Kiss
of the Damned is available on VOD now! If you are ready for a totally
unique vampire experience then this is the ideal Easter flick. The
mastermind behind the film is the legendary Xan Cassavetes, daughter of
John Cassavetes and Gena Rowlands.We sat for a cup of coffee at Studio
City's horror headquarters, Jumpcut Cafe and discussed The 13 Question
Marks of Horror...
1. You come from a great show biz family. Was film your
first love?
I don’t know if I’d call them “Showbiz”. They were pretty
Arts ‘N Crafty, not fancy, not into Hollywood, made their own movies, paid for
them themselves so it was pretty mellow and not flashy, but No. Just like any
other kid doesn’t want to do what their parents do because it seems “Lame” or
“Parental”. I grew up in a really good era, I’m 47, when I was like 12 or 13, I
was already starting to go to all the Punk Rock clubs. There were no age limits
back then. It was a Mafia run state instead of a Police run state so it was a
good time to be growing up. So I was obsessed with going to the Punk Rock clubs
and seeing all the bands that would come from London or whatever. It was a
SUPER great time to be 12 or 13. I stayed obsessed with music until finally I
formed my own band which I was in for 10 years. After Punk Rock and Post Punk,
then there was the Hip Hop movement and I was in New York for that, it was just
like this incredibly magical time to be coming of age, starting a band and be
in love with music. So no, I didn’t want to make movies at all until I started
making movies for my band and for other people’s bands and then I still didn’t
think of it.
2. What finally brought you to making movies?
I had a kid and my way of getting peace was to go write and
then I started writing screenplays and they were so weird and I was so attached
to them that I thought “Well I’m gonna make these movies”. So it came full
circle. My brother and my sister were directors too. I don’t think any of us
started out thinking we were gonna jump into directing.
3. You’ve tooled around with shorts and a documentary. How
different was it jumping into a horror feature?
I made shorts but the first real thing I did that was a
concentrated job was the Z Channel documentary, which was a big editing time.
It was the best thing ever because it was a total film nerd boner. It was
relatively simple because you know the guy it was about was Jerry this great
guys every in his life was super brilliant and articulate with the best stories
so is very simple and in a fabelistic sort of way. My own passion fueled the
whole thing for me I was so into it. I didn't know if anybody else would even
care but they seem to care a little bit.
4. How did that style change with Kiss of the Damned?
This movie was different because it was done really quickly
and there were no rehearsals I was just very much instinct. I have three lead
women who are French and that wasn't bad, it was just challenging because their
playing this melodrama with French accents at her like crazy, but to construct
the atmosphere which kisses down to really build on atmosphere, and strength
offsetting, and things like that. It was just so much more to play with that
making a documentary.
5. Kiss of the Damned is your first feature. How did this
film come together?
I was about to make this other movie which I have been
trying to take for like five years which is the bigger budget for a psycho
sexual love story that takes place in Mexico City. And I finally got that
together I realized there was really out of touch with something I had written
five years or and I want to just do something that I thought of and for the
moment that was really immediate so although the other movie was bigger I was
able to convince some of the investors to just give me a fraction of the money
and go shoot this crazy French vampire movie and Connecticut had happened super
quickly. I started writing over Thanksgiving and we were shooting by May. It
was out of control.
6. Can the film be interpreted different ways?
When it does happen and you don’t have time to think, your
subconscious comes so into it. There is so many things in that movie there is a
subconscious thing that you're like Oh My God, I thought this was a vampire
movie but so much of it is biographical, even philosophical, but you'll never
know that because it happened so fast.
7. I love the classic Euro Horror, especially Hammer Horror.
What films influenced Kiss of the Damned?
I love H Hammer. I love Nosferatu by Werner Herzog. You do
sound design the atmosphere it just the most creepy and fucked up vampire movie
ever. I love Trouble Every Day, I love the Jean Rollin vampire movies, not as
much as I love his other movies, but I love those. I just love the idea these
beautiful sexy women in vampire movies, sorry. And as far as vampire movies I
love Mask of Satan, I love Mario Bava, obviously when you seeKiss of the Damned
and she you'll see that I always admired his lighting. I'm obsessed with this Viscante
as well as far as applying that something more sinister, just a lot of
different things, not necessarily horror things, but using a lot of different
things to create a vampire movie.
