If Chins Could Kill: Confessions of a B Movie Actor by Bruce Campbell
Authors: Bruce Campbell
Tags: United States, General, Biography & Autobiography, Entertainment & Performing Arts, Actors, Biography, Performing Arts, Film & Video, Autobiography, History & Criticism, Motion Picture Actors and Actresses, Film & Video - General, Entertainment & Performing Arts - General, Film & Video - History & Criticism, Motion Picture Actors and Actresses - United States, Entertainment & Performing Arts - Actors & Actresses, 1958-, Bruce, Motion picture actors and actr, Campbell
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I also found out, after the fact, that the stuff I was almost always drooling as a monster was actually black latex paint. Hell, who needs a functioning intestinal system, we had great-looking bile!
Within the Woods, as well as serving as a prototype, allowed us to experiment more extensively with the concept of "fakery." It was the first time, in the interests of getting the most out of our schedule, that we blacked out windows to provide the false illusion of night. It also was one of the few times that we actually filmed outdoors at night... all night.
Despite the newfound hardships, the film came together very well. It was our first collective effort to actively pursue a genre and it worked. Sam had clearly made strides as a filmmaker, and I began to get a basic grip on this elusive, acting thing. Well, okay, it wasn't acting, per se, but I had taken a baby step beyond the "mugging for the camera" phase...
Once assembled, we did our own brand of test marketing to see if Within the Woods would get a response from regular civilians. What could be a better proving ground than our old high school? A screening was arranged and the feedback was good... and loud. Hell, this film got a better response than Six Months to Live.
We weren't experienced filmmakers by any means yet, but this audible feedback was all the encouragement we needed to take the next leap.
13
THERE'S NO BUDGET LIKE LOW-BUDGET
We had a useful prototype, but what was the next step? The how question still fluttered about. With Michigan, you had to plan months ahead, just to factor in the weather. Summer 1979 became the target for shooting, but we had to get our act in gear -- May flowers were already in full bloom.
Before we attempted to raise any money, we had to figure out how much was needed. For the first time, we had to determine, in advance, what our film might cost. This was an entirely foreign concept to us, since we had always casually pooled our loose cash and shot whenever we could and with whomever was available. A "professional" endeavor like this would call for renting equipment that wasn't ours, using a real film laboratory and, yikes, even paying people.
In my year as a production assistant not long before this, I had become reasonably familiar with a number of motion picture suppliers in Detroit who catered to commercial producers. Technically, we were just doing a long commercial, so we gathered price lists and began to jot some numbers down.
Long before the days of budgeting software, we started with a blank sheet of paper. Not knowing any other method, we proceeded to make the film in our heads, reviewing every phase of production.
"Okay, we gotta rent equipment... what equipment? For how long?"
"What do you pay production assistants? Should we pay them at all?" There were the odd "how to make an independent film" guides available, so we got our hands on whatever we could at the local bookstore. Our little hand-hewn budget began to grow... and grow. Eventually, it reached an inconceivable $150,000. For all we knew about raising money, it might as well have been a million.
Being so immersed in the Super-8 format, we convinced ourselves that we could save lots of money if we shot our feature in that same format and blew it up (enlarged it) later to the industry standard of 35mm. Was this an insane idea? We had never seen a film in a theater that had originally been made in Super-8, but there was always a first time...
A company in San Francisco (Interformat Labs) could fill the obscure request. The fellow in charge, Mike Hinton, sent us a test of a film that was shot in Caracas Venezuela on Super-8mm and blown up by them to 35mm. When the test arrived, we marched down to our local Maple 3 theaters in Birmingham and screened it.
The print looked okay, but just okay. We asked the projectionist what he thought about the quality of the film. He assumed it was a blowup from 16mm, a fairly standard process. This was very encouraging to
Within the Woods, as well as serving as a prototype, allowed us to experiment more extensively with the concept of "fakery." It was the first time, in the interests of getting the most out of our schedule, that we blacked out windows to provide the false illusion of night. It also was one of the few times that we actually filmed outdoors at night... all night.
Despite the newfound hardships, the film came together very well. It was our first collective effort to actively pursue a genre and it worked. Sam had clearly made strides as a filmmaker, and I began to get a basic grip on this elusive, acting thing. Well, okay, it wasn't acting, per se, but I had taken a baby step beyond the "mugging for the camera" phase...
Once assembled, we did our own brand of test marketing to see if Within the Woods would get a response from regular civilians. What could be a better proving ground than our old high school? A screening was arranged and the feedback was good... and loud. Hell, this film got a better response than Six Months to Live.
We weren't experienced filmmakers by any means yet, but this audible feedback was all the encouragement we needed to take the next leap.
13
THERE'S NO BUDGET LIKE LOW-BUDGET
We had a useful prototype, but what was the next step? The how question still fluttered about. With Michigan, you had to plan months ahead, just to factor in the weather. Summer 1979 became the target for shooting, but we had to get our act in gear -- May flowers were already in full bloom.
Before we attempted to raise any money, we had to figure out how much was needed. For the first time, we had to determine, in advance, what our film might cost. This was an entirely foreign concept to us, since we had always casually pooled our loose cash and shot whenever we could and with whomever was available. A "professional" endeavor like this would call for renting equipment that wasn't ours, using a real film laboratory and, yikes, even paying people.
In my year as a production assistant not long before this, I had become reasonably familiar with a number of motion picture suppliers in Detroit who catered to commercial producers. Technically, we were just doing a long commercial, so we gathered price lists and began to jot some numbers down.
Long before the days of budgeting software, we started with a blank sheet of paper. Not knowing any other method, we proceeded to make the film in our heads, reviewing every phase of production.
"Okay, we gotta rent equipment... what equipment? For how long?"
"What do you pay production assistants? Should we pay them at all?" There were the odd "how to make an independent film" guides available, so we got our hands on whatever we could at the local bookstore. Our little hand-hewn budget began to grow... and grow. Eventually, it reached an inconceivable $150,000. For all we knew about raising money, it might as well have been a million.
Being so immersed in the Super-8 format, we convinced ourselves that we could save lots of money if we shot our feature in that same format and blew it up (enlarged it) later to the industry standard of 35mm. Was this an insane idea? We had never seen a film in a theater that had originally been made in Super-8, but there was always a first time...
A company in San Francisco (Interformat Labs) could fill the obscure request. The fellow in charge, Mike Hinton, sent us a test of a film that was shot in Caracas Venezuela on Super-8mm and blown up by them to 35mm. When the test arrived, we marched down to our local Maple 3 theaters in Birmingham and screened it.
The print looked okay, but just okay. We asked the projectionist what he thought about the quality of the film. He assumed it was a blowup from 16mm, a fairly standard process. This was very encouraging to
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