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Owen: So do you feel your horror movie
career was somewhat destined with being born on
"Friday the 13th"?
Tim:
It very well could have been. It was a full moon
that night too, and I'm told that I used to howl
at the moon in my crib when I first saw it as an
infant...
Owen: You directed
and edited your first feature movie, 'Day
of the Reaper' (1984), at age 17. Do you
see constants between the format and execution of
that film and the way you direct today?
Tim: Generally speaking, yes, in terms of getting all
the shots you can in a limited amount of time and
battling things like temperamental actors and bad
weather. But I was just starting out then and
although I was reading books on writing scripts
and directing, I didn't have the knowledge and
experience that I do now. It was a "learn by
doing" type of thing, really, all happening
before the eyes of the public as each movie was
released, which has pros and cons. An expensive
learning process too, as super-8 film was like
$12 a roll...for 3.5 minutes of footage! Even
though I was a pretty bad director then (not that
I'm so great now!), it was a great learning
experience. With 'Reaper' I started learning how
to communicate with actors, work with effects,
cheat shots, and the whole nine yards. I don't
think I had a firm grasp on shooting and editing
and how they really could work together, that
took up through 'Truth Or Dare---A
Critical Madness.'
Owen:
Your directorial effort from 1995, 'Creep',
chronicles a killing spree of a pair of sibling
serial killers. It caused such a stir that before
it was released to video stores 25 minutes of the
film was cut...First off, did you have any say
regarding the edited material and secondly what
were the primary areas of focus that were causing
problems with distribution?
Tim:
With 'Creep' I was working with
several producers and once the movie neared
completion, their job and focus was trying to
make money off the thing. But the movie turned
out so bizarre, I think, in terms of subject
matter and the way it all came across...that it
either alienated viewers or turned them off. It
just wasn't a pleasant movie, even if parts of it
were Z-grade cheese due to the small budget.
Creep was inspired
from that whole era of 'Natural Born
Killers' and 'Henry: Portrait of
a Serial Killer' type of movies. Back
then, I was an angry young man, obsessed with
authors like Jack Ketchum, Richard Laymon, and
Stephen King. There were two original cuts, one
that was for the Blockbuster market (which didn't
pan out too well anyway in terms of sales) and
one that was for the niche market crowd who liked
really sleazy movies. Ultimately, even the niche
market crowd was kind of disappointed because I
felt we went too far with some things and
pre-publicity pictures were published in
magazines that we had cut from even the harder
cut of the movie...So cut to a few years later
and due to viewer demand, the producers released another version with some of the things we initially cut
out, and it did okay, although by then we had
been ripped off so badly by various middlemen and
wholesale distributors that the financial damage
was irrevocable. The DVD version was a mixture of
the first and third cuts, but to this day, there
has never been a "full-on" edition
released with some of the stuff that went too far
(killings, bloody aftermath shots, and loads of
Jess Franco-style material). Hopefully there
won't ever be, honestly! But the biggest
distribution problems were wholesalers ripping us
off and just the looney 'tone' of the movie,
there were no heroes to root for, it was
depressing, and (SPOILER HERE) everyone simply
died at the end. It's just a hard movie to watch.
Tim: Speaking of
controversy, you're also the notorious director
of the "Officer Friendly" parody films
of police reality shows'- 'Dirty Cop, No
Donut' (1998) and the sequel 'Dirty
Cop, No Donut 2: I am a Pig' (2000).
What has been the response from real officers?
Has it been more an appreciation for the humor or
are they pissed off to be mocked?
Tim:
Notorious! I like that, it sounds like a
Duran-Duran song! (laughs) Most of the police
officers who saw the original got a good chuckle
from it. When the big 'twist' happens in the
movie, it becomes clear that we weren't trying to
make a statement on real police officers and the
work they do. It was simply a plot device for us
to do that 'shockumentary' type of thing and it
cost us virtually nothing to do it, which was why
I chose the police slant of the story. We weren't
even going to release the original 'Dirty
Cop'---it was originally done just as a showcase
idea for some investors so they could see what we
wanted to do. But we ended up shooting enough
footage for an 80-minute showpiece and when the
investors disappeared (as they always seem to
do!), we ended up hooking the movie together and
releasing it. I've always been a big fan of the 'Dirty
Harry' movies, so 'Dirty Cop'
was meant to salute those in many ways, with the
cop smashing up the drunk driver's car and really
going ballistic on a domestic dispute and dishing
out his own brand of justice on a rapist. Part 2
was a collaboration with filmmakers Donald
Farmer, Bill Cassinelli, and Joel Wynkoop, so
that one ended up being a little more
fetish-like, unfocused and all over the
board---and ultimately, just not as much fun as
the original. It pretty much came out with a
whimper and died a quick, quiet death. Similarly
to 'Creep', we cut a lot of
stuff out of that because we thought it went too
far...I cover that pretty well in my book Unreel
Owen: You shot the
serial killer movie 'Truth or Dare? A
Critical Madness' right out of high
school with some major financial backing. You've
mentioned in other interviews that having the
responsibility for a $200,000 assignment at that
age was like "crash course film
school". What were the main things you
learned from the experience?
