to do something special, like climb on top of a freighter, then I had to animate each leg separately. I tried to keep in mind that an eight leg walk is similar to four bipedal walks tied together and then offset, so if the front right leg moves forward the next biped left leg follows, and also that the spiders forward push starts from the back legs, sort of like a quadruped or four-legged animal, minus the waist movements.”

What particular problems did Spiders 2 present, and how happy were Nu Image with your work?
“We had Joe Alter's hair plug-in ‘Shave and a Haircut’ on every spider. So we had to make sure the spiders’ hair was applied properly. If we changed the size of the spiders many times we'd have to adjust the ‘Shave’ hair. Eventually, if I couldn't get it to look right, I just sent it to David Matherly (‘Shave and a Haircut’ guru!) to fix. Talking to Scott Coulter and David Matherly, I know that Nu Image Films were very pleased with my work.”

What are the differences/similarities between animation and motion capture work (Roughnecks Chronicles, Dan Dare, etc)?
“Personally, I don't think there is much that is similar between motion capture and hand key animation. Motion capture is fantastic for realistic motion for humans or animals. It takes a lot of work for an animator to try and mimic a realistic movement, say a human walk; many times the animator wants to exaggerate the movement to bring out character in the walk, but realistic movement is more subtle. Also, even though you're using motion capture, you have to clean up the motion capture data and make sure the tweaks you make complement the motion and don't look unnatural. You need a good eye for realistic motion and movement.

“In hand keyed animation there's a lot more freedom in what you can do with motion. First of all, you have to animate to the style of what you’re working on, but if the style is loose then the chances are your animation can be loose. Then you’ve got to take into consideration what are you animating: a small, fast moving character or a large, slow one? I really enjoy hand key animation and in my opinion it takes more talent to hand key animation than it does to clean up motion capture. In animation you’re able to bring a character to life not just by making the character walk but by making it walk with its own personality. Also, in cartoon animation you’re not limited by nature’s laws of physics and exaggeration is not only acceptable but in most cases expected, in order to make it exciting to watch. With this type of animation you need to have a strong understanding of 2-D animation principals (anticipation, exaggeration, squash and stretch, arc of motion, secondary animation, etc...).”

Tell me about your personal project, The Demon Within.
“The Demon Within is a personal project that I wanted to do so I could learn more about the live action effects process. I'm a strong believer in doing personal projects in order to not only learn how to use new software, but to discipline yourself in the art. Also I like horror films so this is a sort of tribute to them. The best way to learn how to do something is to do it hands on. After working on Spiders 2, in which I did eight effects shots, none of which required any real 3-D camera reconstruction, I wanted to get deeper into the whole production process.

“I have to say, even though The Demon Within didn't come out the way I really wanted it to, it taught me so much on the importance of every step in the production process. I shot the footage on a cheap 8mm video camera which was a mistake because of the poor quality of it. At least I was still somehow able to use MatchMover 1.0 software to reconstruct 3-D camera data, and it was cool using that software for my first attempt at it. Finally, the modelling of me is not accurate, and I realise that the reason for this is because the pictures I used were not lined up correctly. I should have eyed it more closely; I feel I'm a better modeller then that. But here is what I mean about doing it to learn - after working on this project, my next one will be that much better.”

What projects are you working on now, or have you got lined up for the future?
“It seems lately that with many run-away productions leaving Hollywood, I'm doing anything and everything I can to get by. I want to move onto more higher-end productions, so I'm now working on a new project involving Maya 4 Unlimited. The project itself will involve a basketball character, will be an entirely 3-D production, and will have over 30 shots. From the looks of how things are going so far, it will be my best work yet. It should be done in a few months and that's all I'll say about it for now.”

website: www.cramsite.com
interview originally posted before November 2004

Alan Marques was Digital Effects Supervisor on Strange. I met him when I went on set in October 2002, when a scene was being shot involving a giant, demonic tree inside a house.

What does your role as Digital Effects Supervisor entail?
"I’m basically looking after all of the computer graphics and the post production for the whole series."

How does your work integrate with the on-set effects like this tree demon?
"As you’ve probably noticed, they’ve got puppeteers wearing green costumes, and also the animatronics are controlled by poles which have been painted green that are being operated by those puppeteers. So basically what we’re doing is we’re using that green colour to remove the puppeteers from the environment that they’re in. So for every shoot that we do, we have a clean background plate that we shoot afterwards which has nobody in the shot. We’re able then to use that green colour to remove them completely through the clear plate. In addition to that, there’s stuff we’re adding in post-production that you won’t see today, which is we’re adding actual tree roots that are growing out of the floorboards in the shot. So those are going to be on top of the shot to give it a bit of life. So there will also be things growing up around the camera and stuff like that - that’s computer-generated."

Do you and Neill Gorton’s team have to work together?
"Yes, we do. We go up and take lots and lots of reference photographs of the animatronic under construction, so we know what its surface textures are like. And I’ve taken lots and lots of reference photographs today. So yes, we do it in conjunction because when we come to our side we need to make sure that our CGI elements look the same, so we need as much reference as possible for that."

What attracted you to working on this show?
"The subject matter and the fact that the writing’s really good. Obviously Andrew Marshall has a good reputation, and when I read the script I thought, ‘Great, these are absolutely brilliant scripts.’ I see lots of scripts in my time, and these ones I really like. So I think that was what really got me - as soon as I saw the scripts I said, ‘We’ve got to do this show’."

When you’re reading a script and get to an effects sequence, do you immediately start thinking, ‘Oh, I could see how that would work.’ and start working it out?
"You can do, but typically you do it in conjunction with the director. Our first move was to have a meeting with the director who had already actually done some storyboards for the script. He has a vision and our job is to try and get his vision. You can read in a script what’s going on, but what you don’t know is how many cuts he’s going to use and from what angle. And from our point of view, that’s the important bit: we need to know what angle he’s shooting from, and how to achieve the effect from that camera angle. So basically it’s a combination, but typically we’re working with the director and his vision of the script."

Apart from helping with the tree here, what other effects are you doing?
"Quite a wide range. We have a number of big green-screen shoots. There’s a sequence which takes place on a London bus at night, as it’s travelling fast along a road. That’s all going to be shot inside on a green-screen stage and the backplates for that are being shot elsewhere. We also have an episode with a thing called the Death Coach which has to explode through a wall, from Hell. So it has to come out of this wall and the burning fires of Hell are behind it. It comes into this courtyard and basically the whole sequence takes place using a lot of green-screen and computer graphics to help that sequence be really dynamic.

"With this sequence there‘s going to be a lot of flames in the room but they can’t actually have flames in the room apart from a small flame-fork. So we’re going to be adding a whole load of extra flames in post-production from library footage. And also we have to make the tree creature burn but we can’t really burn it because it’s made of rubber. So we’re going to be adding flames on top of the tree and that will be done completely in post-production. We’re getting these lighting effects on it to make it look like it’s on fire, then we’ll work on it in post-production."

Are there CGI creatures?
"No, there aren’t - and the reason for that is cost. These budgets aren’t great and we’re basically set up to try and be as creative as possible. So the idea on the show is to do as much in camera as possible - Neill Gorton’s work. To actually build the creatures as much as possible, and where they need augmenting, then my side will augment them and actually add things to them. With this tree creature we’re adding branches that are digital. So that’s kind of the way we’re going with this show, simply because to build CG creatures takes a lot of time, and these shows are being turned round really rapidly. We have to do an entire episode in ten days, so that’s a very fast turnaround. Although we’re preparing for it upfront with a lot of planning, that’s still quite a tight turnaround and we have to work with that. Ten days to do the post-production for each episode - that’s enough time for us to do all our effects, to do our green-screen composites and remove the puppeteers from those shots."

Neill was saying it’s more like a film than TV work. Do you find that?
"Yes, absolutely. What they’re trying to achieve is quite wide-ranging, so yes."

Did you work on the pilot?
"No. This is probably the first major TV project we’ve worked on because my company’s fairly new, but I’ve worked on about 14 features over the years in various capacities, things like GoldenEye and Lost in Space. So I’ve worked on quite a wide range. My company’s been set up to try and help facilitate smaller productions who can’t afford big effects houses. We’re set up as a very different kind of business, one that allows us to produce this type of work very cost-effectively, and that’s why we’re able to work on shows like this."

Do you start work as soon as the rushes are through or do you wait until the whole episode is in the can?
"It’s a bit of both. Key sequences we’re given early because we need them as soon as possible. But typically, once the main cut’s done, we’ll be given the effects rolls to work on and we’ll have that ten-day period. But stuff that’s quite tricky to do, we’re going to be given specific shots early so we’ll have plenty of time to crack some of the more difficult sequences. This one today, for example, is probably one of the trickiest things. Removing the puppeteers is quite difficult. You have to have a clean background plate behind them, and sometimes, because the creature’s already in the shot, it’s very difficult to keep the shot clear. So there’s probably going to be a lot of paint work and retouch work.”

Andrew Marshall, in partnership with David Renwick, wrote The Burkiss Way, Whoops Apocalypse (TV series and film) and Hot Metal, then wrote 2.4 Children solo. In March 2002 I contacted him just as the pilot for his fantasy series Strange was about to air. (In April 2003, a few weeks before the full series of Strange was broadcast, I spoke with Andrew again.)

What can you tell me about Strange?
“Strange stars Richard Coyle as John Strange, a former priest who is engaged in seeking out demons in human form in a dark, unnamed cathedral town in England, aided by Samantha Janus as Jude Atkins, a nurse in the City Hospital. She has a sceptical boyfriend (Alastair Mackenzie) who tries to persuade her that she is engaging forces too dangerous to contemplate, and the investigation is hampered by the destruction of evidence by Cathedral Official Canon Black (Ian Richardson) who seems to be following a mysterious agenda of his own...

“Joe Ahearne (Ultraviolet) directs, Marcus Mortimer produces, I am the writer/exec producer, digital effects are by Framestore, and the music composed by Dan Jones (Shadow of the Vampire) is played by the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra.”

The male/female, sceptic/believer set-up may make some people see this as an attempt to emulate Buffy the Vampire Slayer. How would you respond to that?
“The show began development in excess of three years ago, and I can say with my hand on the Holy Bible that I have never seen an episode of Buffy. I did see the movie some time ago, but didn't think much of it, so never switched on the series... then when I started doing this, I made a point not to start watching in case it distracted me. So, you see, I have no idea how it compares in any way."

The show is set to air straight after Casualty, which is a very different sort of show. Are you happy with that slot?
“I see no reason why the Casualty audience shouldn't also enjoy this - which is simply an attempt on my part to write something in a more filmic style of dramatic entertainment than is usual on TV. The unusual mix of elements, which reflect everything I like to watch myself when out for an evening of fun, is reflected in the co-production of the series between Entertainment and Drama. This is also the parentage of Jonathan Creek but, as you will see, this is a very different type of thing altogether.

“Having said that, I very much hope science fiction and fantasy fans will not be disappointed, and, in order to say hello to them, there is a small greeting in each episode for the fans of a certain show. They will know who they are."

interview originally posted before November 2004

A few weeks before the first series of Strange was due to start in May 2003, and just over a year since we first spoke about the show, Andrew Marshall gave me a few updates on how he felt the BBC’s only non-sitcom fantasy series was shaping up.

What are your thoughts on the work of Neill Gorton (visual effects) and Alan Marques (digital effects) and how well they have brought your ideas to life?
“Starting with the premise that anything is possible if you have enough money to spend on it, and the restriction that we only have a certain amount of money - only fantastic talent will yield the results. I think we are more than fortunate to have Neill and Alan as collaborators. I would like to also mentioning the other creative collaborators who make Strange what it is, namely production designer Tom Brown, photographer Paul Bond, costume designer Hazel Pethig, make-up designer Jan Sewell and composer Dan Jones. All of these people contribute to every effect you see in their own way.”

