Pulp Features

For those of you who haven’t seen Nightwalkers, a low-budget Supernatural Horror Thriller from Gallows Hill Productions, it’s a classic tale about a town cursed with “strange happenings”. Pumpkin Hollow is home to all kinds of horrific evil, like witches and vengeful and creepy Scarecrows. I am personally afraid of scarecrows, perhaps because they keep going about killing people out of revenge. And it makes a great film as well. In fact, it’s spawning a series, as Nightwalkers 2 is already in production.

Gallows Hill Productions owner Dana Carney is just a Horror Fanatic. It’s no wonder Gallows Hill is having such success after their first film. He’s got some great people in his corner, like his ultra-supportive wife Georgia (what other wife indulges her husband in his horror film making?); his producer Tom Harris (who’s always reaching in his wallet and really making these films “Happen”); Ronny Macomber the young Lion who does lights & sound (he’s a worker); Scream Queen, Brinke Stevens who he owes everything to (she really got this ball rolling); Sean O’Bannon his Main Man (he’s going to blow everyone away with his acting); and Scream Queen, Felissa Rose (the Sweetest Person, she has been behind his project from day one).

From about 12 years old Dana dreamed of being in or making horror films. And how does he feel about living that dream? Let’s find out, shall we?

Heidi: Gallows Hill Productions has so far tackled horror films. What is it about horror filmmaking that you enjoy, and what horror films have inspired you to go into horror film making? Is horror filmmaking more difficult because it has such a devoted and particular audience?

Dana: I don’t see myself doing anything but horror. To me it was always horror films. I was lucky because where I grew up, they had a theatre that played double horror bills. I spent most of my childhood there.

There were two films that really did it for me. The first was Night of the Living Dead. I don’t remember what the second film was… as I was running home to tell everyone about this movie. It really awakened something in me.

That didn’t happen again till I was 13 years old and saw Halloween 1978 on the big screen that was all it took. Right then and there I knew I wanted to make horror films.

I don’t find Horror Films more difficult to make as I feel most true horror fans are forgiving if they see you put forth an honest effort. I’ve had the pleasure to meet a lot of these fans at various conventions. They are the greatest…

Heidi: Night of the Living Dead seems to be an inspiration to indie horror filmmakers everywhere. Russ Streiner, John Russo, and George Romero created one of the first low buget gore films ever, and had monumental success. Eli Roth, Greg Parker, and Jason Griscom, all indie horror directors, have cited it as an influence on their films. What is it about this film that inspires you?

Dana: I think NOTLD inspires all indie filmmakers. It got the ball rolling and let the dreamers like myself start thinking, ‘I need to do this’. NOTLD shows the true spirit of people coming together under hard conditions to beat the odds. I truly love this film.

Heidi: Horror Fans are more forgiving if you put forth an honest effort. What elements, in your opinion, does a horror film have to have in order to be a “good effort?”

Dana: A good effort to me is… not taking shortcuts. Give the fans some good makeup, storyline and a jolt or two every 5 to 10 minutes. True horror to me is being trapped with your back to a wall and the Monster is getting closer. You have to make a stand and quick. That’s true horror.

Heidi: The Film, Nightwalkers is a series of tales all set in the same town of Pumpkin Hollow. Sort of in the vein of Creepshow, Tales From the Crypt, Tales From the Darkside, and other films influenced by pulp horror comics. I haven’t seen a film in a long that embodied all of the gore and joy of the old horror comics.

Dana: Oh sure, I read all of the Vault of Horror and Tales From the Crypt comics as a kid. I get a lot of Ideas to build off of from these great stories. Today I still own every Issue of Fangoria magazine. I have always loved the anthology films such as Asylum and ,em>Creepshow. There is a running theme in Nightwalkers that this town has always had strange things happening in it.

Heidi: Is it Cursed? Will part 2 take place in the same town? What can you tell, without giving too much away, about this town’s “history”?

