Just how many films is indie-horror director and actor Larry Fessenden involved with this year? The answer is what we in the entertainment-reporting business refer to as “a lot.”
More specifically, Fessenden is releasing his new, bad-business-on-a-boat, terror flick Beneath next month while demonstrating his thespian chops in the much-anticipated home invasion horror-comedy You’re Next (out Aug. 23) and the Sundance-screened, due-out-later-in-the-year We Are What We Are.
Fessenden also appears in the eerie-looking new indie-horror movie Jug Face, whose latest trailer has just hit the web. Directed by Chad Crawford Kinkle and costarring Lauren Ashley Carter, Sean Bridgers, and Sean Young, the film concerns a pregnant teenager in a backwoods community who discovers she might be sacrificed to a creature in a pit.
Jug Face will be available on demand from July 8 and hits cinemas on Aug. 9.
You can check out the trailers to Jug Face, Beneath, and You’re Next below.
Habit, Wendigo and The Last Winter‘s Larry Fessenden has returned to directing with the feature film Beneath, which will be doing a limited theatrical with it in more than 15 markets this summer as well as VOD on July 16th.
In addition to the trailer, Bloody Disgusting is exclusively sharing the following viral video starring “Uncle Brian” Spears—horror FX make-up man extraordinaire, who did the makeup fx for a bunch of Glass Eye Pix films including Stake Land, The Innkeepers , and of course Beneath.
In the film, “When a group of young friends commemorating their high school graduation take a trip to the remote Black Lake, their celebration turns into a nightmare with the sudden appearance of a bloodthirsty, underwater predator. Stuck in a leaking boat with no oars, the teens face the ultimate tests of friendship and sacrifice during a terror-stricken fight for survival.”
Made for Chiller, the pic stars Daniel Zovatto, Mark Margolis, Bonnie Dennison, Chris Conroy, Jonny Orsini, Griffin Newman, and Mackenzie Rosman.
With a giant man-eating fish in tow, the maven of indie horror returns to the director’s chair for the first time in six years with Beneath.
“I would not have told you a year ago I was going to make a movie about a giant fish. I can guarantee that much.”
Nearly 40 years ago, that could have been Steven Spielberg talking about Jaws. Here, though, it’s indie horror guru Larry Fessenden, who is just as much an American original.
Since the 1980s, he has been an actor, producer, director, mentor to other filmmakers and entrepreneur of the strange with his Glass Eye Pix production company, which has put out recent films such as Stake Land, Bitter Feast and The Innkeepers.
Fessenden blends the old school with the new in most everything he does, and always with fans in mind — the guy even put out a set of throwback Web radio shows called Tales From Beyond the Pale, with a second season coming this summer.
“Why not do audio programs in the age of YouTube and video!” Fessenden, 50, says with a laugh. “Part of it is just to re-engage the imagination of the kids and get them to enjoy stories in different mediums.”
But back to that giant fish. A lover of the low budget, Fessenden returns to the director’s chair for Beneath (in theaters and available on demand July 15, and on Chiller TV this fall), which features a group of recent high school graduates headed up to a lake to party and, in a leaking boat with an unfortunate lack of oars, find a man-eating, catfish-looking creature ready for a several-course meal.
It’s Fessenden’s first directorial effort since the 2007 environmental horror flick The Last Winter, and the latest in a career that started in the early 1980s.
“I’ve always wanted to direct, that’s my priority,” says Fessenden, who also has acted in films such as Bringing Out the Dead, Happy Accidents, Broken Flowers and even a modern-day adaptation of Hamlet with Ethan Hawke.
Fessenden talks with USA TODAY about the new film, the Jaws influence, what he doesn’t like about today’s horror and what favorite movie of his might polarize the viewership.
Read Larry Fessenden’s full interview on USA TODAY.
Jonny Orsini stars as one of the teenagers trapped on a boat circled by a man-eating fish in BENEATH.
USA TODAY releases an exclusive clip from Larry Fessenden’s BENEATH in which Mr. Parks (Mark Margolis) warns Johnny (Danny Zovatto) that going into Black Lake might be dangerous.
Probably the wackiest, and perhaps creepiest musical-design treatment that a mega-piranha has yet gotten, “Beneath” uses teeth-scraping metallic effects and berserk buzzing, so much so that the score’s subject feels like it’s about a swarm of killer bees. There’s much cleverness to be had with a solitary rowboat of fresh young meat, from country-jazz to the real, chilling deal of a solo violin and off-kilter strings that capture the seemingly placid water. Sword’s score floats effectively on Graham Reznick’s “ambiences,” which often sounds like sonar on the prowl. “Beneath” might be a bit avante garde in approach, but there’s certainly enough musical content with water-like harps and mournful voices to hook in adventurous listeners already out to snag the cool outer limits in sound design scores.
Check out the full article here and pre-order the album at Amazon.
Following up the first exciting slate of genre films announced for its Frontières International Co-Production Market, the team behind Montreal’s Fantasia festival has revealed another dozen movies for its Off-Frontières lineup, including titles from some of the indie world’s biggest talents as well as exciting newcomers.
These projects will be unveiled during the Fantasia Industry Rendez-Vous, which involves producers, sales agents, distributors and other film and TV folk from all over the world, and takes place July 25-28 at the festival:
THE MORTUARY COLLECTION (U.S.), written and directed by Ryan Spindell, produced by Larry Fessenden, Brent Kunkle and Glass Eye Pix (STAKE LAND, THE INNKEEPERS, etc.)
Latin America has become a horror film hot spot over the past couple of years, thanks in large part to director Adrián García Bogliano, whose 2011 slow burn terror flick Penumbra is a must-see for fans of the genre. Now, Bogliano is hoping to make a splash in the U.S. with his new movie, Late Phases, which is currently shooting in upstate New York.
The director’s first English-language film, Late Phases relates the story of a cantankerous blind vet named Ambrose McKinley (Stake Land‘s Nick Damici) who moves into a retirement community where residents have been dying from dog attacks — although, as Ambrose starts to realize, the mutts may be more than mere canines. The film also stars Ethan Embry (Can’t Hardly Wait), Erin Cummings (Spartacus), Lance Guest (Halloween II), Tom Noonan (Manhunter), Tina Louise (Stepford Wives), Karen Lynn Gorney (Saturday Night Fever), Caitlin O’Hearney (Wolfen) and Rutanya Alda (The Deer Hunter).
Director of photography ERNESTO HERRERA, director ADRIAN GARCIA BOGLIANO and producer BRENT KUNKLE on set day one filming LATE PHASES, written by ERIC STOLZE.
DARK SKY FILMS and SITE B present a GLASS EYE PIX production, producers GREG NEWMAN, ZAK ZEMAN and LARRY FESSENDEN.
Glass Eye Pix is the fierce independent NYC-based production outfit headed by award-winning art-horror auteur Larry Fessenden with the mission of supporting individual voices in the arts. Read more...