Tim:
Production, A-Z, really! (laughs) With 'Truth
Or Dare?', I learned all about casting,
storyboards, script breakdowns, finding close
locations, working with stunt crews, wardrobe
departments and just all the things they teach
you in film school that indie filmmakers usually
do for themselves. There's actually departments of people to help out throughout the whole
process, which was a big shock. Then there was
dealing with all the investors and some very
'creative' producers who kept trying to change
everything I was doing while we made the movie,
which was really annoying. At times, it was
glorious fun, and at times, it was like living a
dream turned into the worst nightmare that one
could imagine. I also learned that even with a
larger budget behind you, it's still 'improvise
and adapt' in terms of making these things---even
the departments hired can let you down and the
creator has to be prepared to do everything
yourself with a backup plan--- even when you're
paying people. That was probably the biggest
shock! The people aspect was also incredible,
seeing how egos and human nature caused our tight
little group of collaborators into this whole he
said/she said 'betrayal' and 'self-destruction'
mode...In the end, everyone seemed to have an
agenda that was contrary of the original goal,
which had been to make the best movie we could
with 30 new special effects that had never
been seen before!. That was the way Truth
Or Dare was advertised in Variety
while we were shooting it and losing that focus
was the most frustrating part of the whole
experience, I believe. Ironically, nearly the
same thing happened when we made Killing
Spree a year or so later! (laughs)
The chaos behind the scenes is sometimes more
insane than the rampage the killer is performing
on the screen!
Owen: That also
kind of keys in to another common element in your
films -- "the rampage". What about that
appeals to and/or intrigues you?
Tim:
I think it's a reflection of life, really,
something that scares us all. 'What if a psycho
comes into the burger joint and starts wasting
everyone with an Uzi while you're just up at the
counter trying to order some artery-clogging
food?' A lot of the elements I put in my little
slasher movies were inspired by two things: the
movies and novels I enjoyed growing up and things
I saw happening in real life around me. Lots of
the 'rampage' sequences in 'Truth Or Dare'
were taken from real incidents I had seen covered
in the news: people getting shot while waiting
for a bus, a kid leaving a baseball game being
gunned down while he walked home, and on it goes.
The same goes for 'Killing Spree'---the
whole decapitated head scene was inspired by a
real incident in West Palm Beach where this guy
cut off his girlfriend's head and was walking
down the street with it in the middle of
downtown---in broad daylight, holding it like a
bowling ball! Police arrived, and he threw the
head at them! I was seeing all this in the news
and putting it all into my movies probably just
as a way to deal with my own fears in a way where
I could actually control it---in a fantasy
environment. So the rampage offered me two things
as a filmmaker- it's something that is unexpected
and scary that any of us might have to deal with
at any time (and my how it's escalated with all
the horrible terrorist crimes) and it's also a
way to keep a low budget movie going, adding a
tempo of 'action' to the proceedings. There's so
many ways to cut and edit 'rampage' scenes---fast
cuts, slow cuts, playing with music, sound
effects, character perceptions, and on and on it
goes. And it's still something that you can do as
a filmmaker very economically, the scene is made
entirely in the editing room...
Owen: So with
films like 'Truth or Dare', 'Killing
Spree', 'Creep', 'Wicked
Games', etc. is there some specific
killing sequence from one of your films that you
think represents the pinnacle for your work?