8. What can you tell me about the plot?
It’s about a lonely woman, vampire, living in this house
that she staying in temporarily and this man she meets a video store, because
they love movies, and fall instantly into an attraction and an identification.
And its about the guy being drawn into this mystique of women. Starting with
this woman but there are more and more women, bad ones, good ones, but this one
that he's after is a lovely person. It's
also about her fear of her own power and that she could be discovered as a
non-attractive soul. Which I think that women, particularly beautiful women,
have this issue. Speaking strictly in the context of a vampire film, it's
really kind of about a guy who becomes obsessed with the mystique a woman
without really knowing her and gets himself in a situation where he would
voluntarily wants to be bitten. He actually brings it upon himself, forces the
issue, because he wants to go the extra mile. Like someone might have a unprotected
sex with a suspicious woman in that moment where they can justify all
recklessness. She takes him in and is very afraid that he will actually know
her and her insanity, and the chaos she brings and they try to have this love
affair until the sister comes to stay in the house for a week, on her way to
vampire rehab, and she is burned all these bridges, has nowhere to go and she
kinda tips over this love story.
9. Is it effects heavy or more character driven?
There's hardly any effects, it's very old school. Share a
few effects at the end but they're very tiny. There's one VFX’s shot, one
killing scene. Everything seems carries them very naturally, very organically.
10. Tell me about the search for Djuna. How did you settle
on Joséphine de La Baume?
I producer had heard of for, she was an agent provocateur
model and also she's in a Pop band and there's a consciousness of her in London
and France. And then she showed me one picture of this girl's face and I was
like, what? It was just like that old school beautiful face like Sharon Tate.
You know they don't make those faces anymore. And I just thought, I have to
meet this girl. We were skyping back and forth her I loved her personality and
I love her attitude she was just one of those girls that's my kind of girl who
will do anything like live sees herself for maximum effect. Not like a prissy
repressed bitchy bore. She's not into her PR, she's into her life as a
performer somebody that embodies something she's really good in the movie,
she's a good actress.
11. There have been so many teeny bopper vampire
incarnations over the past few years. Was it personally satisfying to bring the
vampire some dignity again?
Because twilight was so huge and it's in the consciousness
people want to compare it to my movie and it's like what? Twilight is great, I
took my daughter to see it when it came out, it's for children. Do people
really want to sit around criticizing their mood is made for 13 year olds? As
far as giving the vampire is back some dignity, one has always take the chance
of taking away some dignity because it's such a philosophical opportunity. Not
just have "I’m in a sheer dress and I’m gonna bite you" that's cool
too, but the idea of everlasting life in the idea of beauty and the idea of
loneliness, just the nightmare of eternal life and not being able to live a
normal life is more interesting to me. There is a dignity in pain and that's
why I loved Nosferatu so much. Klaus Kinski is like get me the fuck out of
here, my life sucks. When he bites people it's a perversion that he does
against his own will. There are vampire movies for children and vampire movies
for adults and I don't make films for children.
12. This film has a lot of excitement buzzing around it. Is
it daunting?
Some people really hate this movie, simply what I really
hate it because it's not gonna give them what they expect to get out of it and
some people who will be excited by the fact that it didn't give them what they
expected to see out of it. Me personally, I find myself in this horror world
right now because I made this movie but to me I'm really not into being
conservative about the way I think her live or make a movie. I don't want to
hit all the official acceptable marks. While I'm excited that people want to
see the movie I also know that there will be people I think would love it who will
hate it and people they think will hate it who will end up loving it.
13. What do you have lined up next?
I have three or four different projects that are all a
variety of things. I wouldn't say that there horror but they're all in the
super we are tricked out fantasy department is expedited I think. I like
messing with the genre make it so weird that you will never recognize it.
Other Horrific Musings:
13 Question Marks of Horror With American Mary's Tristan Risk
13 Question Marks of Horror with Hail Satan's Denesa Chan
13 Question Marks of Horror: Wrong Turn 2 's Mathew Currie Holmes
Shock Till You Drop's Ryan Turek: The Sinful Celluloid Interview
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