What's your favourite special effect in the series?
“It's difficult to single out any particular effect because, if they're working properly, they're totally integrated in the action, and don't really stand out as effects in themselves; for example the climax inside the bus in one episode was shot with green screen outside the windows and, as finished, simply looks like a moving bus - even though many hours of work by Alan went into it.

“Neill's prosthetics for the aged Jude in Episode One (together with Jan Sewell's special ‘aged eyes’ lenses) were utterly convincing. Sam let me touch her ‘80-year-old’ neck which even felt real. The ‘sewn together’ body which Neill made for an actor to wear in Episode Two was utterly horrifying in the flesh (or rather foam). We had an interesting debate as to whether we could show him naked - after all we'd only be showing plastic naughty bits not the real thing - but modesty prevailed on that one. And the incubi that Neill made for Episode Four were incredible little creatures; strangely, all the girls on the set wanted to be photographed cuddling one - I don't know what that tells you about our crew...

“Alan's rendition (or is it Renderman's?) of the Death Coach's arrival in Episode Three is a stunning moment, fantastically enhanced by Dan Jones' music, as are his terrifying flying scalpels in Episode Four. Often there are combinations of the two masters: Neill's ‘sword pops out of a hand’ effect with Alan's ‘glow and heat haze’ effect in Episode Two, and of course the famous ‘vampire tree’ – built by Neill, using Alan's operator-erasing tricks and an extra CGI branch.”

How have the performances of Richard Coyle and Samantha Janus added to and informed the characters that you created?
“It's particularly difficult for an actor to construct depth working from what are, to a certain extent, legendary characters. I think we have in Richard and Sam characterisations of great solidity and detail. There are suggestions of multifaceted people who have real feelings and different moods and thoughts from one scene to the next. Also the relationship they have created between the two main characters, being an unusual one, is delightful. Like a swan paddling beneath the surface, they both do an enormous amount of work on their personas of which you only see a small glimpse in the actual scene and I'm constantly impressed at the results.”

What are the prospects for a second series, in terms of both (a) the BBC, and (b) the characters?
“The prospect of the series continuing is, as always, in the hands of the viewing public, but I think there is a great deal left to explore.”

After I reviewed their debut feature Unhappy Birthday in October 2011, the writing/directing duo of Mike Matthews (left) and Mark Harriott (right) kindly answered a few questions by e-mail.

How do the two of you share out the work as co-writers and co-directors?
“We knew we wanted to make a psychological thriller when we visited Lindisfarne island. Then Mark's sister offered us the Market Cross B&B and Kyle Hall locations. With this in mind, we spent a month or so on pre-writing and ideas. We went to Dubai and wrote (ironically) in the sunshine, not the cold, rainy North-East. We sat down and kept all our best ideas, re-writing script versions together, sometimes arguing (healthily and spirited, obviously) but generally picking the best plot lines. Mark pushed the the sexy and explicit scenes more as Mike worked on the character studies and development.

“On set we only had a week and Mike had worked with the DOP Mark Hammond previously so Mike concentrated on the camera aesthetic while Mark worked more with the actors focussing on the performances.”

To what extent is this a 'gay film' and to what extent a 'horror film', and what sort of balance were you seeking to achieve between the two?
“Unhappy Birthday was always meant to be a horror/thriller but there has always been a tradition of queerness in horrors from Bride of Frankenstein to many classic vampire films. Instead of the gay characters being these clichéed characters of horror yore we thought we'd update them and make them three-dimensional characters.

“Amen island was always meant to be the opposite to Summerisle in The Wicker Man, being an overtly religious island - Amen would have revolted against an out gay, a bi man and a threeway sexual relationship with a sexually experimental female, so it fitted into our story so well. We used their sexuality to bring more depth and horror into the film, what could be worse than having to breed the next generation of Amen islanders using the sperm of a raped gay man! We thought the irony of this would serve the film well so the ideas of a gay sub plot and a horror worked in tandem.”

How close is the finished film to what you originally set out to achieve?
“As our budget was so tiny (£5K) we wrote this with no budget in mind. We did have to leave out a lovely spooky scene in the local shop which was upsetting and we also had to cut out some dialogue which didn't work as we only had two takes max on each scene. We also had to shoot the final scene of crucifixion and castration on the field in 10 minutes as we lost our light which was a pity, so there were some changes we had to deal with. We discuss this in more depth in our featurette The Making of Unhappy Birthday on the DVD. On the whole, as it was shot in a week, we were so happy by the result.”

How did you assemble your cast and crew?
“Christina De Vallee, Jon Keane and Jill Riddiford were actor friends of ours and we based the characters around what they would be capable of. David Paisley is a great TV actor so we were delighted he said yes after reading the script. The crew was brought together from teams we worked with in both of our general TV directing work. Everyone worked for free and each person has a percentage stake in the film and spared their own time to work on something slightly more ambitious.”

How has the film been received so far and what sort of audience mix is it attracting?
“We have had some amazing screenings at the BFI Southbank, Apollo Haymarket , Tyneside cinema and regional filmhouses in the UK. It's difficult to know who the audience is made up of. In the USA we have played in San Francisco, Seattle and more festival screening announced on Facebook, and Wolfe Releasing are launching the DVD for Halloween. Other countries around the world are screening the film such as Scandinavia (Copenhagen), Africa, Canada and a long list of others coming up soon. We would like to think the audience is made up queer film buffs and horror lovers!”

What are your plans for the future?
“We have interest from Italy and France for distribution so we hope that this will come to fruition and we continue to have cinema screenings in the UK which can be seen on our Facebook pages. The film is being released in the UK on DVD by Peccadillo and in USA by Wolfe. We are staunch horror lovers and we intend to make another horror in the future but are currently developing a romcom! Quite the opposite!”

(Supplementary question for Mark) For all the British horror completists out there, can you tell me a bit about the Jack the Ripper sequence in Secret Diary of a Shemale and any other horror-related pornos you've made?
“I shot the Jack The Ripper scene in Secret Diary of a Shemale (available to download on the Television X website) in Shoreditch with the help of horror maestro David McGillivray. It was a funny shoot as Alekssandra my lead was walking through the streets at night in just nipple tassles and a rubber cape. Lots of guys tried chatting her up, one even lit up the scene using his car lights in return for her card (he probably didn’t realise she was a chick with a dick!).

“The sex scene was between Starr and a German trans performer. We shot the interior above a tranny club in Walthamstow. I liked the idea of the ghosts of Jack the Ripper victims finding solace in their deaths by having sex they wanted with one another and enjoying it rather than doing it for money. In the scene Starr (a biological female) discovers her working girl colleague has a cock under her dress. She loves the sensuality of this discovery and they had a fantastic fucking scene together. I liked to think that there might have been many men that dragged up as female prostitutes in the Ripper days to make some money, fooling their clients...lol!!!

“I've also directed Fang Bang for Television X, which is a horror spoof of True Blood. It’s probably my favourite series for TVX. It even has a scene where a vampire bride (Stacey Lacey) is fucked by her creator (Johnny Cockfill) on a coffin and inside is her dead husband whom she has just fucked then drank his blood dry. Check it out...hardcore horror, werewolves and vampires!!!”

Though you probably won’t recognise his name, Paul Matthews is one of the most prolific British makers of B-movies. His company PeakViewing Transatlantic has made more than 20 films since 1992, often directed by Paul, usually produced by Paul and his sister Liz. I got quite friendly with the PeakViewing team during my time on SFX and visited two of their shoots: Rampage on the Isle of Man (which was released as Breeders) and Beings in South Africa (which was released as The Fairy King of Ar). PeakViewing films have starred such notable names as Ron Perlman, Robert Vaughan, Malcolm McDowell, Corbin Bernsen, Justin Whalin, Judge Reinhold, Patrick Bergin, Rik Mayall, Tia Carrere, Adrian Paul, David Warner, James Coburn, Edward Woodward, Jurgen Prochnow and Martin Sheen. Not bad for a company based in an end of terrace house just outside Cheltenham, which is where I interviewed Paul Matthews in February 1997.

Let's start with your background. Was your first film The Christmas Stallion in 1992?
"The Christmas Stallion, which we did in Welsh and English - we made two films at the same time. Basically, I had an idea for a film about a wicked land-developer, a 16-year-old girl and horses. It's just a family movie for Christmas really. Liz at the time was running a distribution company called Consolidated and they were working with S4C. They wanted some ideas, so I just gave them that as an idea, then wrote the script. Luckily they liked it, and we made the film."

What was your background before that?
"Before that I was in the building trade. I was a concrete welder. Nothing to do with films at all."

Did that give you the finances to set yourself up doing these things?
"Not really. Mostly it was Liz's idea to set up the company and go it alone. It didn't take a lot of money to set it up, really. Since then we've just built it up. After making one film we've made the next and then the next and the next."

So each one finances the next one?
"Exactly, yes. Well, it keeps the company going, it keeps us going, and then we make another one."

I understand there are five siblings running PeakViewing.
"I'm President of the company, Liz is Chief Executive, Veronica's Financial Control, Janet is Head of Sales, Peter's Head of Post-Production and Production basically and does the editing."

Is there an advantage to all being a family working together on these films?
"Very much so actually, yes. Because it's working with people that you know, that you trust absolutely. We're all on the same wavelength, which is good. And we all have our individual areas of expertise that we bring to production. Our brother-in-law as well worked on the films. He's Construction Manager on Rampage; he did location work on a couple of the others. So it works very well."

How many films have you made so far?
"This is the tenth or eleventh. I think it's the tenth, if you count the Welsh and English versions of some of the movies that we do, then this is the tenth."

Are the Welsh/English things shot like the Spanish version of Dracula? Do you shoot one thing then shoot it again?
"What we do is a take in English, and then a take in Welsh."

With the same cast?
"We did on two movies. Then on the third one we actually had a different cast. So we had Patrick Bergin and Teresa Russell in the English version, and we had Nicola Beddow and Anurein Hughes in the Welsh version. That was The Proposition, a historic drama about drovers in the 1790s."

Why have you gone from doing family and historical things to monster movies?
"Really, we started off doing a family Christmas movie; then we did two westerns; then we did another family movie; then we did Grim; then we did Proposition which was a historical drama. And now we're doing Rampage. So we've done family movies, we've done historical drama, we've done sci-fi, we've done horror, we've done westerns."

Which are proving the most popular or working best?
"The action-oriented movies sell easiest because that's what sells. American-style action movies sell relatively easily. You don't have to be Brain of anywhere to watch them. Which is great. They're pure escapism, which is what I like. I don't like to sit there and be preached at when I watch a film. I like to sit there and just forget about my troubles and watch it as a movie. That's what I like to do."

Do you write and direct all of them?
"I've written all of them; I've written and directed two of them. So more and more directing, yes. But I used to just write the scripts and then produce with Liz."

Have any of your films had theatrical distribution?
"Not so far, no."[Merlin: The Return was released to British cinemas in 2000 - MJS]

Is that a pain?
"It is a pain. The westerns went out on video in the UK: Trigger Fast and Rebel Rousers. But that's all that's been released in the UK at the moment. The Christmas family movies that we did, Christmas Stallion and Christmas Reunion, have been on BSkyB and Channel Four for the last few years every Christmas. So that's quite nice, to see them on TV."

Does your stuff sell well abroad?
"It does actually, it sells very well. Because we try to go for a good cast, a good quality movie with a fair amount of action in it, and a good story as well."

Liz said you were considering setting up your own video label to distribute your stuff.
"Yes, we'd like to. Because at the end of the day, if nobody else in the UK wants to take the films out on video or in the cinema then we'll do it ourselves. If we have to do it ourselves, then we'll do it ourselves."