Tim:
I'm not sure. I know when I started out, my goal
was to push the envelope and just go for the
jugular, staying as crazed and uncensored as
possible. I would say each movie has a little
sequence it's known for. With 'Killing
Spree', I'd say it's the gal's giant
lips going over her lover's head (a scene where
all the buyers at the Cannes Film Festival walked
out!) and then the 'remove the jaw with the claw
hammer' murder. In 'Wicked Games',
I'd say the gore highlight is the victim falling
onto the sprinkler and then having it come on to
jettison gallons of blood all over the place.
With 'Creep', I'd say the whole
'cemetery raid' scene is just very creepy in tone
and the gore scene that stands out is where Kathy
Willets kills a photographer with a farm auger
and then slurps down on his bloody tongue. In 'Truth
Or Dare', the one thing the movie is
usually remembered for is the scene where the
killer deliberately mows down a baby stroller
with his car, then backs up over the mother as a
final insult. It was written even crazier and
meant to be filmed showing the killer swerving
directly into the carriage, but I remember the
producers got cold feet on the afternoon we shot
that and we had to change it to look more like it
was an 'accident.' The idea of that scene was
two-fold: first, shock value. The car chase scene
in 'The French Connection',
famous for where Gene Hackman swerves and misses
the baby carriage at the last minute, was the
catalyst. I thought, 'what if someone HIT the
carriage? That would get people's attention!' And
despite what people thought at the time, I wasn't
some sort of drooling psychopath who wanted to
see this type of carnage executed for no reason
at all---and believe me, most of the cast and
crew thought I was absolutely insane when they
first read the script with some of the death
scenes. The idea actually tied into the 'Truth
Or Dare' sequels. When I got the
greenlight to make the original movie, I was also
commissioned to write the sequel so we could roll
right into it if things went well. Of course,
things didn't go well, but the sequel to the
movie was written before we even rolled cameras
on the original. And the baby carriage tied into
that---I wanted to show that for every action,
there was a reaction, and I envisioned the father
of the baby being so tortured by that event that
he too goes insane. This was one of my first
sequel ideas. Of course, it took forever for the
producers to read the original script that they
were already financing, and no one had bothered
to read the second one, so they just didn't
understand. I'm not trying to justify the
sequence. Looking back, I don't know if I can
sanely and morally 'justify' a scene like that.
It was who I was then, and the idea was to take
that tragedy and spin another story off from it,
which I eventually did do. It took me a lot
longer than expected to finish that story arch in
'Screaming For Sanity- Truth Or Dare Part
3', which didnt finally make it
out until 1998. So that little piece of
unfinished business took over a decade for me to
complete! When the sequel deal with the original
investors fell apart, I was forced to rewrite
that first sequel draft, which finally became two
movies---'Wicked Games' and 'Screaming
For Sanity'. Both movies had parts I
cannibalized from that original script I
mentioned, so that's how the whole trilogy
evolved. And of course, as my budgets got lower,
the production value of each movie wasn't near
what I had originally envisioned. We did the best
we could, but compared to the first movie, it
sadly just wasn't there. But at heart, I am a
storyteller, and I just had to get these tales
out there, no matter what! (laughs) It was an
unhealthy obsession. Actually, during that
'golden age of gore' time period for me, so to
speak, from 1985 to 1998, I continually took
sequences, characters, and murder set pieces from
those early 'Truth Or Dare'
sequel drafts and put them into the each new
screenplay and project. It took about twelve
years to use most of those ideas, but when you
look at all the movies I made from that time
period, you can see how they are all sort of
interrelated. When we couldn't use an idea as
written or a producer would nix it because we
didn't have the time or money to do it, I'd just
say, 'that's okay, I'll use it in the next
movie!' I probably have 1,200 plus pages of
script drafts that spun off from that first 'Truth
Or Dare' sequel draft---most of the
'better' ideas and scenes showed up in 'Killing
Spree', 'Creep', 'Wicked
Games', 'Screaming For Sanity',
etc. I know there are still some scenes and ideas
in those crazy drafts that I never did get the
chance to use, but I got most of the best of
them...but then again, maybe not! (laughs)
Owen: Tell me
about 'Realms of Blood'.
