Interview w/ Caleb (Die You Zombie Bastards!) Emerson

by Vaughn Drake

Caleb Emerson (writer, director and actor) unleashed Die You Zombie Bastards! upon us in 2005. A low budget comedy horror that touched on just about every b-movie cliché and monster that they could think up and film. It was made as irreverent as possible, with over the top acting, strange lines of dialogue and characters. It toured around the festival circuit and since 2007 has developed an audience on DVD.

WSC: Die You Zombie Bastards! is a low budget movie made with love. I heard that it took quite awhile to actually film, edit, score and distribute. Could you summarize the events that happened as you went from forming the idea, to filming it, to seeing the first DVD off the press.

CE: Geez...that could be a VERY long answer...My Brother-in-Law, Haig Demarjian and I started writing it in maybe 2000. I would write a scene, send it to him and he would add to it and send it back and vice-versa. It took maybe a year.

In early 2001 we started looking for investors and we slowly found a few and just started shooting as we got money. We shot most of the film between August of '01 and January of '03. I spent the first half of '03 rough cutting the film, and then in the fall of '03 we did the final pick up shots and a few little additional scenes that weren't in our shooting script. Stuff that we felt we needed after seeing the rough cut. Most of '04 was spent editing. Our editor, Danie Strange works freelance so whenever he had a free week or so I would fly out to Los Angeles and work on it with him. I think we finished editing around December of '04.

I then spent about a month doing sound design and mixing and finally in February of '05 my DP Jarred Alterman and I did the color correction. We had our theatrical premiere in Providence, Rhode Island (where I lived at the time, and where much of the film was shot) in March and out festival premiere almost simultaneously in Berlin at the Tromanale Festival. We spent pretty much all of 2005 submitting the film to festivals and sending it out to press people for reviews. It took a long time, but by the beginning of 2006 we had screened theatrically in Providence, twice in Boston and New York. The film had played at some very prestigious festivals and was getting some great reviews.

We finally got a sales agent in the Spring of '06 and we signed for North American and UK distribution that summer. I don't know why it took so long for them to release it, but Image Entertainment finally released it on DVD in January of last year (2007) and it came out in the UK a month or two after that. And that's basically it. 7 years from idea to video store.

WSC: Casting Jamie Gillis, star of many hardcore roughies (Water Power) and XXX classics (Through the Looking Glass) was an interesting casting decision as Stavros. How did that come to pass, and was it hard to retain his services over such a long and difficult shooting schedule?

CE: I just think he's an excellent actor. I sometimes have movies on when I write, and I was watching 800 Fantasy Lane on when I wrote the first Stavros scene, so I was just picturing him in the role. I figured, "what the fuck"...I'll just see if I can get him. He's not too hard to locate online. I made him an offer and he accepted. It wasn't a lot of money by movie standards, but it was massive for us (more than everyone else combined). He was only on set for 2 or 3 days though. We shot all of his scenes in November of '02 so it wasn't a big hassle for him. He was in New York at the time, which is only a few hours drive from Providence. I have nothing but wonderful things to say about him as an actor and as a person. He was a joy to work with and I am honored to have him in the film.

WSC: Geoff Mosher as Baron Nefarious, seemed to channel Emperor Wang from the 1974 film Flesh Gordon. Was it intentional or am I just making a connection where no connection should be made?

CE: I've actually never seen Flesh Gordon. I'm SURE Geoff has, so you'd have to ask him. I told him to have Jim Varney from Dr. Otto and the Riddle of the Gloom Beam, Ernest Thesiger from The Old Dark House and Jerry Lewis in mind when he was preparing for the role...

WSC: In one of the DVD extras, there's an interesting behind the scenes look at some audio being recorded by Tim Gerstmar, who along with other roles in the film, played Red the serial killer, cannibal superhero. It's obvious you guys had a heck of a fun time making this movie, and never took it too seriously. The over the top enunciation of the lines was fun to watch. At what point was it decided that the over the top delivery and repeating of lines in editing, was the way to go?

CE: Well, to paraphrase a quote from Lloyd Kaufman, we took the movie very seriously; we just didn't take ourselves very seriously if that makes sense. I wanted this to be a good, unique and enjoyable movie. We put all of our hearts and souls into it. We're just sill people though.

As far as Tim's delivery? That's just Tim. That's the way we joke around with each other and I think it's funny. Every scene was a little different in the way we approached it. I don't really know how to answer that one. The repeating of lines was all Daniel Strange though. He's a brilliant editor and he made Tim funnier, which is no small feat.

WSC: I didn't mean to imply that you didn't take it seriously or that is was a bad movie. Only that the delivery was way over the top, and Tim and you knew you weren't competing for an Oscar. So you guys just had fun with it.