What was the genesis of Rampage?
"Basically, what we try to do is make films that have a commercial value, and other people want to invest in. Because if nobody in the industry wants to invest in a movie then you can bet your bottom dollar that it's not worth making because it means you can't sell it. We have a number of partners in America that we make movies with. We know what they want to buy, and we know what the foreign buyers want to buy. So therefore what we do is try and tailor-make our films to fit in with that. And a sci-fi action movie sells well. It sells well in the American market and in the foreign market. So it seemed the logical thing to do. So I just wrote the script based around what I thought would work."

Rampage was originally announced as Grim 2.
"It was, simply because Grim did quite well in the States, and it also did quite well in the foreign market place. But in the end what I decided to do was actually get away from Grim and go for a different type of alien, a different type of monster if you like."

How different is the storyline?
"Vastly different. Grim is definitely a horror genre movie, whereas this is more sci-fi/action-orientated."

Is this setting itself up for Rampage 2?
"Possibly, possibly. But at the end of this one we've got more meteorites heading toward Earth bringing more monsters, so we'd have to have a lot more aliens and a lot more action and a lot more money and all that sort of stuff."

Is Rampage still a working title?
"Yes, it is. It will probably change. I'm not quite sure what it will change to yet, but it will probably change." [The title was changed to Deadly Instincts and then to Breeders - MJS]

Are you going to be showing it at Cannes?
"Hopefully we'll be showing it at Cannes, yes. It depends: if we can get it finished in time we'd like to show it at Cannes."

Why did you choose the cast you went for?
"Basically we chose Samantha Janus because she really fitted the role. She's very athletic, she looks the part. She looks like an American blue-eyed blonde, which is great. Also she's very easy to work with, very professional. She has a great attitude towards making films, and she really wanted to do it. And she's a very good actress as well. So we were very lucky that she agreed to do this."

Does the name value help?
"It does in the UK. In America, not quite as much obviously. But I think Sam will definitely be a big name in the States in a couple of years time."

Was Todd Jensen cast to give it an American hook?
"We cast Todd to get an authentic American in the lead. But also we've worked with Todd before in the westerns. We know Todd and we get on very well. But he also brings that square, clean-cut American look to it. He's also a very, very good actor that's done a lot of roles. He's done a lot of these action movies. He's somebody that I think is just about to break out in quite a big way. So Todd was a good choice for us."

What about Oliver Tobias?
"Well, to be honest, we were looking for someone to give the part more backbone, some sort of presence. We wanted somebody who was well-established, had that presence on screen. We were running through it and I'd seen Oliver on TV in The Knock, and it occurred to me that: yes, why not? He's really good. Again, he's a nice chap and he's easy to work with. And he brings a distinguished air to the role, which is great. And he did it really well."

Did you audition or screen-test?
"We did for the minor parts. Kadamba Simmons we've worked with before. Kadamba is one of these actresses that puts up with being wet, puts up with being dragged around in the dirt and all this sort of stuff, without complaining and moaning and groaning. She turns up for work in the morning and she does a great job. She's very photogenic: the camera likes her. And she's a very good actress. So we'd like to use Kadamba again because obviously she's easy to work with. Very much similar to Sam: very professional attitude. A lot of the rest of the cast are Welsh actors that we've worked with before, that we know. They're good, solid professional actors that have a lot of screen presence and bring the whole thing to light."

Weren't you originally going to shoot this in Wales?
"We were originally going to shoot it in Wales, but then we switched to the Isle of Man for financial reasons."

Presumably they must be good financial reasons, because it was bitterly cold up there.
"Well, it's not a lot warmer in Wales! The Isle of Man run a very good scheme to encourage films to go to the Isle of Man. They go out of their way to make you feel welcome and they make it very easy for you to go there and shoot. It's quite a complicated paperwork trail to get everything signed and sealed but once you've done that then it's a great place to go and make a film. As I say, the whole of the island seems to make you feel welcome and go out of their way to welcome you. It's very good."

Did you do a location scout out there?
"Yes, we went out there, did a location recce and what have you and then I adapted the script to what I found in the Isle of Man, so that we knew we could make it work in the Isle of Man."

Did you finish the shoot on schedule?
"Yes. We only shot for four weeks, 24 days: four six-day weeks. Which is very tight for an action, sci-fi, animatronic film. So we had to be well-organised and what have you. It was tight but we just about achieved it."

Was everybody happy with what they produced over those four weeks?
"I think so, yes. I think everybody pitched in. We had an excellent crew from the designer, the first AD, to the camera crew, the sparks, everybody worked really hard to make the whole thing work. It was because of their expertise and working as a team that we got it done in the four weeks."

Had you worked with many of them before?
"Yes, we'd worked with most of them before. They're people that we've worked with before and want to work with again because they're among the best people in the country to get a film like this made on time, on budget. And excellent quality."

Were you pleased with the monster suit?
"Very much so. It was Gorton and Painter effects that did the monster for us. They did Grim for us eighteen months ago. It was brilliant, it worked really well. And Clifton who played the monster did an excellent job. Put up with wearing that suit all day long and he did really well."

That must have been a tricky role to cast.
"It is hard to cast a monster. At the end of the day, you can ask someone to come in but you can't give him a script to read and lines to say and what have you. You can ask them to walk up and down a couple of times and growl I suppose but that doesn't really work. Basically what I did was auditioned quite a few people: actors like Clifton, dancers, what have you. We were looking for someone who was fairly tall but also athletic so that they could move well. Clifton fitted the bill because he's an athletic individual; he's tall but he's also a dancer so he knows how to move, he's done mime and he's played monsters before, which helps. But at the end of the day what really swung it was he was the easiest-going, had the most - if you like - happy-go-lucky attitude towards playing the monster. He wanted to play the monster. He didn't want to be an actor and act as the monster; he wanted to be the monster, which was great. And it worked out very well. He did a great job."

Did the extras enjoy themselves?
"I think so, yes. Quite a few of the minor roles are from the Isle of Man. The role of Myra, which is Sam's best friend in the movie, was a girl from the Isle of Man, a girl called Katie Lawrence, who's never done anything else before. She did a really good job for someone that's never done anything before ever."

Did you put out a casting call in the local paper?
"What we did was go through a local casting agent, a chap called John Danks. He organised casting sessions for people from the Isle of Man who wanted to give it a try and we had a lot of interest which was great."

I know you had HTV here this morning. The publicity seems to be kicking in for this one.
"It does, yes. It's gaining a bit of momentum, which is great. I'm not sure I like some of it!"

Certain newspapers. [The Daily Star ran a picture from the film under a headline along the lines of ‘Sam Janus in aliens sex horror’ - MJS]
"We haven't got a lot of control over that."

Presumably it all helps.
"Oh, it all helps, obviously. At the end of the day all publicity is good publicity, I suppose. And it is nice to have the publicity because a lot of people put a lot of effort into making this film work. A lot of time's gone into it and it's nice that the results seem to be worthwhile and they get recognition for that in the papers. Which is great."

It must be a bit galling that most people don't even know that there is a British film industry?
"Yes, exactly. It's very difficult. Everybody moans and groans about the British film industry, but there are an awful lot of films being made of one type or another. Most probably are financed from outside the UK. But with schemes like the Isle of Man's and what have you, hopefully we can make more. The pity is that we have to rely on such schemes to keep the industry alive. It's a shame the government can't do more or business can't do more or the financial institutions in some way help us develop the industry. Or redevelop it, put it back on its legs again."

Would you like investment from government or industry?
"I would prefer from financial institutions or business rather than government, because at the end of the day any industry needs to stand on its own two feet and be self-sufficient. It's no good relying on government handouts and then whinging about the fact that they've been taken away. It's much better, we'd be much stronger, if we had private investment or money from outside. We could then become self-sufficient as an industry rather than relying on the government. Because the Americans don't rely on the government. It's a billion-dollar business over there; it is the highest exporting business in America. And it's privately run by individuals who are in the business to make money.

“The one thing I think that we lose sight of in Britain is that films are a commodity. It's no good making a film because you want to make a film. You have to make a film because you believe in it, but also that people want to watch. They pay to watch it, and then you can make another film. I think that's something we tend to lose sight of. Just because it's commercial doesn't mean it's nasty. It's not a dirty word to make a commercial movie. It's commercial movies that give you the opportunity to make the occasional movie that's more art-house or so on. That less people might well watch but it might have more social value. But people want to be entertained and we've got to make entertaining movies."

Are you happy with the level of production you have right now or would you like to have a big success and step up into a big outfit?
"It would be nice, yes, to do that. Obviously we'd like to make more movies. The problem with it is it takes such a long time to get the idea, the script, the paperwork, the finance in place and actually make it. It then takes you six months to put the film together and whilst you're putting the film together and all that, you can't be doing two projects at once. We turn out roughly two a year at the moment. We'd like to make that three a year, definitely. But that means more people, bigger overheads, and all those type of things. But we'll see how it develops."

In America monster movies are churned out and many of them are pretty terrible.
"They do, yes. They churn them out as genre movies and they all work to a formula. To a certain degree Rampage works to the same formula. There are the things in Rampage that you would expect to see in a sci-fi alien movie. Obviously you have the alien, the girl who's in peril, the hero and all this type of thing. So yes, there is a formula but it's a recognisable formula. And actually subconsciously when people watch these movies, if that formula isn't in place then they're disappointed. It was the same when we made the westerns. There was a certain way of making a western that people expect to see in westerns even if historically that wasn't actually that correct. But that's what you expect to see so that's what you really have to show to a certain degree.

“But it really depends; I don't know. There's nothing wrong with churning out movies one after the other because at the end of the day occasionally you churn out a good one. We do it slightly different to the Americans. We spend more money and we try to have greater quality like on Rampage. Because we can't compete head-to-head with them. They've got bigger studios, more money, more muscle. They know how to do that sort of stuff; that's not what we do. For us it's a year's worth of work to just get one movie finished."

When you take Rampage to the AFM, what has it got that will make it stand out to buyers?
"The problem is: you say about all the movies they churn out. When you take a movie like Rampage to the AFM it competes against all the low-budget videos that are around at the time. But it also competes against all the big-budget Hollywood blockbusters with Mel Gibson and who knows what starring in them. So you're competing on two levels. You're competing against the lower-budget videos and you're competing against the big-budget blockbusters that Hollywood turns out.

“So what we try to do is make sure that we can hopefully compete against the bigger movies quality-wise in the photography. Technically, our film will be as technically good as any of them. From there we use the best actors and the best people we can in the UK to try and compete against the lower-budget stuff, although we have spent millions of pounds on making the film. So Rampage is a step above the low-budget end and we're going head-to-head with the big-budget, to a greater or lesser degree."

Are you gradually increasing the budget on each successive film?
"Yes, we are. Rampage was... what was Rampage, Liz?”

Liz Matthews: “It depends whether you mean what it really cost or what we tell people it cost. What it really cost was £575,000.”

"Yes, but that's if you discount all the deferments, but what was it in reality with all the deferments?

LM: “About a million."

And how does that compare with Grim?
LM: “Oh sorry, that was Grim! This one is a million and a half pounds. This is a real million and a half pounds.”

"Grim we shot in three weeks, this one we shot in four weeks, and the difference shows on the screen. It would have been nice to have five weeks or six weeks.”

LM: “And when you add the deferments to Rampage it rounds up to two million. Which is really representative of what you get in terms of production value."

Is Veronica in charge of the financial side of it?
"Yes. But as I say, at the AFM we go head-to-head with all the big blockbusters from Hollywood as well as all the low-budget stuff. So we like to think we're a step above the low-budget end and hopefully try and compete with the bigger ones."

Do you watch much of the stuff that's in direct competition with this?
"We do and we don't, really.”