Tim: 'Realms of Blood'
is a movie made by Florida horror moviemaker
Robert J. Massetti. I saw a screener of his first
anthology movie, 'Phobias', and
liked it so much I helped him get a distribution
deal for the movie. Robert is just a
mega-talented director, and he reminded me of
myself when I was down in Florida, struggling to
get things going, doing the same thing. Robert
and I got along great, so when he decided to do a
follow-up to 'Phobias', it
happened to be another anthology movie called 'Realms
Of Blood.' Robert asked me if I had any
story ideas for an additional segment, and at the
time I was working on 'Twisted Illusions
2' (also an anthology movie), digging
through those old aforementioned notebooks, and I
came across a story I wrote in high school called
'The Cologne' and I whipped it
up into a script for Robert to re-imagine and
direct. Robert was keen on the idea and did a
great job in adapting it. 'Cologne'
is just a great, fun segment about a nerdy guy
named Freddie who can't get a date until he tries
this special perfume out, which is supposed to
attract women...but in the ol' 'Twilight
Zone' and 'Creepshow'
twist style, there are horrid side effects to
using this musk wrong...so then the madness
begins! 'Realms' came out great,
there is also a really slick tale called 'Pain
Killer' in it that is very strong and
Freddy Krueger in style, and there's a neat
vampire piece about a priest battling an
infiltration of bloodsuckers. 'Realms'
dishes up gore in style, it's a very slick little
indie movie, and so far, it's done real well.
Fans are still finding this movie and I don't
think they'll be disappointed if they seek it
out.
Owen: You've also
written a fictionalized memoir of your life in
and around the low-budget horror movie biz called
Unreel. What were the main things
you wanted to convey about this life choice and
the benefits & idiosyncrasies of it?
Tim: I
think I wrote Unreel so other aspiring
moviemakers could see...and hopefully feel...what
a difficult choice it is to become a 'moviemaker'
with absolutely no backup plans. This is what I
did, and as much as I was able to 'pursue my
dreams', there were more times than not when I
was just living a nightmare, so that was what I
was hoping to convey, even though it may not be
as bad as that sounds. The point is, lots of
times we don't 'make it' the way we thought we
would, things don't work out the way we planned.
For every Quentin Tarantino success story, there
are thousands of aspiring hopefuls out there
still working in those video stores, struggling.
There's no health insurance offered in the indie
scene. There's very little money to be made, in
reality, unless you have a one in a million 'Halloween'
style success----which akin to winning the
lottery, in reality. Most unlikely. So I wanted
to tell this story...to give this warning...in
the best way I could, from my own experiences.
Plus it was fun putting all the crazy stuff down
I had gone through. These days, more and more of
the people who are 'fans' of the kind of movies I
make are going out there and doing it themselves
with digital cameras and computer editing...and
the market is unfortunately getting smaller and
smaller. From my experiences, there's also this
incredible kind of ruthless behavior in the movie
world that goes along with an extreme prejudice
from Hollywood against what we are doing. You can
read about it all you want, but until you
experience it first-hand, you can't imagine what
a letdown it is, emotionally, when all these
negative cards keep falling into place. You get
ripped off by wholesalers. Tarred and feathered
by highbrow critics. And no one in
Hollywood will take you seriously if you say you
shot a feature movie on video, its
still the kiss of death despite successes like Blair
Witch and Open Water.
All the while youre working a menial labor
job you hate and struggling with family and bill
issues. (And no, I'm not trying to say every
critic should love your movie, but theres
nothing like a little salt in the wounds to add
insult to injury! You have to develop a thick
skin to stay focused on the dream.) I tried to
explain what all that's like, almost being
snuffed out financially while you pursue this
'calling' you feel, when every time it looks like
your ship is going to come in...things go all
Titanic on you! So if anything, I hope that this
book will help aspiring artists think about
backup plans to make money and take care of their
families concurrently with pursuing their
moviemaking goals. It actually took me years to
figure out how to write 'Unreel'
and not make it too depressing. I felt all my
life experiences were leading up to a book, but I
just didn't know how or when it would evolve. I
wanted to get everything and the kitchen sink in
there and fortunately, I keep a daily diary of
sorts, I've done that since 1980, so I read
through everything I had documented, all these
experiences and emotions in thousands and
thousands of pages (which took about eight months
to do!), and I was able to capture things pretty
accurately. It was an interesting experience,
really, being able to take myself out of what I
had actually lived through, and see things almost
neutrally, from a third party perspective, as
just the writer or person documenting it all, if
you will. It really made me see a lot of the
mistakes I had made in a new light---it became
clear to me how wrong I had been in so many of my
choices. Ultimately it proved pretty humbling and
cathartic, as it led me through to that age-old
question we all have for ourselves, 'what is the
purpose of life' and all that, even if it sounds
cliche...