Dana: Yes there will be some more soul collecting in Pumpkin Hollow for Nightwalkers 2. In the Night Caller segment we have a former resident who made a deal with Satan for eternal life. Now he must kill six townsfolk a year for three years and leave Satan’s mark. There has always been a breeding ground for evil in Pumpkin Hollow, kind of like a magnet to steel. But no one wants to get involved.

Heidi: Gallows Hill Productions likes to use sexy scream queens Felissa Rose and Brinke Stevens in their films. Having such big indie cult idols in their films makes them all the more appealing and fun to watch. I wanted to know what Dana’s opinion of the girls’ addition to the films was (like I had to ask).

Dana: I think the best thing of all about doing these films was meeting one of my childhood hero; Brinke Stevens.

I got in touch with her and we talked about Nightwalkers. She was so supportive and knew we were just getting started. When she agreed to do the part, it was a day I won’t ever forget. Brinke has become good friends with my wife Georgia and I. She is without a doubt one of the most thoughtful and down-to-earth people you could ever meet. I have never seen anyone care for there fans like this woman.

Brinke will be back in Nightwalkers 2 in a big role as a witch with revenge on her mind. Felissa Rose will play Brinke’s daughter. Again another sweet person. Felissa is busy working on a bunch of films as we speak. She is a true professional.

One of the actors I’m totally excited about is Sean O’Bannon. Man he is crazy!!! A total method actor, who throws himself into a role. He plays a insane redneck killer in the film.

We also have great actors Jeff Dylan Graham (Cremains, Dead and Rotting) and Joe Estevez (Hell Asylum).

I feel Nightwalkers 2 will be a sequel that tops the original by far. Nightwalkers 2 is already in another class than the first film. The first Nightwalkers was kind of an experiment to see if it could get done. I learned a lot from that film and won’t be making some of those mistakes again. This time out I’ve had pre-production time to cast, add crewmembers get locations props etc. I have one of the greatest locations because of a lady by the name of Lore Callahan. We will be filming at her Haunted House attraction Hobbs Grove in Sanger, CA. It was also featured in the film Darkwalker. I feel the actors I have involved on this one will make a huge difference. It still takes place in Pumpkin Hollow and has a few things carry over from the first. It’s not a sequel, per say, but a whole new adventure in evil. The stories here are stronger.

Heidi: Sounds like the films keep getting better and better as the storyline expands, the experience goes up, and the budget grows. Many people start off in indie horror with hopes of reaching loftier goals in filmmaking. If Gallows Hill experiences a chance to go mainstream, will they?

Dana: I would like to stay at the indie level. There are so many talented indie filmmakers out there now; Mike Conway, Chris Morgan and James Rogers (who is really working hard on his second film Project Aurora). I’ve seen these guys’ films and they show me indie is where it’s at. It’s all about passion and hard work. Making it happen on your own and putting it up there for people to see. People who will never know the behind-the-scenes lifeblood spilled. That’s how I like it, having the control.

Although “selling your soul” in order to go mainstream may sound pretentious and radically unfair, I can’t help but feel that independent horror always turns out so much more fun that mainstream horror. And one tends to forgive flaws way more easily than in big-time releases…

Heidi: I am one of the biggest supporters and adorers of indie horror that there is. It’s refreshing and exciting to hear you say you’d like to stay indie. Having the control, artistically, truly makes your project your full creation. What elements of control do mainstream horror filmmakers lose? (I know I think they lose all ability to be creative and funny. But that’s just me.)

Dana: I feel huge budget Horror loses a lot of the original vision, because there are too many people wanting different things. I think Rob Zombie made the film he set out to make with House of a 1,000 Corpses. Like it, or hate it, I feel he stuck to his guns and didn’t let anyone tell him what to do. You are at the mercy of studio heads that probably think horror is a joke. They just want to make a quick buck.

Indie Filmmakers are trying to please the “Horror Hounds”; most of the time they barely break even.

I absolutely thought that House of 1000 Corpses had two good scenes in it! Absolutely, at least one or two good, really good, scenes. I liked it better when I saw it the first time, though, in 1974. When it was called Texas Chainsaw Massacre…

Heidi: There is a big controversy between mainstream and indie horror. It seems that everyone wants the control of their film, yet budget limitations hold them back.