LM: “It's basically what's feeding all the cable services. Apart from all the big blockbuster premiere events, all the other movies on Sky are directly in competition with us. And we're in competition with them in terms of getting a place on Sky or a place on a video release or whatever. The big, big problem is getting the theatrical release, which is dire for every single filmmaker in this country, dire."

Would you be looking at doing a limited theatrical release?
LM: “On Rampage, yes."”

There's certainly a market out there.
"Oh, without a doubt. But it's just so difficult to get distribution in the UK. People like Virgin Cinemas, they're a British company, they've taken over the cinema chains. You would have thought they could occasionally put out a British movie, wouldn't you?"

What else do you have in development?
"The next film we've got in development is a family movie. It's a sci-fi again, but it's a family orientated movie. A little bit along the lines of ET but not quite. It's about a family from America who inherit a house with a goldmine. When they uncover the goldmine, they find that there’s some aliens trapped in the goldmine. And all the folklore and old wives' tales that have been built up in the area - things like fairies and pixies and hauntings and changelings and what have you - are all down to the aliens. Who actually caused the problem because they're trying to get free. Then on Christmas Eve, the family release the aliens, and they all fly off into the wild blue yonder."[This is what eventually became The Fairy King of Ar - MJS]

Is the recurring Christmas theme profitable?
"It is, yes, because family movies at the moment are doing quite well. But also if you put a Christmas feel to it, then it's a movie you can sell every year. Every Christmas, all over the world, there's a two/three/four week period where TV stations put out family orientated movies. So if you've got a good solid, family movie, and it's got a Christmas feel to it, then you can do quite well, because you can resell it and resell it. Whereas a normal movie, they might put it out every three, four, five years."

Are you one of these companies that has dozens of things in development, or do you just take it one at a time?
"We have dozens of things in development. We have dozens of ideas sent to us by people and sometimes it's very difficult because we haven't got the time to look at everything and take everything on board. But we tend to keep it to our own ideas and one or two ideas that we really like, that we'll try and develop further. We've got half a dozen ideas that carry through to the next couple of years."

Would you ever adapt stuff?
"I don't like adapting stuff, no. We adapted the westerns from some books written by JT Edson, which was okay. I quite enjoyed that because I'm a western fan. So it was great to do some westerns. But I find it harder to adapt stuff than just to get an idea and write a script and get on with it, basically. The trouble is, when you adapt books everybody who read the book has their own preconceived idea of what it looks like. The imagination's this big and the television or cinema's that big. So you can never actually - or rarely - do it in terms of what people expect."

Do you shoot a cinema ratio or a TV ratio?
"A film like Rampage we shot for cinema. But making sure at the same time that it'll be okay for TV."

What about the music?
"The music is something we're still working on. I haven't quite decided yet."

Do you tend to go for library music?
"It depends because each film's different. Something like The Proposition has got a different feel to something like Rampage. Something like Grim again is different as well. So really we've got to find the right composer to give the film the correct feel. It's so important that you get the music right, just because it sets the mood and it carries a lot of the emotions in the film. So yes, it's difficult. I'm talking to a couple at the moment, but we haven't made up our minds yet."

Who designed Kadamba's costume?
"That was designed by the costume designer. That was Ffyonne. She did a great job, actually. She designed Kadamba's costume which sort of fits with the alien's colouring and what have you, which is very good. It's a bit Barbarella really but that's okay because that's the type of movie it is for obvious reasons. She designed all the other costumes to fit in with an American feel. She got the American police uniforms and all that sort of stuff. So Ffyonne did really well."

I see you've got Species and Alien3 there on the shelf. Are you studying them for reference or trying to make sure you don't copy them too closely?
"Not really. Peter's a member of a video club and he gets four films a month. That's just part of his collection. The other thing is, when we're developing this or when I'm going to be directing, I quite like to watch a couple of monster sci-fi movies, just to get a feel for how you could do it. Or how I could do it. Not exactly copy, but just to get a feel for the genre."

Obviously the special effects side is a lot more intensive here than on the others.
"Jim Francis was the Head of Special Effects, a company called Lightforce. They were with us for the four weeks and they did a great job. It takes a lot of time to set some of their stuff up. But they did really well. The other side of special effects is the digital effects which we had to work on. A company called PremierVision are going to be doing that for us, and they did the effects on Grim as well."

Do you prefer in-camera effects or post-production stuff?
"I prefer to do it on the day. My problem with digital effects is: if you do it on the day and it works, everything goes great and you've got it. If you do it digitally and you shoot with the thought of putting a digital effect on something, that's great. But if the digital effect doesn't work, then you haven't got anything. So it's very difficult. I don't like that element of not having it after you've spent all that time and effort doing it. And I don't quite trust computers anyway. I'm not a computer boffin at all. I never use them. I know they can do amazing things. We do film it with the digital effects in mind, obviously, but I just don't like that element of not being in control, of what could go wrong."

Are you going to use them to distort the alien POV shots?
"Well, we did that last time on Grim. But what we did this time was we created our own camera filter. We got a distorted piece of glass and painted some veins on it and what have you, put a blue gel over. So that we actually created our own physical filter to shoot through which gives us the alien's POV. Which is great because now it's on film. I don't have to digitise anything, I don't have to create a computer image and I don't have to pay a lot of money to have it put back to film afterwards. So it worked really well. And it was very simple and easy to do. That's an instance where I think it was better to do that than create the digital effect afterwards. Because there's a lot of cost involved in digital effects.”

website: www.peakviewing.co.uk
interview originally posted 24th March 2007

After posting my review of Savage Spirit in July 2006, I tracked down ‘Evil’ John Mays who kindly agreed to an e-mail mini-interview about the great special effects which he provided for that movie.

How did you get started in movie special effects?
“A friend of mine, Lance Pope, got me started. He owned a haunted amusement park/creature-and-props factory. I worked under his guidance for several years. He schooled me in the building of props, effects, costumes - and what actually scares people.”

How did you become involved with Savage Spirit?
“I got lucky. The production company was attending a convention where I was working as the prop builder/stage manager. They had already made one horror movie, They Feed, and planned to do another. On the next movie they wanted to pull out all the stops for the gore effects. I showed Connie Biskamp some photos of my work and they decided to give me a shot.”

What sort of constraints of time/money did you have on this production?
“Cory Turner is a good director and runs a tight ship. I needed to turn out the effects right on the first try if at all possible. The blood splat in the bathroom in the first five minutes of the movie, the axe in the chest in the kitchen, and the death by garage door were all done on the first take. The hand and facial wound make-up effects took about an hour each day to do, so I tried to plan ahead so as to not hold up production. The only thing that dries slower than paint is make-up which is needed ASAP to be on camera. As we all know, wasted time is wasted money.”

To what extent did your effects skills determine the story and the different types of death therein?
“They already knew what they wanted, and except for one effect that just did not look right on camera, nothing changed. Originally, Cory had discussed keeping the movie gore in the PG-13 category. That was before the first death scene we filmed (hand + garbage disposal + axe). We were able to pump so much violence and gore into that one scene that we all knew we had an R-rated horror movie on our hands.”

What was the most complex/difficult effect to achieve on this film?
"That would be the ‘death by garage door’ effect, and also my personal favourite. I had an idea of how it would look and we did one dry run to make sure all the pieces were in the right places. Originally, the head was to be caught under the door, causing it to stop moving down. As we started shooting, the weight and force of the garage door pushed the prop head to the inside of the garage instead. I fired the blood cannon just as I noticed the change in its position. We, inside the garage, were now coated in goo, and I was afraid the shot was a disaster. That was before I heard the cheering of the crew outside the garage.”

What other movies have you worked on recently, or do you have lined up?
“Quite a few projects have wrapped since then. I have been involved in three features: Razor Room (horror), In the Plan (a cop drama), Red Victoria (a horror comedy) and Damn U Bone (another cop drama soon to be in production). I have been asked for my effects in several other projects later this year: Dementia, The Tenth Axis and a few others that I am not at liberty to discuss.”

Tom Mes is the author of Agitator: The Cinema of Takashi Miike (available from the always excellent FAB Press) which is the first ever in-depth look at the cult Japanese director. Tom runs the excellent Midnight Eye website on Japanese cinema and took time out to answer some questions for me.

How/when did you first come across the work of Takashi Miike?
“I saw my first Miike film at the Rotterdam Film Festival in 2000. They were showing three Miike films that year: Dead or Alive, Audition and Ley Lines. At that point I had never heard of Miike before, so I went in with a clean slate and no expectations, which was a real blessing. All the hype around Miike didn't start happening until after that festival, which would prove to be his international breakthrough. I'd met Japanese director Makoto Shinozaki (who wrote the foreword to my book) during the festival and he recommended I should go see Dead or Alive, because, and I quote: ‘The last ten minutes will kill your mind.’ That was no lie, because I haven't been the same since.”

The handful of Miike films that I've seen don't appear to have anything in common, apart from all being very unlike anything else. Are there any themes, motifs or stylistic touches which you think characterise a 'typical' Miike movie (if such a beast even exists)?
“You're right in the sense that there seem to be no links between Miike's individual films if you've seen a handful of them. But as you watch more, you'll start noticing similarities in the kind of issues he treats. Miike's work is actually incredibly consistent, both on a thematic and on a stylistic level. It's quite an astounding feat given the number of films he makes and all the different scriptwriters he works with. What he's most concerned with is people who fall outside established definitions, be they cultural, national, physical, whatever. He has a great interest in what he calls ‘floating’ people, the people who fall between the cracks because they don't fit in. His work has great social merit because of this. Showing people the consistency, and thereby the validity, of Miike's work was my main goal in writing this book.

”As for a typical Miike movie, probably the one film that best sums up the entirety of his thematic and stylistic concerns is Ley Lines. If you want to understand the filmmaker Takashi Miike, that film is an absolute must-see. And even if you don't, it's still a must-see, since it's an amazing piece of work.”

How long has it taken you to write Agitator, and what has been the most difficult aspect of the project?
“The whole project, from first preparations to printing, took just over a year and a half. The actual writing was done in about six months. Without doubt the most difficult thing was tracking down all the films, particularly all his early made-for-video stuff. I must have been to every second-hand video shop in Tokyo, and there's a lot of them! Most of those films are out of print and are even difficult to find in rental stores there. The only way you can still get hold of them is in second-hand places where they sell ex-rental tapes. It took me two trips to Japan to get hold of everything. I found the last film I was still missing on the very last day of my second stay in Tokyo. It's a good thing I found it too, because it was Miike's very first film, so it was pretty crucial.”

What help has Miike given you and what does he think of the book?
“He's been extremely helpful. No request was too strange and he helped in so many ways. He lent me some of his own copies of his films, donated personal photographs for use in the book, checked facts, and took time out from his inhumanely busy schedule for a marathon seven-hour interview.

”At the moment he hasn't seen the book yet, so I don't know his final thoughts, but he was very genuinely surprised when I first told him about the book. He never considered that someone would look at his work in that way. I really look forward to hearing what he thinks of the finished work, but I hope he'll ignore what I've written and just continue to make films like he's always done.”

How has Miike's attitude to his work changed now that he is making films that will have a global audience, rather than just a domestic one?
“I don't think it's changed at all. He is very aware that it's a temporary thing and that all the hype and the interest can be over when festivals and media find the next outrageous filmmaker to go bonkers over. Of course, I hope this won't be the case and one of the reasons I wrote this book was to help make him an established and recognised filmmaker, because I think he deserves to be seen among the greatest filmmakers active today. But as far as Miike is concerned, if a handful of people passionately like his films, he has enough motivation to keep doing what he does. He cares about the process of film-making more than about how the films are received.”