Owen: Did the fact
that Unreel was partially non-fictional as well
as the fact that it was your second novel, after The
Hammer Will Fall, make it somewhat easier to
write?
Tim:
Not at all, simply because I was putting my whole
life under a microscope! (laughs) 'Hammer' was
adapted from a screenplay I had been working on
and tinkering with for over ten years, and when I
finally couldn't raise the money I felt was
necessary to make it into a solid film, I decided
to translate the script into book form so I could
'share' the story with anyone interested, so
writing that was fairly simple. I had a nice
blueprint to work from and add to. With 'Unreel',
finding a direction I was comfortable with was
the first problem, which took years. Then, as I
mentioned, going through thousands of pages of
diaries I scribbled in, reliving all those
incidents and emotions, taking notes, and finding
'the heart' of each thing, was very trying.
Finally, sitting down to write the book took
about a year. I had to counterbalance all the
real stories with a parallel fictional chase
story, where I also was able to intergrate my
thoughts and opinions on things. That part was
fun---the chase scenes, even though there's
thought expressions of my 'real' life in there
with the character, came easy. And I think
they're pretty exciting, it's like a salute to my
favorite action movies of the '80's and 90's. I
didn't think that 'Unreel' would
see publication it's such a strange book, even
though many celebrities (Pam Anderson, John
Travolta, etc.) are now writing books that are
partly non-fiction. 'Hammer' did
really well in terms of sales, even seeing print
in foreign territories like South Korea, but
'Unreel' is too strange for mainstream markets, I
think, plus I'm not a big enough celebrity for
most readers to make this kind of thing a
'must-read'! (laughs) Seriously, 'Unreel'
really wore me out in terms of writing and work,
it was a massive undertaking. I had exhausted
most of those scripts and notebooks I mentioned
earlier in all these different little movies and
now I was putting myself into the mix of
creativity, so it seemed like it was the end of
an era for me, perhaps some kind of strange
milestone. 'Unreel' has gotten great feedback,
though, from those struggling to make it in the
movie business and those who have any artistic
aspirations at all, so I'd highly recommend it as
inspiration to anyone who is struggling in the
biz. It's a fun book, it ends on a positive note,
and you'll see that we all go through similar
trials and tribulations in pursuit of creative
endeavors.
Owen: With writing
as well as directing, are both equally creative
for you or does directing tend to be a more
"occupational expression" of your
creative vision? Does that even make sense?
Tim: Writing is
more internal and you can say a lot more on the
written page in terms of...anything, really. You
can step inside the minds of your characters and
really get to know them. With the blank piece of
paper, you can have anything happen. There are
absolutely no limits or restrictions on your
imagination, so in that way, it's very freeing.
Even with scripts, you can write down whatever
you like, you see it so clearly in that movie
theater screen in the back of your mind, and it
can be a joyous experience. You write in
solitary, for the most part, and there's no
interference. With directing, it's very much a
collaboration. The actors, crew, and other
creative people involved with the project help it
come to life, so yes, I'd agree that directing
becomes more of a 'job' or 'occupation' in the
sense that you're working with other people
closely for a common goal, and it may be
different from the way you imagined it in the
writing stage. That's fair to say about all
directors, really---locations may change
blocking, actors may think of better dialogue
than you have in your script, the script
supervisor might have an idea that works better
than what you have on paper, if you're willing to
try it. So directing is different from writing,
but then you go into editing, and if you do that
in solitude, it's very much like writing, where
you add things, change things, and end up shaping
the movie into something creatively new and
unexpected, more times than not. Editing can feel
very much like the writing stage a lot of times,
it's very cathartic, personal, and fun when you
add all the bells and whistles into the mix.
Especially music and sound effects, it's just an
incredible high as an artist, seeing it all come
together, this world you saw in your head and now
it has become a reality, even within the smallest
of budgets. Sometimes this is the only time I
really feel alive, when I'm doing something like
this. The urge to create sometimes overwhelms all
rational thought and action for some of us. My
guess is we have some kind of mutant gene that
wires us in this fashion...or we inherit the urge
from the Creator Himself, right?
Owen: Speaking of
which, one of your latest film projects, 'Reconciled
Through Christ', sounds fascinating. Can
you give a brief synopsis of it?
