My review of TRILOGY OF BLOOD is gonna be biased because I play guitar for THE DEADNEKS-but I'll be as honest in my review as I can.
The idea for the film was originally conceived by DEADNEKS founder/singer Joey "Fangface" Broy several years ago. The concept was to showcase three of our songs in music-video form (as well as other songs of ours used as background-music) and tie them together into a short, exploit/horror type film. We always had interest in doing it-but it never really went anywhere until we met Charlie Ruckus and the other guys who at the time made up Ruckus Productions (Rick Kelley, Brian Archambault, and Larry Smith) at a show and started kicking the idea around. They took a serious interest in it, understood our financial limitations-and signed on to film it. We had a few pre-production meetings, some casting calls, etc...and within a few months we started filming.
The plot revolves around three young ladies (Elyse Carr, Tisha Gardner, and B-movie 'starlet' Brenna Lee Roth)-who pick up a redneck hitch- hiker (Joey) in the backwoods of Virginia. The hitch-hiker offers for the girls to come to a barn-dance/BBQ and the girls accept-not realizing that this isn't your typical backyard BBQ...
The film was shot over a three-day weekend with virtually no budget. The entire cast worked for free with the exception of Brenna who was coming from Ohio and obviously needed travel expenses covered. Other than Brenna, the Ruckus guys, and a few of our FX people-no one had ever 'acted' or worked on a film before. Everyone involved put in long hours for no pay and hopefully are all happy with the final results.
Since Joey and I are big fans of old-school exploit/horror cinema-we definitely wanted a 'gritty' look to the film which we feel Ruckus captured very well. There are obvious nods to the films of H.G. Lewis (one of our favorite directors) as well as several other grindhouse-style horror films. We also caught a lot of good 'improv' scenes-mostly courtesy of our boys Tat and Cyrus that added a bit of comic-relief to the mix.
As to the technical aspects of the film: personally I think that the 'grainy' look of the film is exactly what we wanted and helps to keep it from looking like the average SOV no- budget film-another aspect that Ruckus captured well. If I had any gripes about the technical end of things-it would be that some of the audio is a little obscured because we had to run a generator since we were shooting outside most of the time-so you get some generator noise. In most of the scenes it actually adds another weird 'layer' to the film- but there's a spot or two that it's a little overpowering. I also wish we would have had time/money to refine a couple of the gore FX-but overall I think they're really solid and funny and definitely stay in the vein of what we were looking to do. Part of the post- production issue is that we had to have it out in time for the premier of the film which put a lot of pressure on Charlie to get everything knocked out in time-a tough job that he single-handedly tackled and did a great job with-especially given the time constraints.
TRILOGY OF BLOOD got it's big-screen premier at the Alamo Cinema Drafthouse in Winchester VA on April 3rd 2010 to a sold-out crowd and got a very good response. We're hoping to have it screened in some other areas soon-so keep your eyes peeled :)
If I were objectively rating TRILOGY OF BLOOD-given my tastes I'd probably give it a 7.5 or 8/10-but since we all put a lot of effort into it-I think everyone that had anything to do with it deserves a 10.
Joey and I are currently working on the script for our next DEADNEKS film- DEMONIACAL-which will be longer, gorier, and overall 'bigger' in every way-so stay tuned...
The idea for the film was originally conceived by DEADNEKS founder/singer Joey "Fangface" Broy several years ago. The concept was to showcase three of our songs in music-video form (as well as other songs of ours used as background-music) and tie them together into a short, exploit/horror type film. We always had interest in doing it-but it never really went anywhere until we met Charlie Ruckus and the other guys who at the time made up Ruckus Productions (Rick Kelley, Brian Archambault, and Larry Smith) at a show and started kicking the idea around. They took a serious interest in it, understood our financial limitations-and signed on to film it. We had a few pre-production meetings, some casting calls, etc...and within a few months we started filming.
The plot revolves around three young ladies (Elyse Carr, Tisha Gardner, and B-movie 'starlet' Brenna Lee Roth)-who pick up a redneck hitch- hiker (Joey) in the backwoods of Virginia. The hitch-hiker offers for the girls to come to a barn-dance/BBQ and the girls accept-not realizing that this isn't your typical backyard BBQ...
The film was shot over a three-day weekend with virtually no budget. The entire cast worked for free with the exception of Brenna who was coming from Ohio and obviously needed travel expenses covered. Other than Brenna, the Ruckus guys, and a few of our FX people-no one had ever 'acted' or worked on a film before. Everyone involved put in long hours for no pay and hopefully are all happy with the final results.
Since Joey and I are big fans of old-school exploit/horror cinema-we definitely wanted a 'gritty' look to the film which we feel Ruckus captured very well. There are obvious nods to the films of H.G. Lewis (one of our favorite directors) as well as several other grindhouse-style horror films. We also caught a lot of good 'improv' scenes-mostly courtesy of our boys Tat and Cyrus that added a bit of comic-relief to the mix.
As to the technical aspects of the film: personally I think that the 'grainy' look of the film is exactly what we wanted and helps to keep it from looking like the average SOV no- budget film-another aspect that Ruckus captured well. If I had any gripes about the technical end of things-it would be that some of the audio is a little obscured because we had to run a generator since we were shooting outside most of the time-so you get some generator noise. In most of the scenes it actually adds another weird 'layer' to the film- but there's a spot or two that it's a little overpowering. I also wish we would have had time/money to refine a couple of the gore FX-but overall I think they're really solid and funny and definitely stay in the vein of what we were looking to do. Part of the post- production issue is that we had to have it out in time for the premier of the film which put a lot of pressure on Charlie to get everything knocked out in time-a tough job that he single-handedly tackled and did a great job with-especially given the time constraints.
TRILOGY OF BLOOD got it's big-screen premier at the Alamo Cinema Drafthouse in Winchester VA on April 3rd 2010 to a sold-out crowd and got a very good response. We're hoping to have it screened in some other areas soon-so keep your eyes peeled :)
If I were objectively rating TRILOGY OF BLOOD-given my tastes I'd probably give it a 7.5 or 8/10-but since we all put a lot of effort into it-I think everyone that had anything to do with it deserves a 10.
Joey and I are currently working on the script for our next DEADNEKS film- DEMONIACAL-which will be longer, gorier, and overall 'bigger' in every way-so stay tuned...