Dana: There is a doubled edged sword here… I would love to work with a bigger budget sure, but I feel that pulling off a film on a small budget shows the commitment and hard work of all involved. I see so much waste in big Hollywood horror films. There is a happy medium: if you get some money great!!! Put it into your film…if you don’t have the money that’s ok too. Put your heart and soul into the film. Just make it happen

Heidi: What types of special effects were used in Nightwalkers and will be used in part 2? I want to know about the gore. You got to do so much of the FX on Nightwalkers… how does it feel to be doing the kind of thing that made Tom Savini, and Rick Baker wizards in the horror world? Will you be doing as much of it on part two?

Dana: I did the Majority of the F/X work on Nightwalkers with latex and Props. There was some stuff done by David Pirkle and James Rogers who did some of the zombie work (faces) and an awesome baby sculpture. He is a true talent. In part two, I will still be tackling some of the F/X work, but will have LA’S Al Cortez and Kris Pakowski doing most of the work. I also have Erich Lubatti casting actor James Townsend’s head for a beheading. Erich made the Night Caller mask in the second segment of the film. I will always have my Claws into the F/X. I love it too much. The gore level in these films is there but not over done. I don’t sit on a gore shot or toss tons of blood on a wall. It’s not that kind of film. Like in Creepshow, the gore is there to shock.

And how we all love a good indie horror shocking!

Heidi: Tell us about the future of Gallows Hill. Where do you want to be in 10 years? And what types of films do you hope to be making?

Dana: I feel we are getting better every time out. We have made some great friends in the Industry. I have met with some great talents who I am blown away by. Will we be around in ten years??? I would like to think so; I will probably be passing it on to the younger guys like Ronny Macomber and my Son Brandon.

Heidi: I want to know what the filmmaker’s favorite scene is. It’s always interesting to know what the best part is for them… Mine is usually the sex scene, or if there isn’t any, then the gore scene.

Dana: My Favorite scene from Nightwalkers is after these punks brutally slaughter an innocent family. One of them gets his head crushed open by an avenging Scarecrow.

Ah. Sounds intriguingly gory…

Heidi: What is your favorite horror movie? You mentioned Halloween and Night of the Living Dead as movies that inspire you, but when you sit down and watch a horror flick, what do you like to watch?

Dana: I love them all. I got around 200 horror DVDs, lots of indies and low budget ones. I’m a sucker for anything with “Zombie” or “Living Dead” in the title.

For all of you true die-hard horror fans reading this, want to hear some real Fan Love?

Dana: I thank God daily for these people and the horror fans out there. Thank you to all those who have Purchased Nightwalkers. And for those who have not, Get it now!!!! Or the Scarecrow is going to get ya!!!!!!!!

Satan’s Playground is a supernatural shocker chronicling a family’s spine-tingling odyssey in New Jersey’s legendary Pine Barrens region. En route to a wilderness camping retreat, their car inexplicably breaks down. As darkness falls, panic sets in. Then the marooned family stumbles upon an ancient and seemingly abandoned house. And it is here that they meet the bizarre Mrs. Leeds who lives there with her equally unhinged children. Offering no assistance, she warns of a violent, unseen force lurking in the forbidding countryside. Soon, the family will encounter a supernatural evil older than the woods themselves.

Satan’s Playground…a place where deadly myth becomes gruesome reality.

I have to admit that Dante Tomaselli’s first film, Desecration blew me away. His second film, Horror, was nothing short of stunning.

Tomaselli has the rare ability to combine incredibly striking imagery with an unnervingly atmospheric soundtrack to make films that both engage your imagination and get under your skin.

Satan’s Playground, his third film, includes Sleepaway Camp’s Felissa Rose who also made an appearance in Horror, The Evil Dead’s Ellen Sandweiss and Michael Berryman along with Tomaselli regulars Christie Sanford and Danny Lopes. And if the images below are anything to go by, we can expect another spectacular film.

Enjoy.