Just why does Miike make so many movies? Doesn't he ever sleep?
“No doubt he skips nights on a regular basis when he's shooting. On the one hand it's his own attitude, he likes the constant level of tension and adrenaline that comes with making one film after another. On the other hand, the way the Japanese film industry is structured allows a filmmaker to make six, seven or more films a year if he should wish to. A big part of the industry is devoted to making films that are shot on a low budget and with very tight schedules. These films receive a very small theatrical release, but they are intended to recoup their cost on video. Directors need to shoot them for an average of US$500,000, usually less, and in two or three weeks. In return they get complete creative freedom, because the risk for the producers is very low. Since there are so many of these films being made to meet the demand of the video market, it's very much possible for a director to make seven films a year if he wants to. Miike is singled out because he goes to such extremes, but he's certainly not the only Japanese filmmaker to make multiple films a year.”

website: www.midnighteye.com

Total Film was first published in January 1997 (cover date February, as is the way) which means it must have been 1996 when I sat down and interviewed the legendary Russ Meyer who was over in the UK to promote the VHS release of some of his movies. Three points to note here. First, Russ Meyer was the absolutely most heterosexual man I have ever met in my life. Second, to this day I’ve still never seen any of the man’s films. Third, this interview was responsible for that first issue of Total Film having the word ‘Brobdingnagian’ on its front cover (as in ‘... breasts’). I can’t see any film mag getting away with that nowadays.

Your first proper film was The Immoral Mr Teas...
"Proper film?"

Well, you made a burlesque film called The French Peep Show in about 1950, with Tempest Storm.
"That was a film on burlesque. I would say that was the one. It's been kind of ignored."

I heard it had been lost.
"Probably it has been. I think there was someone unearthed one somewhere. I had no control over it - it's not mine. The man Peter A DeCenzie is gone now. But it's a film that is forgotten."

But most filmographies start your career with The Immoral Mr Teas. It's cited as the first sex-related film that wasn't just a boring fake travelogue of a nudist colony. Did it just come along at the right time, or was it that nobody had thought of doing it before?
"Well, I'll tell you what started before that which kind of kicked me off - not 'ticked me off' but 'kicked me off' - was the fact that there were a lot of nudist films made in the States. They were in black and white, and they were always about sunbathing, the fact that the sun is good for the body. Young children become even more nourished by walking around nude with their parents. They were always photographed in such a way, like when they were playing ping-pong, you could use the table top to cover up the pubic hair or the man's dick. And the children were always okay, totally spanked-ass naked, no problem. It's sort of worthwhile that children are out there, embracing the sun.

“So I didn't want to make a movie, as I was telling my partner after he had done the thing on Tempest Storm. Tempest Storm was - and still is - a strong woman: good-looking, and the whole works. She made a lot of money as a stripteaser. She was the first one to come along with big breasts. I was taken to a liking with her, and carried off to go down to where she was living, to continue her career. I thought, 'Well, leave my wife and go off with a girl: seems like a good idea.’ We ended up nearly dying on what they call the Ridge Route. We were driving, both fell asleep, and just woke up bouncing off the back end of a giant lorry. So it could have finished everything for Meyer and Tempest Storm, had we not awakened in sufficient time.

“I went to live with her for a couple of days and then I ended up being a person who would capture her gowns as they came - 'Schoop!' - over to the wings. So I did that for a day or so, saying, 'Well, that's kind of interesting.' I could pinch her ass when she walked by me, and so on. Then I realised that I had to have something else to do in life, other than be a person that cared for a stripper's garments. So we said goodbye and we remained friends for a number of years. She ended up marrying a well-known singer, a pretty good singer..."

I understand that Immoral Mr Teas was made for $24,000 and took in $1.5 million.
"We played with numbers."

But it was a big hit. Did you expect it to do so well?
"It was an enormous hit. No, I didn't expect it to be that much of a success. When we played it originally, it was busted in San Diego: the term 'busted' is not 'bust' but the police. We'd not come up with what was called a 'patch'. My partner, Pete DeCenzie, was in with people who spoke of the underworld, although he wasn't a member of it. He says, 'You've gotta have a patch.' It's like putting a band-aid on, for a policeman, then you'd make it, like that, no problems. He wouldn't come down and - not necessarily arrest you - but he wouldn't complain about the fact that you were showing a movie that's full of nudity and so forth. The only trouble here is that I didn't come up with a patch. My partner was somewhere else, and boy, they busted us right off the bat. They didn't lock me up, but they grabbed the print, so we couldn't play it anywhere. And once you let the film business know that there is a picture out there that's dangerous, they stay away from it."

But did the public not want to see it all the more?
"Sure they wanted, but there was no way they could. No exhibitor would play it: 'Forget it, I don't care how much money it would make. No way! Stay away from it, that's bad news.' So my partner went up North and he was working with a group of three nude women called Pictures and Poses. These girls would pose to Debussy and this dumb kind of thing. And the guys would sit in the audience and whack off. So that was how it got going. And one day he was asking one of his cohorts, who was a man who pulled the curtains, an Italian guy, and he says, 'Look, how can we get the censor board?' You see, there was a censor board in Seattle, Washington. Nobody else had a censor board. 'Why can't we get them to look at it?' he says. 'Gee, I don't know. They seem to be nice guys.' So Pete says, 'I'll tell you what we'll do. We'll get a lot of red wine and spaghetti and I'll get a suite. You tell them I have a suite.'

“He didn't have a suite. Got it in the hotel, got all that food and wine, got those guys in there and a 16mm print which was projected off the wall. I mean really off the wall! So they showed it and they drank wine, ate spaghetti. And the board said, 'Oh, there's nothing wrong with this. A little nudity. It's wholesome.' From then on we were off and running - we played anywhere we wanted. We had passed a censor board, and that was an important factor with regards to releasing a film. A censor board said okay, and then if an exhibitor wanted to play in, say, Baltimore - which was a problem, they had situations there - they took up the fact that the film had been presented in a theatre under the sanction of the Seattle, Washington's censor board. From the on, it was like stealing - it played anywhere."

A few years later, what was the reason for the move from the earlier 'nudie-cutie' film to thrillers like Faster Pussycat! Kill! Kill!?
"'Nudie-cutie', I don't know."

It's just a term I've read.
"Well, for example, for The Immoral Mr Teas, I don't use that term. It's my first film, The Immoral Mr Teas. A film that was sanctioned to play in cities that had restrictions about nudity. They weren't 'nudie-cuties' - that was a kind of slovenly, unpleasant expression."

I apologise.
"No, no, it's just not used. Call it things like 'titty-boom'."

Okay. But there's a definite change from the 'titty-boom' of Eve and the Handyman and Heavenly Bodies and so on...
"Well, those were different. The Immoral Mr Teas was the name of an actual man I knew in the service. He loved to do put-ons. He had an idea that someday he could be an actor. A great portrait artist, a photographic portrait artist. I asked him, I said, 'Bill, why don't we do this? We'll give you five per cent of the show.' My partner Eve was in completion with this, and then Pete DeCenzie. So we made the movie in three days. It almost never got made. Bill Teas was in the service with me, then I had another friend who was a police photographer. We had everybody photographed; there was one girl left. But we had to go to the beach, and it was hotter than the hinges of Hell, down in Santa Monica.

“Well, Teas just wiped himself out with booze. He was so drunk that he had ambitions of crawling in the sack with this Marilyn Westley. She didn't go for that particularly: the idea of this guy crawling in bed and so on. So what happened was that he decided that this girl was denying him her body. And he was the star. You know what he decided? He was going to shave his beard off. Another army buddy who was with me, a policeman, said, 'Teas, you can't do that to Meyer. He's got his bank roll in this. You're not going to shave your beard off. I'll throw you down on the ground, I'm going to sit on you. And leave that girl alone, she's part of the cast.' The next morning we all went down to the beach; it was like Hades. So hot, he was out there all day just burnt to a crisp, and I shot all this footage that completed the movie. That's how it was made."

Let's move on to Faster Pussycat! Kill! Kill! It's very different from the earlier stuff. It's more action and leather and bikes. It's more of an action thriller.
"You see, it came about because we did a film called Motorpsycho. Like 'motorcycle', but it's 'psycho'. And these were three psychotics. Their thing was beating up people, stealing money, a little rape, it was okay. It went over like a million bucks. I tell you, it really came across strong. So I said to my wife at the time, 'Now look, we made a lot of money on this. Why don't we, you and I...' - we were separated but - 'We'll throw in 50-50.' So we did, took pictures of the thing, made a bundle of money. Then about six months later, I said, 'Why don't we do one with three bad girls?' She said, 'Oh, I don't know about that.' But I found Tura Satana, this Asiatic girl.

“Tura was very strong. She was the kind of girl that you didn't screw with. She demanded certain things. She wanted to make a good film. Motorpsycho was a good film. So we shot this film with her being in charge of these other two girls. And it was just a play-off of the other one with three bad boys; now we've got one with three bad girls. Tura was kind of special because she knew the martial arts. We set out to show them harassing men, things like that. Brutalising men, driving around in Porsches and different cars. They end up in a situation where there's a gas station and the guy is kind of a half-idiot. He says, 'Oh, that man over there, he's got millions of dollars.' Of course the girls immediately go, 'Ooh wow!' Then he has a demented son, big muscular guy. So they have dinner, it's a very short thing. The money is hopefully to be accepted by Tura Satana. Oh, everything went wrong, like all of these things. Tura's girlfriend, Haji, was her lover; she died. The blonde was murdered by one of the others because she wanted to get the hell out from under, and then there was one more girl, that was partner to another girl, and she was involved. So we had a great little crime thing going.

“Then we had the dirty old man who had these sons: one was a hulk of a character, he other one was quite understanding, and wanted to fall in love with Tura Satana. Then of course, her ability to kill this guy with her own hands, that was important. So we put all this stuff together, and all of a sudden in colleges they started looking at it: 'Boy, this is something else!' And from the on, it was! We made it, and then I made other films every year. Another year, another film, and so on."

You seem to have ignored Hollywood prejudices. A lot of film-makers don't - or at least didn't - like casting black or Asian actresses, or having characters in wheelchairs.
"They're all whores, those people in Hollywood! Are you kidding? They wouldn't do anything good for anybody. The hell with it! I don't care. That's the way it is. So he's a dirty old man, so the guy gets run over by Tura in a Porsche, and good riddance. I don't worry about any of that stuff. But what got the majors was: 'Who is this upstart, bringing out pictures? They're playing them in theatres where we put pictures, and it means we lose a screen. That son of a bitch is going to show a movie there, and they'll be playing a picture that we have no gain from.'"

In terms of casting actresses, which is more important: acting ability or breast-size?
"There's no question about the size of the breast. I'd be a fool to think in other terms. You can always get actresses built like hoe-handles."

Two people I've spoken to who worked on your films - Dave Prowse and Dave Warbeck - both had memories of them being tremendous fun. Have your shoots always been fun to do?
"Let's see. One of the few early actors that gave me a gift was Darth Vader (I call him). He gave me a bottle of Scotch when he was going off the island. He had some good times with black hookers. Then we had Percy Herbert who was good fun, always playing a Tommy. He proclaimed that he hated black women but he was always with a black hooker every night. So I said, 'You're just a totally no-good, son-of-a-bitch person, you.' But that was it. We made the movie, except eventually we had Anoushka Hempel. She was a problem. She has a club or a hotel or something, and she's married to a very rich man. What she didn't like was: always in a film you're trying to get cutaways to make it work better. We had a rape scene with Percy and Darth Vader. Then, when I took her back to the States, I found that we needed some more shots.

“Well, Anoushka Hempel had small tits. It was unfortunate. See, they had found a girl who was an Italian with giant tits, and then she had overdosed. Then she got on my case always about the damn English rule about tea-time. God, that was always a knife in my throat. I don't give a damn about tea-time, we've got to work here. Then she'd call the group of English actors. Darth Vader, he says, 'Ah, the hell with it! Forget me, leave me alone.' The others were always kind of siding with her, but it worked.

