Tagdirector interview
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One of the best indie horror films of 2020 is writer-director Brandon Christenson‘s Z which premiered on Shudder earlier this year. The film, which we scored as a 5 out of 5 in our review, is haunting and downright unnerving. Of course, when I had the opportunity to pick Christenson’s brain I couldn’t resist. The film, co-written by Colin Minihan, follows a family whose son has become dangerous. He blames everything on his invisible friend Z, but it doesn’t take long for Elizabeth, the mother (Keegan Connor Tracy), to come to the realization that Z may very well be real. Once she realizes that her son is being influenced by a dark entity she reaches out to a psychiatrist played by Stephen McHattie, leading it to be revealed that she’s faced the entity before. Christenson made waves in the genre before Z was released with his 2017 breakout film Still/Born which follows a new mother who lost one of her
Continue reading →
InterviewsMoviesNewsTrailers
Carlo Mirabella-Davis‘ thriller Swallow (review) is heading towards its March release. I had a chance to review it ahead of time. I found it bold and beautiful, so when I got the chance to interview its writer-director, so I jumped at the chance. On the surface, Hunter (Haley Bennett) appears to have it all. A newly pregnant housewife, she seems content to spend her time tending to an immaculate home and doting on her Ken-doll husband, Richie (Austin Stowell). However, as the pressure to meet her controlling in-laws and husband’s rigid expectations mounts, cracks begin to appear in her carefully created facade. Hunter develops a dangerous habit, and a dark secret from her past seeps out in the form of a disorder called pica – a condition that has her compulsively swallowing inedible, and oftentimes life-threatening, objects. A provocative and squirm-inducing psychological thriller, Swallow follows one woman’s unraveling as she struggles to reclaim independence in the face of an oppressive
Continue reading →
IndieInterviewsMoviesNewsTrailers
I had the pleasure of sitting down with writer-director Carl Strathie to discuss his new film Dark Encounter, a sci-fi thriller about a family’s struggle with loss and the truth of a dark mystery discovered with the help of otherworldly beings. The following is our conversation. Horror Fuel: “If you will, tell us about your most recent film Dark Encounter?” Carl Strathie: “The story is about a little girl who has gone missing. We follow the family a year after on the day of her memorial and they are grieving and they’re coping with the fact that no one knows what happened. It’s about a family struggling. There’s a big twist at the ending. Did you see it coming?” Horror Fuel: “No, I did not, which is a miracle, I always see what’s coming in movies. I like not knowing what happens right up until the end.” Carl Strathie: “Good, that’s good.” Horror Fuel: “I’m glad that you explore the
Continue reading →
InterviewsMoviesNewsTrailers
Indie filmmaker Donna McRae’s new indie film Lost Gully Road has just been released. I had the pleasure of talking with McRae about the film and other projects. The dark minimalistic film starring Adele Perovic as a woman waiting at a remote cabin for her sister, not knowing that she is not alone there in the forest. Horror Fuel: “Will you tell us about your journey becoming a filmmaker?” Donna McRae: “After drama school, I was an actress doing short films and advertisements, but I met up with a young director in film school and I was playing the leading role in his film and I started writing. When I left drama school, after about two years, all the roles that I wanted didn’t happen and so I just started writing screenplays to pass the time. I felt like I liked that better. I like creating story worlds and I was basically trying to write things for myself to be
Continue reading →
IndieInterviewsMovies
One thing we need more of in the horror genre is more holiday horror films. When I heard about Holiday Hell, both a holiday film and an anthology, I wanted to know more, so I went straight to the source, Holiday Hell writer and director Jeff Ferrell who talked about the film and more during our interview. Horror Fuel: “Your film Holiday Hell is an anthology. Can you tell us a little about the segments? Jeff Ferrell: “Holiday Hell is an anthology. It’s in the tradition of movies like Creepshow, Trick ‘r Treat, Tales from the Crypt, and Tales from the Hood. Essentially, it’s five short segments all woven together and the twist in each segment is based around a different holiday. One of the segments is around Hanukkah, another around Valentine’s day, and then we have Christmas, and the winter solstice. Each segment is its own little contained story. There’s a wrap-around that ties everything together. The wrap-around stars
