|
| |
|
More news on Gravedancers
Clare Kramer's new film. |
 It’s cold. It’s dark. And it is very muddy… French actor/Gallic icon Tcheky (THE CORE) Karyo is wrestling with a possessed coffin which has shifted from a horizontal position in an excavated trenchlike grave to a vertical angle after "eating" one of his parapsychology students and is about to burrow deep into the earth, dragging the young woman to Hell.
The coffin trembles. Karyo struggles. Then director Mike (THE CONVENT) Mendez calls "Cut!" and the crew of THE GRAVEDANCERS takes a deep breath. When Mendez adds that the shot is a "print," crewmembers collectively exhale and move on to setting up the next shot.
Make that "shots," because as the filming of Mendez’s new fright feature rushes toward its wrap date, director of photography David (SAW) Armstrong has three cameras and crews running in three adjacent "graves"—trenches dug into a shallow hillside of the Greensboro, North Carolina location. Mendez races over the deep red clay to check on each setup as the crew busts ass to get them ready.
Welcome to the nocturnal world of THE GRAVEDANCERS.
"After I made THE CONVENT, I was offered lots of low-budget scripts to direct," says Mendez later, thawing out in a heated room following "lunch" at 12:30 a.m. "None of them really excited me, and I decided I’d hold back until I had a script in hand I really wanted to make—and this is it."
THE GRAVEDANCERS stars the aforementioned Karyo, Dominic (BLADE: TRINITY) Purcell, Clare Kramer (BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER’s evil goddess Glory), sultry Josie Maran, who played one of Dracula’s bewinged vampire vixens in VAN HELSING, and Megahn Perry, who played Mo, THE CONVENT’s oddball Goth chick. Written by Brad Keene and Chris Skinner, who penned a draft of the upcoming PROM NIGHT remake, the film is, in Mendez’s words, "a movie like POLTERGEIST, but harder. We’re spilling some blood here."
THE GRAVEDANCERS centers on what happens after friends Harris (Purcell), Kira (Maran) and Sid (Marcus Thomas) unwittingly desecrate a graveyard during a drunken wake in the memory of college buddy Devin. In doing so, the naive students raise the restless spirits of troubled and evil souls who attach themselves to each character. Needless to say, mayhem ensues.
An electric air of frenetic energy pulses through the cast and crew—who, despite the cold, are just relieved it’s not raining. Again. An ambitious project given its modest budget and tight schedule, THE GRAVEDANCERS has been plagued by unseasonably low temperatures, frequent torrential downpours and even snow during a night shoot in a local cemetery which prompted the crew to start crooning "White Christmas"—in March, no less.
"Don’t talk to me about the weather," Mendez softly quips between setups. The consensus from the crew is the Weather Gods have cursed the production, and DP Armstrong, wearing a Charlie Brown Beaver hat which makes him look like he should be in the wilds of Canada (which, actually, is where he is headed shortly after wrapping THE GRAVEDANCERS to lens SAW II), rolls his eyes at the bad luck the production has faced. "The level of commitment on this movie is like we’re shooting a $20-million film," Armstrong says, "but the weather has constantly caused trouble."
Soon Mendez calls "Cut!" Another shot is in the can. Karyo bounds over to check the playback monitor. "How was I?" he asks, his voice laced with his distinctive French charm. "You were great," Mendez replies. "I think I could have done it better," Karyo says, genuinely concerned that he’s not giving his director his best performance. "You were great. Let’s move on," Mendez insists. Karyo runs back to the grave site and the camera rolls again.
Look for an in-depth set report on THE GRAVEDANCERS in a future issue of FANGORIA.
| | [by RavenU (Fangoria) ] [0 comments]
|
| |
| AD | 
|
| |
Buffy the Vampire Slayer, its characters, and the Buffy logo are the property of Joss Whedon, Mutant Enemy, the WB Television Network, and Twentieth Century Fox. Angel-The Series, its characters, and the Buffy logo are the property of Joss Whedon, Mutant Enemy, the WB Television Network, and Twentieth Century Fox.Other Series, their characters and logos are property of the proper right owners.
(c)Slayerverse 2006 [Imprint] |