“Important about Anoushka Hempel: I always make a lot of cut-ins. Now we've got a rape scene in which one of the actors is gonna jump on the bed and have her. It got to the point where there was no interplay. She was nude, and we couldn't find anybody in LA with breasts small enough. She was complaining about all this. So we found a girl with tiny tits and we shot it in a friend of mine's dark room, laboratory and so on. And she just became obsessed with this whole thing about being portrayed as a girl with angry, unpleasant-looking breasts and being taken advantage of.

“Then Roger Ebert, the film critic, made a suggestion. He says, 'What are you going to do?' I said, 'Hell with her!' He said, 'Well, I understand her old man has got an enormous amount of money.' So: 'I tell you what I'm going to give you. You can have this whole damn negative for $275,000. You get your old man to give me $275,000.' And she was beside herself. So the hell with it. We put it in there, with this American girl. We had an awful time trying to find a girl with the right size tits. So we photographed her, and when she saw her tits, along with the American tits, she just absolutely freaked out. So I'm not her favourite."

Can I ask you briefly about the few days shooting you did on the Sex Pistols movie when it was still called Who Killed Bambi?.
"McClaren. You can say it in one word: an asshole. Plain and simple. Just what he had in his hand and he didn't have the balls, the courage to do it. I was out with Laurie Frost the other day, who was the focus puller. We had an Australian cameraman. We shot the stuff to show Mick Jagger supposedly going out to kill in the Queen's game reserve, with a crossbow. And we shot it. Then Darth Vader - I keep calling him Darth Vader - Dave Prowse. We'd been given by a film producer a big Rolls Royce, so he was in livery and so on. So this animal was killed.

“And they thinned this out. They do it all the time. They came up with an item that: Meyer is a person who is vile and he goes out with a pistol and shoots little innocent deer. And we had an expert guy, you know. So they took the thing and put it on the bonnet of the car. Then we had this cute little girl in this typical little house. So he drives down and he takes the deer and he puts it on the stoop. The little girl comes out and says, 'Look, Mummy. Someone's killed Bambi.' That was it. that was what we shot, see. That was the extent of it. We had a great script; we had her at the end of the film.

“And here's McClaren being the honcho guy and leading a big band. There they are down by the river. They had a lot of extras. We didn't do it, but that was planned. But then the shock of it was great, with the little lady. We were going to shoot. We never got it shot, because we didn't have the money to hire all the extras. So we looked at: she's sitting in the audience, and here we have McClaren singing like Mick Jagger. It was a big put-on, see. So all of a sudden, the idea at the end of the film, which Ronnie thought was a masterpiece: while he's singing, all of a sudden, the little girl walks right up to him, and she has a .357 Magnum and destroys his face: 'That's for Bambi.'! It could have been just an absolute great film.

“Johnny Rotten was quoted in a magazine, saying, 'Meyer is a cunt.' Well, Kitten Natividad had a bush on her that was just incredible, so I sent a photograph of it to Johnny Rotten, saying, 'No, Johnny, this is a cunt.'”

website: www.rmilms.com

Oliver S Milburn, director ofThe Harsh Light of Day, kindly replied to some e-mail questions in May 2012, shortly before the film’s release.

What was your background in film-making before HLoD?
“The usual really - I'd done some short films and studied film-making at university. It went pretty well at uni, and that was where I met Emma Biggins. We decided to go for it and make HLoD if we could raise the finance - there were some pretty tight time constraints revolving around the kit we used, which basically meant that the start of writing to wrapping on the shoot was only 3-4 months! It’s amazing to think of that, because between then and it hitting screens was nearly a three-year gap... film-making can be unpredictable like that!”

How close is the finished film to what you set out to make?
“Honestly... 'ish'. It basically all comes down to money. I could go on indefinitely about all the differences between the script and the finished film, or the storyboards and the shots we were able to get. Locations, visuals, props, effects - everything had to be compromised at that kind of budget level. But the point is with any film, with any budget, there will always be differences between the idea and the finished film.

“I think it’s important to be ambitious: if you aim really high, like we did, you're going to end up with something slightly below that. If you aim for something mediocre, you'll probably end up with something less than mediocre. I think the essence of the film remained the same; the 'spirit' if you like, and that's a tribute to the cast and crew as much as myself or Emma.”

How did you assemble your cast and crew?
“For the crew it was basically a case of finding our heads of department, and letting them fill in their supporting roles. So we'd find our DoP, and he'd get the camera crew he liked working with. For the heads it was about finding people with a combination of the skills we wanted and the enthusiasm we needed. Asking people to make a film on this kind of budget is asking a lot, so it was just as important that the crew were enthusiastic as it was that they were skilled. Fortunately, it turned out they were all very skilled too!

“A similar rule applied to cast, but casting a film like HLoD is a really arduous process! We'd basically put out casting calls and did a lot of auditioning. I was a first time feature director with a tiny budget, so casting directors wouldn't touch us - we had to do it ourselves and see a lot of people. Daniel was the toughest to cast, and Dan Richardson really stood out of the crowd for that part. We found him pretty late so it was all a little nail-biting running up to the shoot.”

What do you think HLoD brings to the overcrowded vampire genre?
“I suppose a unique vampire, and a unique vampire 'world' once it’s finally discussed. They're certainly not twilight types!

“Yet I'd always hasten to add that it’s not a vampire film, it just happens to have a vampire in it. Infurnari is a key part of the plot, but he's a vampire because it helps to underline the issues in the film. There's an obvious parallel between knowingly committing a sinful act (taking violent revenge) and 'selling your soul' (becoming a vampire). It also worked in terms of Daniel's disability, again underlining the idea that we have to pay for the things we want - Daniel has to become a vampire to walk again.

“So I suppose that's what it brings - a refreshing, relevant use of vampires, rather than centring a film around them. Really all decent horror uses the 'genre' elements in it to explore ideas, rather than just because they're cool. Vampires are cool though.”

What was the single most difficult part of getting the film made?
"Money. Finding it, using it well. I think that's far too obvious an answer though. So in connection with that, I think it’s simply getting yourself heard. Finding a way to get your script ahead of the thousands of others. Film is well known for being a bit of an insiders game; an old boys club. Its true, but only because its pretty much the only way to get above the noise. We didn't have any family ties or industry contacts, but you can't really resent those people who do for using them - I would! There are so many talented people out there, and I hope I'm one of them, but really I think the reason we got a film made was because we were crazy and determined enough to do it.

“Beyond getting it made, what people don't tell you (because it’s pretty disheartening) is that actually getting it watched can be just as difficult. That's where you really need the contacts - festivals, sales agents, reviews etc. - that's a whole other kettle of fish. We're very lucky to have Left Films behind us, and very lucky for any publicity we get... so thanks!”

What have you got lined up next?
“All sorts! I write a lot - sometimes actual scripts, sometimes just treatments. We're a few drafts into an adaptation of the Scott Andrews novel School's Out - a post-apocalyptic action movie set in a boarding school. It’s delicious. That's had some interest; but like any film in the UK we're still having to push it. You really have to build your projects here no matter what level you're at - nobody's waiting to give you money. Once you've made a decent film you can expect to find a little more for the next one, but it’s still you who’s got to find it.

“I'm working on a comedy now, and have a sci-fi screenplay ready to go. I don't insist on writing myself though. Frankly, I'd be delighted to fall in love with a script by someone else... It'd save me half a job! I'm really hungry to shoot a longer piece again, so whatever it is I hope it’s soon.”

I had been working on SFX magazine for a few months when Species was released and I found myself talking on the phone across the Atlantic to one of the stars, Alfred Molina. This interview was conducted in January 1996 and a heavily edited version appeared in SFX shortly afterwards.

What are you doing in America?
“At present I’m in New York doing a play by Brian Friel called Molly Sweeney, which was a big hit in London last year and is now, I’m glad to say, a big hit here. I’m here until the end of April, doing that.”

Did anybody at any time on the set of Species mention the phrase ‘A For Andromeda’?
“No, but I think the film is in a long line of great stories about non-human strands of DNA, and mutating life-forms. It’s one of the great staples of the science fiction genre - as I’m sure you know - and I think Species is part of that tradition. It’s like a movie that tells a story to do with time travel, obviously there’s going to be links to every other movie that dealt with the subject. So what we’ve done in Species is try to take a different slant on it. I think the writers were keen to make Species as plausible as possible, so that the fiction didn’t necessarily overbalance or smother the science.

“I’m a bit of a science fiction fan, and one thing I hate is when science fiction becomes too implausible. The thrill of science fiction is when it’s tantalisingly possible that this could happen. That’s what makes it so exciting for audiences. I think that’s what the film tries to achieve, because there’s a strong scientific element in the film. It’s not dry as dust and boring, it’s not like a lecture. It’s set very much in a plausible world. The film isn’t full of monsters and weird things. You have some wonderful effects when the creature transforms itself from human to non-human form, but they’re all staples of the genre.”

Looking through your CV, this appears to be your first SF film.
“Oh yes. It’s the first one I’ve done. I’ve never done anything like this at all, so it was very interesting. It was a lot of fun, because Ben Kingsley is also a bit of a science fiction fan, and he’s never done anything like this before either. So we were both of us rollicking around the set, getting very excited about it, watching scenes being shot.”

Were there any problems working on a film where special effects were such an important part of it?
“Strangely enough, not for us. The person who had to deal with that mostly was Natasha Henstridge, who plays Sil, the creature. She had to spend a lot of time lying around in all kinds of glutinous fluids and putting on all kinds of weird bits of latex and plastic. Also the actress who played Sil as a young girl had to do a lot of stuff where you see her face morphing into the creature’s face. So they bore the brunt of it. The rest of us, our scenes were all involved with reacting to the aftermath of the technical stuff - walking into rooms and going, ‘Oh my God!’”

It’s a fairly diverse cast list. Did you fit together well as a team?
“Incredibly enough, we did, to a tremendous degree. We all became really good mates. It was quite extraordinary because this whole bunch of people, we all came from very, very different experiences. Ben’s obviously a huge film star and a great classical actor; Michael Madsen’s a big movie star in America; and Natasha had been a model - this was her first acting job. Marg Helgenberger, who played one of the other scientists, her background was essentially television. Forest Whittaker is an American film star. So we’re all coming at it from a different place, but we all got on really well, and we had a lot of fun with it.”

What are the differences between British films and Hollywood films?
“I think there are more similarities than there are differences really. The filming process is essentially the same, although American crews get a shorter lunchbreak. They only get a half-hour lunchbreak and they don’t get a tea-break in the afternoon. Whenever there’s been English people working on crews over there, they always say, ‘You want to get your afternoon tea-break.’ Also because the industry’s so much bigger here, there’s a level of bureaucracy that you don’t have in England. Because this industry, which is a huge industry, has to be managed, so the number of people who are in the film business who actually don’t make films is bigger here. They seem to wield all kinds of subtle and invisible powers: you’re constantly trying to work out why you can’t get something done, and it’s usually because some faceless bureaucrat somewhere is saying, ‘Oh, you don’t have a permit.’ It’s a big machine. But at our level of the game - the people actually around the camera, either behind it or in front of it - it’s really more or less the same. The jokes are the same, the anxieties and the excitement and the concerns are all the same.”