Continue reading →
IndieInterviewsMoviesNews
Actor turned director Cuyle Carvin has been a busy man lately between his roles on DC Universe’s “Swamp Thing”, “The Walking Dead”, and directing his haunted doll film, simply titled Dolls, which Cuyle sat down with me to discuss. In Dolls, a struggling children’s book author and his rebellious teenage daughter move into a house they’ve inherited and find mysterious dolls in the attic. They soon learn that the dolls have a sinister — and deadly — past. Thomas Downey, Trinity Simpson and genre icon Dee Wallace star in Dolls, written by Justin Hawkins and Josh Hawkins, with Jeff Miller (Ouija House, The Toybox) also contributing to the story. Horror Fuel: “Do you mind if I ask about your role of The Walking Dead? And playing a Savior?” Cuyle Carvin: “It’s my favorite show. Half of my career, especially at the start, I played a lot of bad guys. Bad guys are more fun I think. Most actors will probably
Continue reading →
InterviewsMoviesNewsThriller
Writer-director Tommy Stovall‘s (Hate Crime, Aaron’s Blood, Sedona) new film Room For Rent, starring horror icon Lin Shaye, will soon be released. Ahead of its arrival, I sat down with Stovall to discuss the horror thriller, his previous work, and what he’s doing now. Room for Rent centers on a lonely widow Joyce (Shaye) who rents out a room to make ends meet. She meets mysterious drifter Bob and takes him in as a tenant, but soon becomes obsessed with her much younger guest, making him the object of her deepest romantic fantasies. When a friend’s betrayal derails Joyce’s fantasy world, she seizes control of her own destiny with a deadly mission. Horror Fuel: “Your award-winning film Aaron’s Blood is a unique twist on the vampire genre, how did that idea come to you?” Tommy: “Well, the idea actually, my son played the child vampire in the film. When he was a lot younger, maybe five years old or so,
Continue reading →
InterviewsMoviesNews
Conrad Faraj‘s (The Shadow People, The Candyman Conspiracy) latest film Fighting the Sky is rapidly approaching its February release date. Ahead of the film’s arrival, I sat down with Conrad to ask a few questions about the alien invasion film and the many movies he has coming out soon. Horror Fuel: “How did you get into the film industry?” Conrad Faraj: “I’ve always wanted to be a filmmaker since I was very, very young. I remember writing a lot of fan fiction. As I started writing more and more, I decided to make them into movies. I turned short stories into short movies. Ever since then, I’ve been making bigger and bigger movies. Here I am now.” Horror Fuel: “How would describe your latest film, Fighting the Sky?” Conrad Faraj: “Fighting the Sky is a science fiction adventure film with horror elements. It is a film that I’ve been dreaming of doing for a very long time. It’s a film
Continue reading →
IndieInterviewsMoviesNews
Megan Freels Johnston, that’s a name you should get familiar with because you are going to be hearing it a lot in the very near future. I sat down with the writer/director/producer to talk about her past film The Ice Cream Truck and her upcoming films, The Hunting Season and Payback’s a Bitch. Horror Fuel: “Where did you find the inspiration for your film The Ice Cream Truck?” Megan Freels Johnston: “I lived in a neighborhood that happens to have a lot of ice cream trucks and I had just moved there. What struck me about those ice cream trucks was that they were actually selling the whole ice cream cones and banana splits. When I grew up they just sold wrapped up ice cream bars. It seemed so old-fashioned to me. I had just had my second child and I was home with the baby. I kept hearing the trucks go by with the music. It occurred to me
Continue reading →
InterviewsMoviesNews
Writer-director Orson Oblowitz‘s (Corbin Nash) noir crime thriller The Queen of Hollywood BLVD has just arrived on Digital. The film stars Rosemary Hochschild (Supergirl) as a strong woman willing to do whatever it takes to keep her club. “On her 60th birthday, Mary (Rosemary Hochschild) finds her past coming back to haunt her, as a 25-year-old debt means the mob is ready to collect with interest, their sights set on the strip club she has run all her life. There’s only one thing she can do: Mount her defenses and stand her ground in a spiral of violence and revenge that will leave no one in her life untouched.” The film, also stars Ana Mulvoy Ten, Roger Guenveur Smith and the late Michael Parks (‘Kill Bill’, Red State, From Dusk Till Dawn) in his final film appearance. Oblowitz took the time out of his busy schedule to do an interview with me, revealing surprising details of the film and discussing
Continue reading →
