The Corpse in the Fridge

Via some staunch defending of Fantasy Film and her own controversial feature Chaos, Geraldine Creed introduces and interviews Andrew Parkinson. [Extract]

To begin, this interview piece is meant to be a follow up on last autumn¹s Film Ireland round table discussion on the future of fantasy film in Ireland. Seeing as there¹s not much of it going on in Ireland and seeing as Fantasy/Horror has no geographical boundaries, I thought I¹d broaden the horizons of our water-logged Isle by including an interview with a filmmaker who has made some truly horrific and thought provoking movies in the zombie genre, namely, I Zombie and Dead Creatures.

To get to the interview itself I want to re-wind a bit, to December 2001 to be exact. I had just locked off the final, final grade on my second feature film Chaos. Its troublesome journey (from start to finish) was as weird as the film itself! Chaos took four and a half years to make and although I would describe it as a dark and twisted love story set in the future, there are some who have called it a nightmare and a reprehensible piece of 'B-movie trash' that should never have seen the light of day! Now we¹re talking ­ to get such a reaction from certain quarters is always refreshing. It¹s when people have no opinion and won¹t get down off the fence that I begin to get worried. That¹s when I feel film has strayed too far into TV with balanced views (i.e. scenes shot from every conceivable angle) and loads of superfluous background plot. We all need a de-tox from media-funded script development and 'proper' films.

When Chaos was ready to do the festival circuit, I concentrated on Fantasy and Horror festivals and first up in April '02 was Cinenygma, Luxembourg¹s main Film Festival. Chaos screened in competition there, alongside such recent classics as Dog Soldiers, Fausto 5.0 (see Film Ireland 88 Galway review), Fear.com, Demonium and Dead Creatures. Going to Cinenygma had a huge impact on me. I felt I had finally arrived somewhere after years of travelling. It was so bloody refreshing to go see a bunch of films that were not 'safe', not 'proper' not 'reality-based' and not 'balanced'. It didn¹t matter that the films were all different in terms of budget size, production values and look. What bound these films together was their content: they were brave, bold, fantastic, fearsome, hard-hitting and pushed the boundaries - some even going 'too far'.

Dead Creatures, Andrew Parkinson¹s second feature film, is one such movie. It goes into dark places, beyond what is acceptable, into gore and guts and flesh eating orgies and emerges from the depths of this depravity as a truly challenging zombie critique on modern city life. When we first meet Andy¹s heroines, a bunch of ordinary girls, trapped in a 'Mike Leighesque' suburban flatland, we think we¹ve seen this all before: the misery and yeah, the smack addiction ­ but when we round the corner to find that the girls do indeed have a habit they can¹t kick, the film takes a surprising twist. It turns out the girls have a degenerating sickness from which there is no return, they must eat flesh to stay alive but they must also beware 'the hunter', a man who is determined to track and destroy their close group. This film is a fantastic and insightful study of urban alienation and a new departure in female zombieism.

GC The catalogue at Cinenygma mentioned that Dead Creatures, your second feature film, was 'not for sensitive souls' and I must admit, there were times at the midnight screening I attended when we all averted our eyes and peeped through our fingers at the gore. How did the film come about, Andy?

AP The story came together during the editing of my first film I, Zombie. Rewinding four years, I¹d had one of those brilliant 'let¹s make a feature film'ideas. With a half written script and a mountain of optimism, a few intrepid friends and I set out to make our 16mm horror film. The first cut of the film was 2 hours long and highlighted the fact that I didn¹t know jack about the art of script writing. It was one of those areas where making lots of nice little shorts doesn¹t help. So I took what we¹d shot and developed other characters and ideas to help the story work. In the process I had the idea for DC, which seemed a natural extension of IZ.

GC In the conservative and hallowed halls of British film making where the hell did you go to pitch such an extreme idea?

AP The only people I pitched the film to were my friends who I wanted to be involved in the project, and the cast. I knew it was a 'difficult' and in some ways extreme script, so the 'conventional' routes ­ whatever they are, were not even a consideration.

For more information on Andrew Parkinson's films, visit his website.

The full text of this article is printed in Film Ireland 89