Are you recognisable to American audiences now?
“I think I’ve reached that level that Rod Steiger once said he would hate to reach. I’m at that point where every now and then people come up and say, ‘Aren’t you whatsisname?’ They don’t quite know who I am but they recognise me from somewhere. I think it’s because I’ve done a few films here where I’ve been prominent as the villain or the leading man’s friend. They don’t know my name, but they’re sort of: ‘Haven’t I seen you somewhere?’ Sometimes I play around with that. There was one gentleman stopped me in a restaurant the other night and said, ‘Aren’t you... um... you’re... er... are you an actor?’ I was feeling a bit cheeky and I said, ‘No, I’m not. I’m your solicitor. I work at your lawyer’s office.’ He went, ‘Oh yes, that’s right. Nice to see you.’ It didn’t do any harm and it satisfied his curiosity. As soon as I said that, he had no interest in speaking to me. The other thing I’ve discovered is when people come round on sets. If you’re shooting on location they’ll come and say, ‘Are you making a film here?’ And I always say, ‘No, it’s a training film for the Chase Manhattan Bank.’ And they just disappear. In England I always say, ‘It’s a training film for NatWest,’ and people go, ‘Oh, is that all?’”

A small role that you’re well-known for is that little bit right at the beginning of Raiders of the Lost Ark.
“That was my very first film, the first time I ever worked on a movie. I started at the top, didn’t I?”

You didn’t stay there very long though. You were killed in the first five minutes.
“I was the first one to get knocked off. No, one of the native bearers gets killed first. And my partner in crime - well, he’s discovered afterwards but one presumes he’s got killed first. That was great.”

How did you land the role?
“They’d moved their production to London because they wanted to use the English crews, because the English crews were perceived to be better and cheaper. They did a lot of the casting of the small roles and the supporting roles in England and Europe, which is why - apart from Karen Black and Harrison Ford himself - I think every other actor in the show was either British or European. There was Ronald Lacey and Paul Freeman. They were all cast from England, and that’s how I got it. He was looking for dark, Latin-looking actor who could play Peruvians, and I fit the bill, I suppose.”

What would be your ideal role?
“I think I’d like to do a comedy on film. I’ve never done that before - an out-and-out comedy. I’d love to do something like that.”

Didn’t you do Trust Me?
“Yes, that was me, but that was for television. I’d like to do a big feature comedy. That’d be nice.”

In December 1995, the Science Museum in London had an exhibition of material relating to Arthur C Clarke, to celebrate the 50th anniversary of his groundbreaking magazine article on the possibilities of geostationary communications satellites. Although Clarke himself remained in Sri Lanka, I was able to grab a few words with his old friend Sir Patrick Moore. Just over eleven years later, as Sir Patrick prepared to introduced the 650th(!) edition of The Sky at Night, I thought this was worth digging out and posting on-line, even if it hasn’t really got anything to do with cult movies.

How long have you known Arthur C Clarke?
"Since we were boys. It goes back to our teens. He's just a few years older than me. I'm 72 - he's nearly 78 - so I must have been 13 or 14 when we first met, I think."

What sort of things did you get up to as boys? Building small rockets and things?
"No. Arthur was doing that kind of thing, but I wasn't. I'm not very good with my hands anyway. I'm not a spaceman. My interest is in pure astronomy and my own particular subject, which is the Moon. So while he was busy building things and planning things, I was observing them with my telescopes."

Do you remember when the communications satellite piece was first published? Was it recognised as groundbreaking immediately?
"It didn't cause much interest at the time, I don't think. It was regarded as too way out and into the future, which of course it was. Don't forget that way back in 1945 there were still many people who believed that space travel would never come, and they believed that right up until 1957, I think!"

As an astronomer, what sort of connections do you see between Arthur's science fiction and the reality of space exploration?
"Don't forget, Arthur is a scientist as well as being a science fiction writer. Therefore in his writing, when he wants to stick to sober science he can and does. Obviously he can go over the top when he wants to with the full knowledge of what he is doing. Many of his predictions have come true; others will come true in the future; others, undoubtedly, won't. You can't be right all the time. But he's been right much more than he's been wrong."

You used to write science fiction yourself, didn't you?
"I never wrote any seriously. I wrote some boys' novels once. But I have not had time to do it for the last ten years or so. I always meant to write another one, but I haven't got round to it. There's no time to do it unfortunately."

Are you pleased with the exhibition here at the Science Museum?
"I think it's very good. They've got it right, I think. I'm glad to see Arthur's typewriter there - rather younger than the typewriter I use all the time. I use a 1908 Woodstock and that one's rather later than that."

Do you try to keep up with technology, or are you happy with your old typewriters?
"I do all my writing on my ancient typewriter. I can type very quickly on that one; on modern things I can't. Don't forget, my role in astronomy is I'm an observer of the Moon and planets. I'm not really a spaceman. I know very little about the technology of rockets, but about the surface of the Moon I do know."

Do you think space exploration is due for a renaissance?
"Not really, the reason why it appears to have slowed down is because the Americans put all their cosmic eggs into one basket - the Space Shuttle. That cost a lot more, took a lot longer, and had that awful tragedy too. It gives the impression of having slowed down, but when all these troubles have been overcome I think we'll be back on course. I don't think Arthur or I will see it. We may see a major space station; that'll start next year I think. Whether we'll see the first men on Mars, I don't know. We probably won't, but your children will, and your grandchildren certainly will.”

interview originally posted 7th January 2007

Severance, the second horror movie directed by Christopher Smith (Creep), was released in British cinemas in August 2006. It was the debut feature for screenwriter James Moran, who very kindly agreed to a short e-mail interview a couple of weeks later.

What was the initial inspiration for Severance and how close is the final film to what you conceived?
“All I had originally was: ‘yuppies go on team-building weekend in the country, get picked off by psycho killer.’ I'd come home in a bad mood, after a bad commute where loads of pinstriped yuppie swine had been pushing past me and everyone, shouting on their mobile phones, and generally being obnoxious. I decided to put some into a horror movie and kill them all in extremely painful ways. Then I realised that there was some interesting ground to cover by putting a bunch of ordinary British office types into a slasher movie and seeing how they would react. The movie is exactly what I wanted, it's very close to the original script, and keeps all of the same story beats, so I'm extremely happy with it.”

How did Christopher Smith get attached to the film and what did each of you bring to the finished script?
“Qwerty bought the script and I did a new draft for them. After that, they went looking for directors. Chris was just about to release Creep and we all thought he'd be perfect for it. I was worried that any director would want to tone down the extreme violence but when I saw the ‘operation’ scene in Creep, I knew I was in safe hands. I did a new draft based on his notes, then we worked on it together. He really wanted to push the arms industry angle, I originally just had a mention of where they worked at the end, in an ‘isn't it ironic’ way. But he correctly saw that there was more mileage in that, so that's when we put in all the weapons company background stuff. We both brought our passion for horror movies, for telling a good story, and for not settling for any easy options.”

How did the funding from the Film Council etc come together?
“Sorry, I have no idea about that side of it, I only ever dealt with Qwerty, so wasn't aware of the financial arrangements at all.”

What sort of balance were you aiming for between the comedy and the horror - and to what extent do you think you achieved that?
“We had a simple rule: the comedy has to be funny, but come from the characters rather than making gags; and the horror has to be proper, scary horror. We didn't want one-liners or quips, we wanted to make sure any humour came from the characters and situations. That made it feel more realistic, in a way, and it really helped the horror side - because we weren't being overly jokey, it was even scarier when things went horribly wrong. I think we got it just about right, it's never too jokey, and never so traumatic that you can't get a laugh afterwards.”

Opening the film, without explanation, with a scene from much later in the story is a bold move. I think it works, and not just as an attention grabber, but I would be interested to know your thoughts on the prologue.
“Prologues are tricky; we didn't want to open with a scene from the previous killings, and we didn't want to do one of those ‘here's a scary scene from later on! - a-a-and now back to the start, you'll have to wait now’ tease things. So we did a tease thing, but disguised it, and made it look like it had already happened. So we got to do both, with none of the disadvantages of either. We were very worried that people wouldn't realise what we'd done, and we thought about putting more explanation in, but we quickly found that people got it as soon as they saw George and the girls in the fancy lodge. Audiences are much smarter than anyone expects, which is a relief. Plus, you have to start with a bang in horror, especially if you have quite a slow build up, which we have.”

What other projects are you working on (or thinking about)?
“Another horror, Curfew, which is a straight horror this time, no comedy, a raw, 1970s style horror thriller. I've just started a straight comedy, too, with no deaths or anything like that. I'm also working on two other outlines with two directors, and if all goes well I'll get to write the scripts for those - one's a straight horror, one's a sort of adventure/mystery/horror. And I mention this in every interview, just in case they're reading: I'd kill to have a go at the Preacher graphic novels. I think they'd make a superb set of movies, or even just one. So if you're out there, give us a chance!”

website: www.jamesmoran.blogspot.com

Pete Morgan has acted in a few films that I have reviewed and very kindly agreed to answer a few questions by e-mail in November 2009.

How did you get started in acting?
“I got started in acting about four years ago as Pete the doorman in a film called Clubbing to Death, then went on to do several other really small parts in other productions. Got a lead role in a film called The Estate with Sean Brosnan, on which the writer lost his finance so I co-financed the film and co-produced it over a year and a half. Then I came up with the concept and idea for The Codfather and BritPack Productions Ltd was formed and we now have a slate of financed films ready to go in 2010. I have one of the main roles in National Task Force which is set to go in 2010 and Vauxhall Crossed with Dannii Minogue and Hugo Speer. I have just finished Dead Cert playing the part of Baxter for Steve Lawson. That film includes Craig Fairbrass, Jason Flemyng, Dexter Fletcher and Steven Berkoff. I also played Barry in Just for the Record too.”

How did you get involved with A Day of Violence and what are your thoughts on the finished film?
“I got involved in A Day of Violence by a friend of mine called Chris Fosh. The part was offered to Danny Dyer, so I was told, but he had other commitments so I got offered the part. Even though it was fairly small, I enjoyed it a lot. And Darren Ward and the rest of the cast and crew were a great bunch of misfits to work with - lol. Hopefully working with Darren on his next one.”

When you were making Kung Fu Flid, did you have any doubts about the subject matter or the reaction that the film might provoke?
“To be honest I have never looked at these things as a problem. I treat everyone the same. It’s the people who keep going on about it all the time that make it a problem. I really hit it off with Mat Fraser and to be honest he is probably the most able person I have met, especially his mental attitude. Okay, he has short arms, but when working as closely as I did with him you take no notice. He does everything himself - respect Mat. Great martial artist... great to work with you and great being his fight director.”

What sort of working relationship have been able to build up with producers or directors that you have worked with on more than one film, such as Jonathan Sothcott and Steve Lawson?
“Jonathan Sothcott I worked with on Flid, Just for the Record and Dead Cert. This is a genuine guy who is a true professional gentleman. A few other people did not like him but I just really hit it off with him. Great in the game. Steve Lawson, well he has been good to me and I have known him for several years now. I see Steve as a true friend - I even went to his kid’s christening. He’s coming on in film and proving to be a good director. I feel Steve has found his comfort zone.”

What can you tell me about your project Mrs Impossible?
“If I tell ya I will have to kill you. This one’s still quite under wraps at the mo. We have done quite a few script changes etc. All I can say is it’s going to be a good one - check back soon and I can give you a bit more.”

Where do you see your career going in the future?
“That’s always a hard question. I would love to be a successful actor/producer, as these are the two things I enjoy doing, and secure a film business for my children to eventually get involved in. Acting is my mistress, producing is my wife. I am learning all the time in acting. When I was on Flid, working 21 days with Frank Harper was great, he taught me so much. I learnt so much from him, a great experience. And I would love to do more work with Jonathan and Steve.”

interview originally posted 11th November 2009

Director: Ted Newsom, Wayne Berwick
Writer: Ted Newsom
Producer: Ted Newsom
Cast: Kenneth Tobey, Brinke Stevens and, well, everybody
Country: USA
Year of release: 2005
Reviewed from: screener disc

The Naked Monster is a film that took 21 years to make and cost almost as many dollars. It is both an homage to, and a spoof of, 1950s sci-fi and horror movies which goes beyond anything that could be called ‘affectionate’, stopping only slight short of stalkerdom. The film has been carefully constructed to give the impression that it has been cobbled together using two VHS machines, a stopwatch and the complete literary works of Bill Warren. But is it just an impression?