More from director interview
InterviewsMoviesNewsShudderStreaming TVTrailers
One of the best indie horror films of 2020 is writer-director Brandon Christenson‘s Z which premiered on Shudder earlier this year. The film, which we scored as a 5 out of 5 in our review, is haunting and downright unnerving. Of course, when I had the opportunity to pick Christenson’s brain I couldn’t resist. The film, co-written by Colin Minihan, follows a family whose son has become dangerous. He blames everything on his invisible friend Z, but it doesn’t take long for Elizabeth, the mother (Keegan Connor Tracy), to come to the realization that Z may very well be real. Once she realizes that her son is being influenced by a dark entity she reaches out to a psychiatrist played by Stephen McHattie, leading it to be revealed that she’s faced the entity before. Christenson made waves in the genre before Z was released with his 2017 breakout film Still/Born which follows a new mother who lost one of her
Continue reading →
InterviewsMoviesNewsTrailers
Carlo Mirabella-Davis‘ thriller Swallow (review) is heading towards its March release. I had a chance to review it ahead of time. I found it bold and beautiful, so when I got the chance to interview its writer-director, so I jumped at the chance. On the surface, Hunter (Haley Bennett) appears to have it all. A newly pregnant housewife, she seems content to spend her time tending to an immaculate home and doting on her Ken-doll husband, Richie (Austin Stowell). However, as the pressure to meet her controlling in-laws and husband’s rigid expectations mounts, cracks begin to appear in her carefully created facade. Hunter develops a dangerous habit, and a dark secret from her past seeps out in the form of a disorder called pica – a condition that has her compulsively swallowing inedible, and oftentimes life-threatening, objects. A provocative and squirm-inducing psychological thriller, Swallow follows one woman’s unraveling as she struggles to reclaim independence in the face of an oppressive
Continue reading →
IndieInterviewsMoviesNewsTrailers
I had the pleasure of sitting down with writer-director Carl Strathie to discuss his new film Dark Encounter, a sci-fi thriller about a family’s struggle with loss and the truth of a dark mystery discovered with the help of otherworldly beings. The following is our conversation. Horror Fuel: “If you will, tell us about your most recent film Dark Encounter?” Carl Strathie: “The story is about a little girl who has gone missing. We follow the family a year after on the day of her memorial and they are grieving and they’re coping with the fact that no one knows what happened. It’s about a family struggling. There’s a big twist at the ending. Did you see it coming?” Horror Fuel: “No, I did not, which is a miracle, I always see what’s coming in movies. I like not knowing what happens right up until the end.” Carl Strathie: “Good, that’s good.” Horror Fuel: “I’m glad that you explore the
Continue reading →
InterviewsMoviesNewsTrailers
Indie filmmaker Donna McRae’s new indie film Lost Gully Road has just been released. I had the pleasure of talking with McRae about the film and other projects. The dark minimalistic film starring Adele Perovic as a woman waiting at a remote cabin for her sister, not knowing that she is not alone there in the forest. Horror Fuel: “Will you tell us about your journey becoming a filmmaker?” Donna McRae: “After drama school, I was an actress doing short films and advertisements, but I met up with a young director in film school and I was playing the leading role in his film and I started writing. When I left drama school, after about two years, all the roles that I wanted didn’t happen and so I just started writing screenplays to pass the time. I felt like I liked that better. I like creating story worlds and I was basically trying to write things for myself to be
Continue reading →
IndieInterviewsMovies
One thing we need more of in the horror genre is more holiday horror films. When I heard about Holiday Hell, both a holiday film and an anthology, I wanted to know more, so I went straight to the source, Holiday Hell writer and director Jeff Ferrell who talked about the film and more during our interview. Horror Fuel: “Your film Holiday Hell is an anthology. Can you tell us a little about the segments? Jeff Ferrell: “Holiday Hell is an anthology. It’s in the tradition of movies like Creepshow, Trick ‘r Treat, Tales from the Crypt, and Tales from the Hood. Essentially, it’s five short segments all woven together and the twist in each segment is based around a different holiday. One of the segments is around Hanukkah, another around Valentine’s day, and then we have Christmas, and the winter solstice. Each segment is its own little contained story. There’s a wrap-around that ties everything together. The wrap-around stars
