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Your upcoming movie Karpenter - in a few words, what is it
about?
Karpenter
is about a serial killer who escapes asylum and starts
killing everyone in the small town of Hamilton, Montana. Now I might be taking a wild guess here, but the
film being a slasher movie, its title being somewhat similar to John
Carpenter's last name isn't a complete coincidence, right? Right!
Ha ha! We love John Carpenter's films and they totally inspired us to make
this movie. I mean, I always wanted to make a Halloween-like
movie! With Karpenter
being a slasher movie, is that a genre at all dear to
you, and what do you think makes your film stick out of the crowd? I
do enjoy the good old fashion slasher movies like Halloween,
Friday the 13th and so on. I especially love the 1980's and some 90's films' style
and look. I wanted to design my film after those films from that time. Our
film isn't a period film, but has that feel of a 1980's slasher movie. I
made sure to keep out all computer special effects and stick to the good
old fashion practical special effects and gore. (Other)
sources of inspiration when writing Karpenter? I
love a number of the Elm Street films and
Terminator and T2 that
have that slasher feel to it. I watched a number of 80's horror films that
fueled my excitement when making this movie. Now
slasher movies tend to have their fair share of gore almost by definition
- so what can you tell us about the gruesome bits in your movie, and how
were they achieved? Well yes, I began with doing the
special effects myself utilizing my low-budget-no-budget gore tricks. My
pals Tim Nydell (Karpenter) and Will Ponder (Boon) and I got together to
shoot the first kill scene. I made a dummy upper torso rig with a blood
pump for this decapatation gag we did. I used a lot of chocolate and
strawberry syrup ha ha. But, when I posted my vlog videos about making
this film, Sandra Stuckey of Siren Studio FX contacted me and said she would
love to help us out. Sandra and her daughter Casey Lynn Stuckey (Monica)
came on board and did all our makeup special effects and hair and makeup
styles, too. That helped us out on the film so much and they did a great
job. I made sure all our gore gags were not going to be CGI or hybrid CGI special effects. I kept all the special effects practical so it would keep
that feel of the horror films from the 80's. I just love that stuff so
much.
Do talk about overall directorial
approach to your story at hand! Well, I knew I needed
to keep the feel and tone of a 80's horror film. Plus, I was going to
shoot this movie in only a month. I wanted to challenge myself to make a
film on a strict schedule and on a $0 budget. We did it! I did it! Ha ha!
I still can't believe it. What can you tell us
about Karpenter's key cast, and why exactly these people? I
used local actors from my hometown of Hamilton, Montana. We have a local
community theater here called the Hamilton Players. The playhouse is ran
by Denise Rose (Theater Director in Karpenter) and I utilized a number of
actors from there. My friend Tim Nydell told me that if I made a slasher
film, he totally wanted to play the killer since he loved the
Halloween
films and Friday the 13th movies.
So, I cast him to play the character and
he helped come up with the name for our killer. Then, I cast myself and my wife
(Danielle Ackerman who plays Winnie) and Tim's wife Becky Nydell (Debrah).
Our lead is played by Lydia Jessop (Sara) - I saw her perform with Tim in a
play at the theater and contacted her after that about the movie and she
came on board. Then, we grabbed D.J. Sherwood (Mark) who had acted before
on film and said yes to the part. Don Earl (Nugent) I know through my day
job at the television station and he auditioned and was cast. Will Ponder
(Boon) was cast after I bumped into him while I was out and about and told
him about the movie and he was happy to help out and I cast him in a part.
I went around, asked local buisnesses if they'd like to be featured in the
fim in cameos as a victims in the movie. So, we got the Hamilton
Players,
Chapter One Bookstore, Adore' Hair and Design Salon, and River Rising
Bakery to be in the film. I cast the film with friends and family and
locals. A
few words about the shoot as such, and the on-set atmosphere?
So,
I kept an open mind to changes that may occure or need to happen while on
set due to lack of budget and schedule. Plus, I knew it would in fact
create a look and feel to our film no matter what. The other thing I made
sure that every shoot day or night was fun for us all. And we had a blast! The
$64 question of course, when and where will Karpenter
be released? We
are currently working on that. I've entered the film into a number of festivals
and had a festival contact me about the film already. We are currently
looking for distribution, too. But very very soon. Slasher
films are for some reason especially prone to sequels - so is there at all
a possibility there will ever be a Karpenter 2 ... and/or other
future projects you'd like to share? There could very
well be a Karpenter
sequel or prequel. My friend Tim Nydell (Karpenter)
already wants to see a number of Karpenters made. In fact he told me he
started developing a Karpenter 2 script already, ha ha. My wife even said
after seeing our character Nugent talk about Karpenter's past that there
is for sure a prequel there. We will see what happens. And yes, as of now,
I have a noir black and white miniseries called Grid Street
coming out soon this next month on our YouTube Channel and Amazon
Prime/Amazon Video Streaming it's like Dick Tracy and
Sin City meets the
Batman Animated Series kind of show. And I'm developing a new science
fiction horror feature film called Spacelock that will be
coming out soon this next year. Will Ponder (Boon) and I are developing a
project near this summer to shoot that he and a friend have been writing,
too. So, a lot of cool fun things are coming soon, ha ha. Your/your movie's
website, Facebook, whatever else?
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My website:
http://www.christianackerman.com
- and Karpenter
site is
http://www.fastcoastproductions.com
and Facebook page http://www.facebook.com/karpenterthemovie
and IMDb page is http://www.imdb.com/title/tt7664010
and a BTS is at https://vimeo.com/245036043
FastCoast Productions YouTube channel:
https://www.youtube.com/fastcoastproductions
Anything else you're
dying to mention and I have merely forgotten to ask? Be
sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel to keep up to date on Karpenter
news and upcoming new projects. Please visit our site and contact us if
you would like to get involved with our films by donating or volunteering
and so on. Thanks so much! Thanks
for the interview!
Thank you for getting us out there! My pleasure!
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