French Frights: Dead Shadows
Imagine being an aspiring filmmaker and deciding your first self produced movie would be about an alien invasion.
In my paper about Jean Claude Biette and his movie Le Champignon des Carpathes, I stated that it’s rare for a filmmaker to try and self produce his movie. Even more so when he’s an established one. Of course, everyone’s gonna Sam Raimi and Peter Jackson me — although you’re forgetting about the SPierig Brothers! But those types of movies do not exist in the French landscape. Or, well, they do exist, as a production teacher of mine once stated: “A film that’s self produced in France is what we call a wild movie. There are around five of them made each year. None of them make it to theater.” There’s a reason for this, in France, to release your flick you have to have a visa, to gain a visa? You have to pay your workers. If you made a movie with your friends in your garden, even if you’re fuckin talented, there’s a fair chance noone’s ever gonna see it, because no cinema network will ever pick it up.
This is partly why the French movies are a dying breed, ridden with nepotism. No new blood can come in. But what would happen if someone weredumb enough to try and make it? Hell! What if said person wanted to make a horror flick because they thought French are unable to make fun horror? Well, then you’d get Dead Shadows!
As is common in this series, at first there existed a teenage boy who watched horror movies as a child. Yet, David Cholewa didn’t try getting in a cinema school, deciding instead to earn a degree in laws studies, after which he became head of a distribution company. This path sorta mimics his sister’s who also first earned a law degree before getting into television and becoming a presenter. Difference is David had a plan. David wanted to make movies.
. Cholewa loves Carpenter and the horror cinema of the 80s, what he would like to do would be close to those flicks close to his heart but in a more French context. See, there is this trend here where filmmakers/writers will try to copy USA production so they’ll make their stories take place in the United States. Cholewa wants to make genuine fun horror but with French overtones. A rare breed indeed but not the only case:
Main difference between Cholewa and other directors, though, was that he had a distribution company and access to producers from other countries. First, he sent pitches to most of his foreign contacts, asking them which concept they were more likely to buy. Decision seemed unanymous, a story centered about a young man suffering from fear of the dark or achluophobia.
Cholewa hired a writer, upon which he only put constraints. Movie had to be shot in one room, or at least in a single flat. It would feature no apartment, it had to be shot quickly. But when he saw there could be numerous foreign purchases, Cholewa gave his writers free rein. The huis-clos about a young man trying to vanquish his phobia while wanting to seduce his neighbor soon turned into a plot involving an alien invasion, and our main character becoming a hero so as to save his love interest.
The beginning director wanted to paint a homage to Carpenter’s the thing, to Brian Yuzna’s Society (hence the guro/orgy part) but his main inspiration, at least according to him, was the Italian comic book Druuna. His writer, Vincent Julé, seems more inclined to say he was inspired by japanimation.
Soon, Julien Denan joined the project. Most famous for directing a documentary about John Carpenter — Big John — he had known Cholewa for quite a while and owned a production company. With this newfound financial support, Cholewa thought he could finally make his dream come true.
For the casting he hired Fabian Wolfrom, his very first feature film. Cholewa chose him because he thought the young actor hadn’t the mannerism of theatre actors common in France, some members on his team didn’t agree with his decision and the inexperience of the lead might have played a part. He also hired John Fallon, who worked at Arrow in the head, and whom he knew from his attendance of multiple genre festivals. And Rurik Sallé, a genre journalist quite famous here in France, who was really happy to be able to incarnate a character outside of comedy for once. Cholewa’s sister also made an appearance in the film as well as a director friend of mine named Choukri Ben Meriem but he’s just an extra during the party tidbits.
Cholewa and Denan soon agreed on hiring only newcomers technicians. This would ensure two things. First they would be eager to work on an alien/apocalypse flick set in Paris. Second, they would not complain about the long hours ahead of them.
The team first shot five scenes that they used in order to edit a trailer they could show in Cannes to try and find potential buyers. This proved successful and with rights bought in the US, England and Germany, Cholewa now sat on a budget he thought was enough to finish his flick.
The crew shot for hours on end through 20 days. With long hours and shooting exteriors without authorisation. This is a wild movie, right there. Also Cholewa admits they worked with green screens while most of them didn’t know how to use them. While the budget was long rumored to have been 150,000 euros, it was in fact 170,000. Almost nothing in the French cinema industry but still something quite good for an independant budget. Thing was, for the production, Cholewa only had 90,000. The rest he would have to find during the post production process.
Plan was simple. Digital District a post-production company, was supposed to finish every digital SFX in the movie. The SFX on set had been made by a talented team of makeup artists led by David Scherer who Cholewa knew because everyone in the French genre movie industry seems to know who Scherer is. Damn, even I got his contact.
But the plan with Digital District fell through. Maybe because of the lack of money, maybe for other reasons. What we do know is the filmmaker gladly admits, his team and him made mistakes for it was their first film, so money sort of burned fast. When the production ended, there was no left to finish it all.
Cholewa had an idea, he edited the film, made it as screenable as possible (the fact he couldn’t colour grade his teaser may have left an imprint) and decided to test screen it in Cannes to try and get another round of buyers. This screening was so terrible to him that he said he left the theater crying. Despite his dark thought, the very next day, buyers came to his stand. According to Cholewa Japanese buyers thought what they had seen was the genuine finished product and they were interested. With this other round of purchases, Cholewa soon was able to finish his flick.
The movie had a pretty good run in festivals, and by that I mean it went to Sitges (which is like the best) and to L’Etrange Festival which may very well be the best French genre film festival. Still, after all those trials and sleepless nights, the movie wouldn’t make its money back. According to Cholewa they lost money on it but not much.
Cholewa would go on to work with a Canadian producer on a movie co-written by Richard Stanley — and I find this amusing since I wrote a paper about the South African director yesterday — but would then abandon his career completely. The wait in between projects was too much to bear.
Still, Dead Shadows still exists, with all its dreams and weaknesses, with its raw nature, which is certainly why Japanese invested in it. It sort of resembles a weird French Sushi Typhoon production.
Next week we’ll talk about Man-Thing, the Marvel Horror flick!