Tim:
It's about a man who falls away from
religion and God, even though he knows and feels
the truth deep inside himself. He decides to kill
his wife, who has left him because he's pretty
much a lying, cheating rascal. So the next step
in his spiral downward is quite logically murder.
So he embarks on this road trip where a stranger
he picks up causes him to question what he has
done in the past and what he is about to do.
There's a lot of interaction, fighting, and
confrontations between the two characters, but
more than anything, it becomes an internal
conflict thing with the main character, which
loosely echoes what happened to me as I was
writing 'Unreel.' I looked back on my life of
movie madness and obsession and wondered 'is this
all there is?' And I felt really empty. And I had
gotten very depressed over the years just
immersing myself in the world of serial killers
and crime to come up with new ideas and twists
for all my little movies, so I had that issue
going. And after 9/11 happened and shook the
world, of course, and I began asking myself
things like 'if I died today, where would I go?
Would I be ready? I can feel my soul inside, that
much I'm sure of...' Plus my grandfather died and
it was very sad, and this made me think more
about how I was living and the uncertainty of my
beliefs. So basically, I asked God, if he was
even listening, to 'show me the way to go home,'
so to speak, as Orca crew sings in 'Jaws'.
And God is always listening, trust me, knocking
at your door, waiting for you to just open it up
a crack. Long story short, I ended up recalling
the religion I grew up with, Christianity, which
I kind of discarded when I got old enough because
I saw so many hypocrites in it and so much that
didn't really seem to work. And I knew many of my
favorite authors and directors had gone through
this same process of losing their
religion, so to speak, and I had related so
much to that in my own journeys of life. But I
decided that I needed the truth and I should
pursue it doggedly, wherever it might lead. So I
read the entire Bible cover-to-cover to see what
it really professed as opposed to what various
denominations tell us, and then I got obsessed
with all these various theology books and I read
up on all the different religions to see what
really made sense to me. And as it turned out,
simple Christianity was the only religion that
really did made complete sense in my mind. It
excludes no one, no matter what youve done
in the past or what stage of life youre in.
Theres nothing to physically do, no rituals
or tasks to perform, no donations are necessary,
its completely internal as your faith
forms: accept Christ, confess mistakes, change
your ways, and work with Christ through prayer.
Its pretty much a come as you
are thing, we are all accepted
if we want it. And all I can say is that for me
personally, there was also enough physical,
historical, geographical, and archeological
evidence to give me complete confidence in the
Bible and I was so happy to 'know God', so to
speak, through the words and actions of Jesus,
God in the flesh, in the New Testament. That was
like the weight of the world being taken off my
shoulders, really, and my faith was able to grow
again, after being lost and confused for so long.
So naturally, I wanted to 'shout this out' and
'tell it to the world', so I ended up making a
low budget movie about it so I could share my
experience with anyone else who might be
interested. So 'Reconciled' is pretty much a
testimony of my faith at the end of the day and
was made as just a reminder to myself of where I
had come from and what I learned. It's not meant
to 'push beliefs' on anyone, it's what I believe
and if it can help someone out there who might be
searching like I was, then
thats just an added bonus. At the end of
the day, only God can make changes in ones
life, the messenger is only a tool to get there.
It was interesting making 'Reconciled', and as we
entered the long postproduction stage, Mel Gibson
came out with 'The Passion Of The Christ'
and it seemed that he made his movie for the very
same reasons I was making 'Reconciled',
so that inspired me to keep moving ahead with
what I was doing at a much, much smaller level,
of course. And I have to give hats off to my 'Reconciled'
collaborators---Todd Pontsler for the computer
effects, Larry Joe Treadway and Ron Blair in the
lead acting roles who both gave so much, and the
music by Nathaniel Scott was just so good...I
couldn't have done it without them. Or my wife
Kathy, who has always been so supportive of all
these endeavors, both behind the scenes and in
front of the cameras, for so long now. Everyone
was so understanding with the material and a true
joy to work with. We had a blast making the
movie, and I think it shows.
Owen: I am also
interested in hearing about your latest horror
anthology film 'Twisted Illusions 2'.
Tim:
Joel D. Wynkoop and I started out in the
underground scene back in 1984. The first movie
we collaborated on was a shot-on-video anthology
movie called 'Twisted Illusions'
(1985), which had a little short in it called 'Truth
Or Dare', where Joel played the lead
psycho. That little segment, of course, became
the basis for the whole 'Truth Or Dare'
trilogy, and 'Twisted Illusions'
is what really put us on the map, so to speak.