CE: I know, I know...I didn't mean to sound defensive. I just sometimes feel that people don't always understand that it takes just as much hard work and sacrifice to make a silly movie as it does to make a serious one.

WSC: "Scream for me Long Beach!" Tim's non sequitur improvised line was great. It was so far out of left field. I couldn't stop laughing. Was it from Iron Maidens Live After Death album?

CE: Sure was. That was a Tim adlib that cracked everyone (or, at least me) up so we left it in.

WSC: I noticed at two Motorhead references in the movie. Are there others?

CE: Haig and I are both gigantic Motorhead fans. We actually looked into getting Lemmy to play Red’s dad. But it was becoming a big ordeal, and no offense intended, but Lemmy can’t act. It would have been funny to have him make a little appearance, but he’s done that in several Troma films and we ended up thinking it might have ruined the scene because it’s kind of a serious scene that involves some real acting.

In the original script Red’s father’s parting advice to him was “You know I’m born to lose, and gamblin’s for fools…but that’s the way I like it baby…I don’t want to live forever” which is of course a line from Ace of Spades. We wrote it in, then shot it…then in post I stared thinking that that was a really stupid thing to do...those lyrics are undoubtedly copyrighted, and not only would we need their permission we’d probably have to fucking pay them, or pay somebody. We contacted their publishing company to see what kind of permissions we’d need and they didn’t even understand what we were talking about. So I just said fuck it and overdubbed the line to make it “You know I’m born to booze, and diddlin’s for tools, but that’s the way I like it sucka, I don’t want to shit forever” which seemed funny at the time. It still makes me laugh, so it’s still in there.

Uh..what else is there? Oh...Red yells "The Ace of Spades" when he gets the card from Hasil...I think that might be it. But I honestly don't remember.

WSC: Wasn't there a street or a town named Kilmister?

CE: YES! Thank you for noticing...it's been a while.

WSC: The maps. Loved it. They were a good for a laugh each time. Err. I guess this wasn't really a question. (If you've never seen the movie, Caleb and company played fast and loose with geographical locations.)

CE: Even though that wasn't a question, I'll tell you how it started. I wrote the Barundeb Duttah scene which takes place in Pittsburgh (for no reason at all). At the end of the scene I wrote that Red runs away from the building and dives into the ocean and swims to Sweden. I sent it to Haig for input and he delicately said, "Uh...you know that Pittsburgh isn't on the coast...right?" I didn't even think of that. It's not that I though that Pittsburgh WAS on the ocean, I just wasn't even thinking in terms of reality. So I said, "Fuck it...in this movie, Pittsburgh IS on the coast dammit"...and like with everything else in this movie it just snowballed into stupidity.

WSC: IMDB lists DYZB! as Tims most recent movie. Is he a working actor, or is acting just something he helps you out with on occasion?

CE: As far as I know he has no interest in being a full time actor, which is too bad. He's really talented. He's been in DYZB!, a few of my shorts, and a couple of shorts that Daniel Strange directed. I'm sure he would consider acting again if someone offered him something, but he is not actively pursuing it. He also lives in Korea right now so that might make things a little tough.

WSC: DYZB! is your last directing credit listed on IMDB, but you have several acting credits listed since DYZB!. Any plans for a new feature length film? Perhaps a movie about the creature at the start: the half man, half fish, Amphibious Guy...and of course many naked female scientists searching for him.

CE: I have two new features that I'm trying to get off the ground right now. One is a script written by someone else that I optioned, and one is a script that I'm writing with my friend Thea Martin. The first is sort of a surreal character-driven torture movie for lack of a better description. It's in real time with almost an entirely female cast. I think it's great. The second is sort of an erotic science fiction adventure story. Sort of. Haig also wrote a script for Die You Zombie Bastards! 2 which I think is excellent. If anyone wants to finance my next film...give me a holler!

WSC: You played the dim witted police officer, Peanutch, with an over the top comedic genius. Are you comfortable on that side of the camera?

CE: I love acting. I don’t think I’m especially good, but I like it. Pretty much every movie I’ve been in is something I was working on in some other capacity. I just kind of fall into roles. Even in DYZB!, the role of Peanutch was written for someone else who didn’t show up…so I just did it. The only role I REALLY pursued was “Carl Jr.” in Poultrygeist. I read the script and begged Lloyd to late me play Carl…he was the best character in the script, and had the best death. But again, I was the AD on that movie too. If someone wanted to hire me to act in a movie, and the role was good, I’d do it in a second.

WSC: I admitted to you that I had seen DYZB! as a download well before I ever purchased my copy. Do you feel that downloading hurts or helps a small movie like yours? After all, I would never have seen it since none of my local video stores carry it to rent.

