Warren's
memories
INVASION
FOR FLESH AND BLOOD was a direct sequel to FLESH
EATERS FROM OUTER SPACE. The shooting title
was RAISING HELL, not INVASION FOR FLESH AND
BLOOD, but when you cut a deal with a
distributor they can have the right to change
titles to something they feel is more attractive
to the buyer, something they think is more
commercial.
FLESH
EATERS was a rough ride for me and I hadn't
anticipated wearing so many production
"hats" when I started it. I ended up
writing, directing, producing, doing the
photography, lighting sets, helping with the
makeup, building sets and props and
sculpting and building the monster suit (with
the help of Tony Annunziata) and when the
filming was complete I was stuck for months
editing everything into the most coherent story
I could from what footage I had to work with.
In
all honesty I have to laugh at movie
critics who criticize my story telling
abilities. If I had the luxury of money to hire
and pay professional crews and actors
instead of using volunteers and working around
their schedules, I would have a fighting chance
at shooting the original scripts as written.
That
hasn't been the case on FLESH EATERS FROM OUTER
SPACE, INVASION FOR FLESH AND BLOOD, SCARLET
MOON or DARK BEGINNINGS. In all my features so
far, my original scripts were re-written
out of existance as we shot to accomodate what
locations we could get (or build) and what
actors showed up for the shoots and how reliable
they were and if they stayed or dropped out
of the picture before it was finished.
My
main focus has always been to shoot
enough material to cover my ass. To shoot enough
footage that I have something to work with
creating a new story after shooting is over at
the point of editing.
For
example, if only three of the five scheduled
actors decided to showed up to a particular
scheduled shoot, I was forced to quickly
adjust the scene to work with only those three
actors. If a main character actor decides to
stop showing up all together, I have to come up
with a reason for that sudden departure,
story-wise, and shift his/her scenes to
another character, re-writing it to fit the other
actor. Its insane. The movies that suffered most
from irresponsible actors were SCARLET
MOON and DARK BEGINNINGS.
The
down side to doing all the jobs I did on
these movies, as one human being, is that
it doesn't allow me to give 100% to any one job.
Everything became a compromise. And I didn't
always have the time to explain in great detail to
the cast and crew what is in my head. I
merely direct where people should stand, how
they should perform their parts and shoot as
fast as I can.
I've
learned the hard way that it is neccesary to
shoot very long days with actors and knock
off all their scenes as fast as possible or run
the risk of only getting half their scenes shot
before they suddenly decide not to be
responsible and vanish.
Anyhow,
despite what Jim Cirronella kept saying on
the new TROMA DVD of INVASION FOR FLESH AND
BLOOD's commentary track, the movie was
NOT ad-libbed every five seconds and didn't just
happen miraculously by itself. I should have
corrected him on the commentary track while it
was being recorded. It was foolish on my
part to not correct him and let him keep saying
it. Oh, well, that ship has sailed...
INVASION
started shooting a few months after FLESH EATERS
(AKA "A TASTE FOR FLESH AND BLOOD")
got picked-up by a distributor. Some of the
people who worked on FLESH EATERS stayed on for
this sequel. Tony Annunziata, Kathy Months, my
father, Shawn Reich, Gary Hoffman,Steve
Mezo, Kenneth Arotin and Adrienne D'Accardi stayed
for the sequel. Nick Primiano and James
Cirronella were new crew members/ actors.
I
wrote a script but kept it simple so things
could be added as we shot. I wanted as many
splatter effects as I could get and we came up
with a list of maybe 20 interesting ways for the
monster to kill people. We posted the kill
scenes on a wall and individual crew
members selected what splatter effect they would
personally like to do.
It
was the best movie I made from a
behind-the-scenes point of view. I had people
sculpting, painting, building sets and props, which
allowed me to include more effects in the movie.
Jim
resculpted the monster's mouth because he didn't
like the "flap mouth" Tony and I did.
Actually Tony and I didn't get to finish
the head before FLESH EATERS started shooting,
we were going to have finger-like claws in all
of those holes around the monster's mouth that
would reach out and grab a victim and drag his
head into the fanged mouth.
Jim
likes Godzilla movies and resculpted the mouth
area with very cool teeth. The only problem is
he didn't listen to me when I told him not to
use cotton in the latex as a thickening material
so his new monster mouth looked great but didn't
move. We had to make additional monster effects
head for the attack scenes or when the monster's
mouth was required to move. I wish the suit head
had mouth movement, it would have looked better.
I am
always looking to grab footage anywhere I can to
ad scope to these movies. I used the airliners
landing at the airport in all four movies.
A
town was doing an emergency drill of some kind
so I got lots of footage of a wrecked train,
police, helicopters and fire department stuff. A
Critic said I stole that footage but he was
wrong; I shot everything that was on the
screen myself.
Jim's
father was a volunteer fireman and got us
matching equipment and suits so our scenes where
Kathy Monks is found on the beach in the opening
matched all the other footage I had shot
previously at the town drill.
One
critic in a 2005 review said I was a filmmaker
who didn't allow working conditions or lack of
budget to stop me from accomplishing my
story-telling goals. He is 1000% correct. I did
scenes whether I had the money to do them right
or not, hoping that my talent would still shine
through to potential investors.
I
must say INVASION was extremely hard work but I
wanted it to be more of a splatter comedy like
Romero had done with DAWN OF THE DEAD, so we
also had alot of fun doing it. There was a sense
of pride on the part of the young people working
with me. They were fans of this kind of movie
like I am and respected the material even as we
were trying to do comedy. I think that sense of
fun was transferred to the movie itself and
makes the movie more enjoyable for the audience.
To
be continued...