(Note: a national re-release and restored version
of the movie is available in a DVD 4-pack release
from BCI.) On the end credits of 'Twisted
Illusions', it boldly stated 'Coming
Soon: Twisted Illusions 2.' And people
kept asking Joel and I 'when's the sequel coming,
when's the sequel coming?' And we kept putting it
off, but finally, over twenty years later, Joel
and I decided to just go for it and do the
sequel. We did it strictly for fun, just for the
passion of making movies. There were no rules, we
didn't consider commercial appeal or anything
like that, just what we wanted to see on the
screen at the time. We all had about zero dollars
to make the segments and we did it just for the
excitement, if you will, of making video movies.
The idea was to kind of go back to our roots,
where we had started, and get that hungry, 'eye
of the tiger' feeling back again, if that makes
any sense. It took all of us a couple of years to
finally complete our segments and put them all
together, but it ended up being so much fun for
everyone involved, that's what really mattered.
It's a little Twilight Zone style
suspense movie made by fans, for fans, that's the
only way I can describe it. I shot my segment, 'Dexter
Deadbeat', in Kentucky, where I had
recently moved. This was another one of those
stories I was toiling with back in the early
'90's when I was working in a video store, and I
went through one of my old notebooks and just
completely updated it, keeping the twist ending
intact. It's about a woman being stalked by a
psycho and when it's revealed why, it's totally
fun and...unexpected, shall we say. No one who's
watched the segment has been able to guess the
motivation of the stalker yet, so that's an
accomplishment right there! Joel's segment was
one he and I talked about doing for years, back
when we were making 'Creep'. It
was his story, about a crazed man who will do
anything to get a part in a movie. It's a fun,
crazy time, watching Joel in the
writer/director/actor mode. And finally, we
invited Oregon filmmaker John Bowker to round
things out with a twisted little piece called 'Betrayal.'
It's basically a revenge/zombie tale...with a
twist as well. John is a great friend of mine, we
have a lot in common, and we had worked together
on separate segments of Kevin Lindenmuth's 'Beyond
The Lost World: The Alien Conspiracy',
and it was a riot doing that, so we
figured...let's do some more stuff together!
Owen:
What other projects do you have lined up in
the future?
Tim:
Nothing is concrete right now. Between 'Unreel'
and 'Reconciled', I really wore
myself out, so I'm planning to take some time off
for a while from the creative process and just
see what direction I feel like moving in down the
line. I'm not planning anything one way or the
other or ruling anything out, either. I've had
some offers to do more horror movies but I turned
those down right now...that little voice in my
head, the one who had me scribbling in notebooks
and tapping on that Brother word processor for so
many years in the eighties and nineties...has
kind of quieted a little bit. Most of the tales I
was obsessed with telling
most of the
setpieces I had bouncing around in my
head
are now out there for the public to see
on paper and disc. There are a few ideas, of
course, that Id still be interested in
pursuing, but its amazing
I have so
much product out there now that every day new
viewers are just discovering both the old and new
stuff and that makes me confident that I can take
an extended break and not lose any momentum. And
Ive already accomplished so much that I
wanted to do over the last couple of
decades
that I feel pretty satisfied. Who
knows, I may not even have anything else to offer
up in terms of future projects. Im
basically just a fan who jumped in and joined the
party as best as I could, with or without
financial backing. I might just go back to being
a fan.
Owen: You were
also recently put in charge of Sub Rosa Midwest.
Do you have any objectives or a plan of action
for where you want to take the studio?