Maplewoods is a film about zombies trapped in an abandoned experimental army town where experiments from the past that went awry are brought back to haunt the present.

This film, traditional in its Romero-esque interpretation of zombies, and rich in story and characters, is in the vein of Day of the Dead. It’s a film about the breakdown of order and loyalty when people are faced with monstrous realities.

Dave B. Stewart III is the writer and the director of this film.

Maplewoods is, in fact, just the first of many instalments…

Dave: I was going to say ‘episode’, but I didn’t want to sound too much like I was talking about ‘Star Wars.’

In this story. There are sequel and a prequel in pre-production. Dave has a total of 5 scripts ready, and the last films will require a big budget. Using the military as a basis for not only the storyline but as a metaphor for society’s hierarchy is an idea that came to Dave not from his own experiences in the Air Force, but rather from his grandfather. Tales of Nazi Germany hiding stores of occult lore and inhuman experiments throughout the third Reich inspired Dave to create the setting of Maplewoods: a community subjected to experiments by the U.S. Government.

Dave: My grandfather is a Military Historian, so growing up I learned a lot from him about the history of the military. Especially the war in Europe in WW2. So those stories and artefacts that he collected were a big influence in my creativity when it comes to my story telling when it involves the military. Castle Wolfenstein, the game, was based off the real SS castle during the war, I think it was either Castle Wolfburg or Weiwelsburg Castle I’m not too sure which one it was exactly. The SS conducted all sorts of occult experiments and bio weapon experiments there as well.

How does Dave describe the story of Maplewoods?

Dave: Maplewoods is a breakdown of the characters. There is a God Fearing soldier, and a soldier who finds out he might have no God after all. Things that are already dead, things that cannot be killed are chasing them. They have been set up by the government, by their own people. They have no loyalty, their oath means nothing. They have to go rogue to survive. It’s about these different points of view. The main character tries to get his men out of there, and tries to remain a team. They will deal with the betrayers when they get out, but their first priority is to Survive.

Reminded somehow of Resident Evil, 28 Days Later, and even Dog Soldiers, I can’t help but feel that Dave might be slightly annoyed when he sees such similar films achieving success at the box office.

Dave: It’s all about Budget and Money. They had a big budget and Hollywood behind them. They already had a huge following. But I feel that we preserved something for the Romero fans out there. Our zombies. The zombies in 28 Days Later and, it looks like, in the upcoming Dawn of the Dead remake, are not even zombies. They are fast. I think that’s going to scare away some the traditional zombie lovers.

And Dave, like so many, is of the mind that 28 Days Later is NOT a zombie movie.

Dave: It was more like Stephen King’s The Stand, or Romero’s The Crazies.

This is an issue that many die-hard zombie fans argue over: The “zombies” in 28 Days Later and the Dawn of the Dead remake act more like fast vicious animals than zombies. There is something so awesome about a zombie trailing you slowly, its limbs falling off from decay, it’s jaws menacing as it desires to eat your brains….any animal can be frightening. Even ants can be scary. But it takes serious talent to make a dead person who is still decaying an actual threat….

Dave: I think they focused too much on CGI in Resident Evil.

I believe that too much CGI is used in horror films today. In fact, the other day, I watched Terminator 1 and 2 on television. The second terminator, though fabulous and great with all the computer stuff everywhere, cannot compare to the Harryhausen-esque scene in Terminator 1 that shows the robot eerily creeping toward its victims, the camera shaking, and the robot-puppet inching towards them like some insect or wicked toy…

But I digress. Dave’s film doesn’t use the computer as an excuse to avoid special effects.

Also, it’s expensive.

Dave: It’s a shame to put all that effort and hard work into the makeup and the effects and then cover it all up with computer imaging.

Something else important about Maplewoods that you may notice: it’s military is very accurate, according to the type of uniform, the weapons, the equipment…Dave is a stickler for accuracy.

Dave: In my film, people may ask why the special ops force isn’t wearing camouflage when they enter the town. They know what they are up against; they know who their enemy is. They wouldn’t be wearing camouflage. Their uniforms pay homage to the German history of the real experiments my film is based on.