CE: Well...I'm on the fence about that one. On one hand it really pisses me off. I really don't think it's any different from stealing it from a store (at least if someone steals it from a store, we still get paid). I spent 5 years of my life and close to $100,000 of my and other people's money to make this movie. I don’t think asking for $5 to rent it, or $15 to buy it is all that much.

This movie got quite a bit of very positive press in some major publications and we haven't even made our money back yet. I'll probably be in debt for many years because of it. And I think one of the reasons a lot of stores don't carry smaller titles like this is because they know that these kinds of movie have a very limited appeal, and fans of these movies are exactly the same demographic as the kinds of people who illegally download movies.

Years ago if local video stores didn't have a movie and a few people asked for it, the store would probably get it. Now if people don't see it they just figure why bother asking when they can just download it for free. Soon we are going to see more and more people no longer being able to make a living making these kinds of movies. There are going to be labors of love (like this movie) where people aren't doing it for the money...and there are going to be a lot of movies that are total dogshit because the producers only spent ten grand on the movie because they knew it wasn't going to make anything more than that.

That's not to say that you can't make a great movie for ten grand; of course you can. But sometimes there are just certain things you need to spend money on. Twenty and thirty years ago movies like Basket Case, Evil Dead, The Toxic Avenger etc. could actually make big money; today you see fewer and fewer examples of success stories like that. And when you do it's rarely a movie that's all that radical or different.

BUT...that being said, as much as I'd love for DYZB! to make me wealthy, I didn't make the movie to make money. I knew the appeal would be very limited. So if it's a case of someone enjoying it for free over them not seeing it at all, of course I would rather have that person just be able to see the movie. I think if the movie had been released 5 years earlier at the beginning of the DVD boom we would be in a much better situation.

File sharing is great for people to get their hands on out of print movies or foreign movies that are not available in the U.S. Otherwise, just fucking rent it or buy it. I think people need to police themselves a bit more. But, as you told me you downloaded it before it came out...you liked it, and then once it came out you bought it. That's fine. Downloaded movies usually look like shit so you would think that more people would just buy DVD's of stuff that they downloaded and liked. But now that we have people watching movies on their fucking phones....bleh...I'm getting old and cranky.

WSC: In the limited time since its release, have the investors made back their capitol and is it possible to create films like this and live off the profits derived from them?

CE: I know a lot of people who make low budget films and many of them have made money. But to make enough to support yourself and enjoy any kind of decent life you would have to make many movies a year...which means spending less time on them, which sometimes means lower quality. Not that every movie needs to take 5 years, and not that Die You Zombie Bastards! is a benchmark of quality, but I think it shows a pretty high level of effort. As far as how to live off of the profits from making movies like this, you're asking the wrong guy. I haven't figured that part out yet. I'm currently editing reality TV to pay my rent.

WSC: Now that the latest format war has been won by Blu-Ray, how will that affect low budget independent horror and creature movies like DYZB!?

CE: I don't think it will at all. People shot great and awful movies on 70, 35, 16 and 8mm film. People shot great and awful films on DV and now people are shooting great and awful films on HD. As far as the format that the movies are delivered on, 5 years from now there will most likely be no DVD. Hopefully someone comes up with a way to get high quality movies online and for the creators and distributors of those movies to be able to get paid. I'm sure someone will...

WSC: Any film recommendations for independent movie fans out there? Either your own work, from people you know or work with that may need exposure, or simply good work from complete strangers.

CE: Hmmm...Well, Poultrygeist is finally getting a wider release and I'm awfully proud of that movie. I acted in it and I was the AD. I shot a couple of movies for a guy named Richard Griffin called Pretty Dead Things and Splatter Disco that are a lot of fun. I just got Space Disco-One which is the new film by Damon Packard. He directed Reflections of Evil which I think is one of the most incredibly unique and bizarre movies I've ever seen in my life. I don't know the guy or anything, but Reflections of Evil fucking blew my mind. I thought Inside was pretty great. I'm really looking forward to the new Frank Henenlotter and Larry Fessenden films even though I haven't seen them yet. I'm sure I could download them, but I'll wait!

WSC: Caleb, thank you very much for you taking the time to answer my questions. I regret that you're part of the horror that is reality TV, but I thank you for creating and releasing Die You Zombie Bastards! into our unsuspecting world. Take care.

CE: No problem at all.

Wildside Cinema and Vaughn Drake would like to thank Caleb Emerson for taking time out of his busy schedule to conduct this interview. To find out more about Caleb Emerson and his film, Die You Zombie Bastards!, please go to http://www.dieyouzombiebastards.com
 

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