Tim: Actually,
that was a loooong time ago when that started up,
that was back in 2000, I believe. Sub Rosa
MidWest started out as an offshoot of Sub Rosa
Studios, and the initial idea was to do
Wave-style videos for that particular niche
market. Not long into it, I became uncomfortable
with what I was doing, of course, as I began to
change my ideals on what was morally correct
(yes, my conscience was piqued), and the focus of
the company quickly changed into providing more
mainstream horror tales for the then-burgeoning
DVD market. I ended up co-executive producing a
bunch of movies, including John Bowkers
Housebound and
The Seekers, also
helping to get them into the distribution
pipeline. Housebound
was really fun, I had a cameo in that and shot a
lot of second unit stuff for John. Then there was
connecting with Robert J. Massetti and helping
him get Phobias out
there and working on Realms of
Blood with him. And I shot a
Bigfoot piece for Ron Bonks deluxe Red
Files: Strawberry Estates
DVD
it was originally part of a weekly TV
show and they put all the shows on the DVD as
extras
I did some second unit shooting for
Richard Anaskys upcoming revenge drama
I Am Vengeance
I
kind of presented filmmaker Michael
J. Hoffmans two debut anthology movies
Scary Tales 1 and 2
I
got to work with Joe Sherlock and Michael Hegge
on getting their horror comedy Blooducking
Redneck Vampires into the
market
and I assisted filmmakers Eric Szmyr
and Barndon Bethmann in getting their two
creature-feature movies into distribution, called
Raising Hell and
The Risen,
respectively. I hope I didnt miss anybody,
but as you can see, I have been doing so many
things over the last five, six years, that
Ive barely had time to breathe! So
thats why I need to slow down and focus
more intently on just one project at a time in
the near future, if I decide to do anything.
Things got so crazy at a couple of points, I had
all these deadlines bearing down on me at the
same time, which really was stressful
I was
working with an editor on my novels and trying to
get that all squared away while simultaneously
trying to edit my latest movie, even as I was
trying to get all these master materials from
other moviemakers assembled and sent out on time
to be authored due to release deadlines. I know
this may sound ideal to some people
who want to get into the business, but for me, it
got to be overwhelming way too many times, just
too many balls to juggle at one time. You have to
remember, while doing all this entertainment
stuff, Im still working a regular 40-hour a
week night shift job in order to pay the bills
and have health insurance
so once again, we
go back to Unreel and how difficult
and stressful this business can
actually be! I think I was just wearing too many
hats, doing too many things, all at the same
time, as I look back on it. And then we ran into
the same old thing, where these wholesale
distributors reneged on a deal and all of us
involved hit major financial obstacles
So as
they say, the more things change, the more
they stay the same
Owen:
What scares you in real life?
Tim: First, I wish to quote someone who recently
reviewed Reconciled
on a website. I dont know the man, but his
name is Jack Seney, and one of the things he said
in his review about Christianity really resonated
with me as well. He said, As I am someone
who has been freed from multiple gutter-level
addictions by Christ and who has studied the
historical evidence for Him extensively, there is
no one who can convince me that He is not the eternal Savior for human souls. I
couldnt agree with Mr. Seney more and have
been through the exact same experience, but for
me personally, I sometimes find this truth
intensely difficult to personally live up to. I
am afraid of temptation and how truly easy it is
to backslide in your moral standings or forget
God in this busy and sometimes selfish world we
live in, so that, to me, is kind of scary.
Its something I personally have to work on
every day. These are things that constantly sneak
up behind you, like a silent killer with a knife,
if you will. Its very much like what the
Apostle Paul stated somewhere in the New
Testament, and my loose interpretation of it is
the more good I try to be, the more I am
able to see how truly corrupt I am inside, and I
end up sinning again, exactly what I dont
want to be doing. One has to stay focused
on their beliefs and Gods principles, and
its so easy to be caught off guard.
Its all too simple to pray to God only when
you want something like a promotion or a loved
one to get better if theyre sick
but
so easy to forget that communication on just an
everyday basis, thanking Him for your well-being,
your family, pets, food, a roof over your head
and all the things we generally take for granted
in life. So I now really try to keep that in
perspective and communicate every day, which is
something so simple
yet so complicated, at
the same time.
Another
thing that kind of scares me is mans
capability for violence
its nothing
new, its well-documented even in Biblical
history
but that we can let ourselves go
that far, and do that much real physical and
mental harm to one another
is just plain
scary. And thats kind of what fueled some
of those early movies I made with those
rampages and the motivation behind
them. I was trying to get inside that
psychopathic mindset. I think
Halloweenstill probably best states
that motivation, though: there is no reason. No
rational explanation. Its just the way we
are unless we seek help from above. And now
Ive realized there are so many better
places to be, more positive things to focus on,
but still
mans hatred and greed is
there, and unbridled
just look at what
its capable of. Simply watch the nightly
news on any given evening. Its eating us
alive at the core and its unstoppable until
the end of time. And even though I know where I
stand and where Im going, its still
very scary to face sometimes
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