It’s good to see a movie that doesn’t let its budget destroy the believability of the story.

Dave: I would have loved to have a helicopter, but oh well…

The thing that makes Maplewoods stand out as a film instead of just another zombie flick is the incredible attention to detail and dialogue that D.B. Stewart has paid. The storyline, like Romero’s Dead series, focuses on the breakdown of the world in steps. Like, 28 Days Later or Dog Soldiers, the rigid command breaks down under the stress of such an apocalyptic catastrophe. In order to figure out who will survives and who will be dead, the film explores how madness an loss of control can make a human being no better than the monsters around him/her, yet as a result, able to survive in the new harsh world.

Dave uses subtle acting and a good script to tell this story without all the razzle-dazzle that higher budget films employ. Because they had no budget for thousands of zombies and monstrous special effects, they focused on the characters. The ability to tell a story without one-liners or unnecessary dialogue is a talent that many film makers lack. Instead of making fun of himself and his film like so many indie horror filmmakers do, Dave takes himself, his budget, and his cast very seriously. He focused on the individuals and the inner structures of the characters.

Dave: When I write, I try to get my story across with characters and dialogue. Actions speak louder than words. I try to use facial expressions, tell my actors to ‘say it with their eyes’. Tell them to feel angst and disgust without saying anything. That adds to the suspense level. My actors got used to hearing me say, ‘hold that face!’ A film that inspires this kind of film making in me is The Good, the Bad, and The Ugly with Clint Eastwood. That last second where he’s in the standoff-and you can see the sweat coming off his skin and you can tell what he’s thinking…”

Would Dave ever make a horror western? I think that’s a really good idea.

Dave: It would have to be not like Army of Darkness. Ghost Town, wasn’t that old film western horror?

After seeing Maplewoods, I have some questions for Dave. Their own government sets up the special operatives team sent in to the town of Maplewoods to destroy the zombies. They discover a bomb planted there that will kill them. Why is this hypothetical government so intent on introducing a whole new batch of witnesses to this clandestine site – just to blow them sky high? Why not forget the rag tag crew and simply explode the facility? Is it to erase any possibility of Major Gibson revealing what he has known about since he was a child? Are the other soldiers somehow involved and have knowledge of Maplewoods and its experiments?

So many things I need to know….

Dave: There is an answer to that. My brother is writing the novelization of the book, and he explains it all far more in-depth. Ok…. The original story is that in 1971 the experiment took place when a chemical was leaked onto the town, turning everyone into a zombie. If you look in the scene in the medical facility where they discover the bomb, you’ll see a zombie kneeling on the floor in green camouflage-that uniform wasn’t in issue until the 80’s.

So where did that zombie come from if it wasn’t in the town in 1971 when all the shit went down?

Dave: The CIA and the military thought it was too risky for any of this information to ever get out to the public. They decided they’d better cover their tracks. They shut it down. They sent in an operative to place the bomb. Of course, he never got out alive. That was the day before the second team, the main characters of Maplewoods, were sent in. If you look closely in that scene, you can see the computer screen flashing something like, ‘I’ll see you in hell’.

AH.

There will be sequels. They are going to stick in a little Science Fiction, as well. Cloning, Dave suggests.

Aspiring filmmakers, beware of what Dave says:

Dave: Try not to trust too many people working in your organizations with website access.

He knows what he’s talking about.

The film premiered in 1999 and sold out. It was a very “positive experience”. Although it took Dave some trouble to get his first interview, in his town’s paper. The journalist said, ‘Do you know how many independent film skills come across my desk?’ to which Dave said, ‘How many of them are actually premiering publicly?’ The journalist replied, ‘Just Yours’.

Tough town, that is, Pennsylvania, the Zombie Capital.

Dave is shooting the sequel to Maplewoods this summer, and it should be out by the end of next year. He is also working on a project called Cult of the Dragon, about Nazi’s in WWII and the horrific things that no one knows…

You can buy Maplewoods through Cinema wasteland.