Continue reading →
IndieInterviewsMoviesNews
Actor turned director Cuyle Carvin has been a busy man lately between his roles on DC Universe’s “Swamp Thing”, “The Walking Dead”, and directing his haunted doll film, simply titled Dolls, which Cuyle sat down with me to discuss. In Dolls, a struggling children’s book author and his rebellious teenage daughter move into a house they’ve inherited and find mysterious dolls in the attic. They soon learn that the dolls have a sinister — and deadly — past. Thomas Downey, Trinity Simpson and genre icon Dee Wallace star in Dolls, written by Justin Hawkins and Josh Hawkins, with Jeff Miller (Ouija House, The Toybox) also contributing to the story. Horror Fuel: “Do you mind if I ask about your role of The Walking Dead? And playing a Savior?” Cuyle Carvin: “It’s my favorite show. Half of my career, especially at the start, I played a lot of bad guys. Bad guys are more fun I think. Most actors will probably
Continue reading →
InterviewsMoviesNewsThriller
Writer-director Tommy Stovall‘s (Hate Crime, Aaron’s Blood, Sedona) new film Room For Rent, starring horror icon Lin Shaye, will soon be released. Ahead of its arrival, I sat down with Stovall to discuss the horror thriller, his previous work, and what he’s doing now. Room for Rent centers on a lonely widow Joyce (Shaye) who rents out a room to make ends meet. She meets mysterious drifter Bob and takes him in as a tenant, but soon becomes obsessed with her much younger guest, making him the object of her deepest romantic fantasies. When a friend’s betrayal derails Joyce’s fantasy world, she seizes control of her own destiny with a deadly mission. Horror Fuel: “Your award-winning film Aaron’s Blood is a unique twist on the vampire genre, how did that idea come to you?” Tommy: “Well, the idea actually, my son played the child vampire in the film. When he was a lot younger, maybe five years old or so,
Continue reading →
InterviewsMoviesNews
Conrad Faraj‘s (The Shadow People, The Candyman Conspiracy) latest film Fighting the Sky is rapidly approaching its February release date. Ahead of the film’s arrival, I sat down with Conrad to ask a few questions about the alien invasion film and the many movies he has coming out soon. Horror Fuel: “How did you get into the film industry?” Conrad Faraj: “I’ve always wanted to be a filmmaker since I was very, very young. I remember writing a lot of fan fiction. As I started writing more and more, I decided to make them into movies. I turned short stories into short movies. Ever since then, I’ve been making bigger and bigger movies. Here I am now.” Horror Fuel: “How would describe your latest film, Fighting the Sky?” Conrad Faraj: “Fighting the Sky is a science fiction adventure film with horror elements. It is a film that I’ve been dreaming of doing for a very long time. It’s a film
Continue reading →
IndieInterviewsMoviesNews
Megan Freels Johnston, that’s a name you should get familiar with because you are going to be hearing it a lot in the very near future. I sat down with the writer/director/producer to talk about her past film The Ice Cream Truck and her upcoming films, The Hunting Season and Payback’s a Bitch. Horror Fuel: “Where did you find the inspiration for your film The Ice Cream Truck?” Megan Freels Johnston: “I lived in a neighborhood that happens to have a lot of ice cream trucks and I had just moved there. What struck me about those ice cream trucks was that they were actually selling the whole ice cream cones and banana splits. When I grew up they just sold wrapped up ice cream bars. It seemed so old-fashioned to me. I had just had my second child and I was home with the baby. I kept hearing the trucks go by with the music. It occurred to me
Continue reading →
InterviewsMoviesNews
Writer-director Orson Oblowitz‘s (Corbin Nash) noir crime thriller The Queen of Hollywood BLVD has just arrived on Digital. The film stars Rosemary Hochschild (Supergirl) as a strong woman willing to do whatever it takes to keep her club. “On her 60th birthday, Mary (Rosemary Hochschild) finds her past coming back to haunt her, as a 25-year-old debt means the mob is ready to collect with interest, their sights set on the strip club she has run all her life. There’s only one thing she can do: Mount her defenses and stand her ground in a spiral of violence and revenge that will leave no one in her life untouched.” The film, also stars Ana Mulvoy Ten, Roger Guenveur Smith and the late Michael Parks (‘Kill Bill’, Red State, From Dusk Till Dawn) in his final film appearance. Oblowitz took the time out of his busy schedule to do an interview with me, revealing surprising details of the film and discussing
Continue reading →