It’s not so much the story that matters here: the story is a by-the-numbers account of a giant ‘monstersaurus erectus’ terrorising California by stomping around goofily and occasionally treading on or eating people. The script of The Naked Monster is basically what you would get if you threw every monster movie plot filmed between 1955 and 1965 into a blender, then scooped out 90 minutes’ worth and baked at gas mark seven. No, what matters here is how the film has been made.

Like some mad DJ mixing and scratching old records, Ted Newsom has ‘sampled’ a pile of old movies to create something new. Then, in among the clips - all from trailers or public domain titles - he has woven a central storyline in which a local sheriff (RG Wilson), a federal agent (John Goodwin, also in Dr Horror’s Erotic House of Idiots and Tremors) and a paleo-ichthyologist with a talent for pouring great cups of coffee (Brinke Stevens: Hell Asylum, Invisible Mom, Witchouse 3 and, oh, everything pretty much) attempt to deal with the giant, three-eyed beastie of the title. They are assisted by receptionist Connie (Cathy Cahn: Dr Hackenstein) and by one of the few people on the planet with experience of defeating monsters, Colonel Patrick Hendry (the late great Kenneth Tobey, reprising his character from The Thing).

And therein lies the central conceit of Newsom’s hugely entertaining film. Anyone can edit together clips from old movies (though few would have the detailed knowledge, patient precision or lack of a social life required to do it as well as Ted manages) but that’s just an extended montage until you add actors. Not just any old actors, but the actors who were in those very films - as the characters they played, 40 or 50 years on.

Thus we have Robert Cornthwaite as Dr Carrington from The Thing, John Agar and Lori Nelson as Dr Clete Ferguson and Helen Dobson from Revenge of the Creature, Ann Robinson and Les Tremayne as Dr Sylvia Van Buren and General Mann from The War of the Worlds, Paul Marco as his Ed Wood character Kelton the Cop, Robert Clarke as Major Allison from Beyond the Time Barrier, Dragnet announcer George Fenneman (who was also in The Thing) as the narrator, and John Harmon and Jeanne Carmen from The Monster of Piedras Blancas.

In a cast which simply staggers belief, we also find cameos by the likes of Linnea Quigley, Michelle Bauer, Gloria Talbott, Bob Burns (both in and out of his Tracy the Gorilla costume), Ron Ford (miming to ‘Fa-Ro-Lee, Fa-Ro-La’ from Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man!), producer JR Bookwalter (The Dead Next Door), screenwriters Sean O’Bannon (Hybrid, Final Examination) and Pete Atkins (Hellraiser II, III and IV), journalists Bill Warren and Stuart Galbraith IV, Simpsons writer Mike Reiss and the ubiquitous Forry Ackerman as ‘Flustered Man’, possibly his finest ever performance: “You should build a robot double of the monster, and it could perhaps do some sort of erotic dance...”.

Very few of the actors actually appear on screen with anyone else, but that’s part of the fun, resulting in a hilarious sequence where an appeal for help is put out on TV and a whole bunch of monster veterans telephone the Sheriff’s office to offer advice based on their own screen experience. And just in case you’re not sure who anyone is, there is usually a model, mask or poster in the background to clue you in.

Combining the main cast of Tobey, Stevens et al, the seemingly endless cameos and the innumerable film clips, Newsom has created a film which zings with corny gags like some sort of feature-length Goon Show. He knows that it’s not enough to have the clips, the old-time stars and an entirely gratuitous sequence of Brinke Stevens in the shower (which, with the addition of one line, is even more gratuitously repeated among the ‘deleted scenes’). Ted knows that you need a laff-a-minute script, careful direction and above all precise editing. Having written, directed and produced numerous horror movie documentaries including Ed Wood: Look Back in Angora and Flesh and Blood: The Hammer Heritage of Horror (Peter Cushing’s last ever work), Ted Newsom is well-placed to know what clips to use, where to find them and how to combine them for the best effect.

The Naked Monster is a sort of last hurrah in many ways. It was the last film role for Tobey who died in December 2002. Agar, Tremayne, Cornthwaite, Fenneman and Talbott also all died before the film was completed (and Marco has passed away in the year or so since then). This stands as a warm tribute to each and every one of them.

The DVD has a director’s commentary, several deleted scenes (including a lengthy spoof of Titanic which was, I think, wisely cut), a stills gallery and an archive interview with Kenneth Tobey.

MJS rating: A

Director: Nonzee Nimibutr
Writer: Nonzee Nimibutr
Producer: Visute Poolvaralaks
Cast: Indhira Jaroenpura, Winai Kraibutr
Year of release: 1999
Country: Thailand
Reviewed from: HK VCD (Ocean Shores Ltd)

I had heard good things about Nang Nak: I knew it had won some prizes and I was very impressed with Nonzee Nimibutr’s contribution to Three, so this was a film I went looking for.

The story, based on an ancient Thai legend, is very simple. Mak (Thai heartthrob Winai Kraibutr: Snaker, Krai Thong, The Hotel!, Kaew Kon Lek) and Nak (19-year-old Indhira Jaroenpura) are a young couple, split up when Nak is called up to fight in a war. He is almost killed but nursed back to health by monks. Nak was pregnant when her husband left and she gives birth while he is away, not knowing whether he is alive or dead, but she has sworn to wait for him.

Eventually, Mak returns to their little house beside the river, away from the village and there is a tearful reunion with his wife and their baby Dang. But why do the villagers, including his best friend Um (Pracha Thawongfla), shun Mak? The answer, as shown in a flashback, is that on the stormy night when Nak went into labour, she died. Nak and Dang are both ghosts.

This is a heart-wrenchingly sad and romantic, as well as occasionally scary, movie. Nak has no reason to think that his beautiful wife is anything other than normal, and he rejects attempts by Um and others to persuade him that he is living with ghosts. Nak is feared throughout the village and people are dying through her supernatural intervention. One group wants to burn her house down, while others are bringing in an exorcist (rather unfortunately called a ‘ghost banister’ in the generally okay subtitles - that could be a corruption of ‘ghost banisher’ or ‘ghostbuster’!).

But Nak isn’t evil, just dead. She has sworn to stay with her husband and her only crimes are loyalty and love that reach from beyond the grave. The film culminates not in the usual magical battle between good and evil but in a goodbye scene between two tragic lovers, just as it started, but with even less hope of salvation. Along the way, there are some horrific images, from the mutilated bodies of Mak’s regiment to a desiccated old woman’s body being eaten by lizards. One of the few major special effects sequences is a dream when Mak sees his comrade Prig crumble and die, which only just works, suggesting that Nimibutr was well-advised to concentrate on horror that emanates from character and situation.

On the basis of this and Three, there’s no doubt in my mind that Nimibutr is the hottest Thai director at the moment, especially as he was also producer of Tears of the Black Tiger, the first populaist Thai film to get UK theatrical distribution since, well, probably ever. What is particularly gratifying is that his work is true to its origins. He’s not imitating western or Japanese cinema but making genuinely Thai films that explore the feelings and fears of people living in the Thai countryside. The forests and rivers of Thailand are as much a part of his work as the people. The limited settings of this film don’t give cinematographer Nattawut Kittikhun much of a chance to shine however, although the night-time scenes are well handled.

Unfortunately this Hong Kong VCD (in Thai with Chinese and English subs) is lousy quality, an overly dark transfer with far, far more and worse artefecting than I have ever seen on a disc before, which distracts from the film. Maybe I should have invested in the DVD. The work of production designer Ek Eiamchurn (who conceived the story with Nimibutr and scriptwriter Wisid Sartsanatieng) and art directors Akkadej Kaewhod and Ratchanon Kayunngan is severely hampered by the poor image quality, although Pakawat Waiwittaya and Chatchai Pongprapapun’s evocative music is unaffected.

The biggest loss however is a crucial scene when Mak sees his wife reach through the floorboards of their house-on-stilts, stretching her arm to retrieve something several feet below, which finally proves to her horrified husband that she is a supernatural entity. I only know this scene is included because other reviews mention it. On the Ocean Shores VCD it’s completely impossible to tell what Mak is looking at.

There is a movie called Nang Nak Part 2, as yet unavailable with subtitles, but it seems to have no direct connection with this one. Unfortunately the website at www.nangnak.com appears to have been taken down but the Thailand Life website has some useful info about the legend which has been filmed more than twenty times. Nonzee Nimibutr’s version was a massive domestic hit, grossing more at the Thai box office than Titanic, and has been rightly compared to The Sixth Sense in terms of not just its serious, thoughtful, character-led approach to horror but also its enormous success with both audiences and critics. Nang Nak won four awards at the Asia-Pacific Film Festival; Nimibutr took home the Golden Elephant from the Bangkok Film Festival as well as scooping a prize at Rotterdam.

Kraibutr and Jaroenpura are the only two cast members credited in the English opening titles. The rest of the cast includes Manit Meekaewjaroen and Montree Katekaew as priests, and also Pramote Suksatit, Patchariya Nakboonchai and the gloriously named Boonsong Yooyangyeng.

So - who is Nonzee Nimibutr? Born in 1962, he was raised by his grandmother after his parents abandoned him. When he was 17 his mother re-entered his life and told him to become an engineer but instead he studied Audiovisual Communication at the University of Silpakorn alongside Wisid Sartsanatieng (aka Wisit Satsanatieng) with whom he would later collaborate. Nimibutr made his name as a director of TV ads and music videos, working for a company called Music Train for four years before founding his own company, Buddy Film and Video Productions in 1988. To date he has directed more than 180 commercials and more than 70 videos.

In 1997 he moved into feature directing with 2499 Anthaphan Khrong Mueang (various spellings exist!) which was well received at festivals under its English title Dang Bireley and the Young Gangsters, but more importantly it was a massive domestic hit and is generally credited with kickstarting modern Thai cinema. The records set by Dang Bireley were then broken by Nang Nak, which was Nimibutr‘s second feature and raked in 150 million bhat at the box office, equivalent to 3.9 million US dollars. Nimibutr has also directed for Thai television, receiving a Gold Award for the miniseries Monday Short Story.

As a producer, Nimibutr oversaw Bangkok Dangerous, the award-winning first film from Danny and Oxide Pang who went on to make the international smash The Eye. He also gave his old friend Wisid Sartsanatieng, who had written the screenplays for Dang Bireley and Nang Nak, his first directing job. The result was the internationally acclaimed Tears of the Black Tiger, possibly the first ever Thai western.

Nimibutr was credited as co-producer on Tanit Jitnukul’s war epic Bangrajan - a sort of Thai Braveheart - in 2000 and also produced the 2001 romantic comedy Monrak Transistor, directed by Pen-Ek Ratanaruang. That same year he returned to directing with the controversial erotic drama Jan Dara, the first production from his new company Cinemasia, which was based on an infamous 1966 novel. Even though Nimibutr himself was by then sitting on the Thai Film Censorship Board, the film still had to be trimmed before its domestic release. Last year he directed ‘The Wheel’, the Thai contribution to the three-way co-production Three, and he is now reportedly at work on a movie set in a monstery called Mai Hed Prated Thai (which translates as something akin to ‘Footnote, Thailand’).

Nimibutr is divorced with one daughter, born in 1995. There is a January 2000 interview with him, conducted by Canadian film-maker and festival organiser Mitch Davis (Divided Into Zero), in the excellent FAB Press book Fear Without Frontiers.

MJS rating: A-