Man in Wood

Man in Wood
chapter - Eva and Ade

Monday 28 June 2010

Review of Ian Simpson's Nadine from Quiet Earth

Review of Ian Simpson's NADINE

Posted on Monday, June 28th, 2010 5:15:39 GMT by: Rick McGrath
Posted under: movie review drama united kingdom

Year: 2008
Directors: Ian Simpson
Writers: Ian Simpson
IMDB: link
Trailer: trailer 1 trailer 2
Review by: Rick McGrath
Rating: 9 out of 10

“Nadine, is that you? Every time I see you, you’ve got something else to do…” Chuck Berry may have been perplexed about the restless activities of his future bride, but he’s not even in the same tenement flat as Ian Simpson, who actually follows his Nadine as she finds lots of something else to do.

None of it nice.

Shot in a seductive mixture of arthouse cool and cinema verité brutal, Nadine is an incredibly powerful look at what it means when “some day… everything goes wrong” for a psychologically disturbed teen at the ignored end of Britain’s impoverished lower classes. The basic plot was revealed on Quiet Earth when Nadine’s second trailer was posted: "Nadine, a teenage girl who is a regular self-harmer, is subjected to a hostile mother, an abusive stepfather, a drug addicted boyfriend and crude sexual violence from the locals. She lives on a desolate council estate surrounded by nature where she finds occasional solace. However, the profound weight of indifference, injustice and cruelty, proves too much for Nadine, whose life enters a rapid downward spiral."

That’s close enough, although the downward spiral is misleading: Nadine’s story is about her misadventures at the bottom of the spiral, and surely anything else must be up from here. This bone-toss to optimism is one of the odder elements of this excellent movie, as writer/director Simpson has chosen to bookend his drama with short docu-style interviews in which Nadine discusses her life and mulls about the future. In between we get to experience what’s she’s talking about. It’s depressing. It’s shocking. It’s a subculture of aggression and instinctual violence equal to the middle-class antics of the characters stuck in the zoo that is JG Ballard’s classic High-Rise.

Yeah, the plot is cool and the action zips along, but what separates Nadine from your run-of-the-tenement-hopeless-poverty-sucks stories is Simpson’s killer direction and his actor’s incredibly great performances.

Simpson’s sense of style is sensational. Apparently shot in black & white, Simpson has allowed just one colour onto his palate – a dark burgundy red, sort of like dried blood. It’s used subtly and seemingly without specific symbolic sense, on shoes, a car, a nightgown, on white sheer curtains… and often not at all. He uses a wide variety of shots, from very long to lingering close-up, and has an affinity for the long slow zoom and perfectly-paced panoramic pans. He’s also very patient. What’s also impressive is his sense of the restrictive aspect of this nether world, where adults hide alone in alcoholism and race hatred, where kids overlap in drugs, sex and casual violence, and to emphasize the “innerness” of it all Simpson keeps it tight and combustible in claustrophobic rooms, ugly tenement halls and the surrounding roads of South London, breaking only occasionally to meander through a neighbouring park, where Nadine comes to recharge – such a romantic.

Simpson also took a chance by casting nothing but non-actors to fill this movie’s many roles. Believe me, you’ll find this unbelievable if you get to see Nadine. I have no idea how Simpson cajoled these performances out of nothing, but there they are and all you can do is wonder. His greatest find is Lisa Jane Gregory, who plays the hapless Nadine to perfection. She’s amazing, especially as a physical actor, although she can turn on the waterworks and crank the emotions as well. Gregory’s presence is amazing. In her suicidal, self-cutting mode, she’s a walking billboard of defeat. Slouched shoulders, perpetually downcast eyes, knock-kneed legs bursting out from under a miniskirt, pigeon-toed feet shuffling in chunky-soled hooker shoes, broken nails, ragged, greasy hair, complete lack of make-up, and underneath, a simmering aggression, all make Gregory’s Nadine a character to watch and remember. The psychic power of the character comes from her unresolved relationship with her lost father, and Gregory is surprisingly good at conveying that emotion. It’s apparent she unknowingly blames herself, hence the self-mutilation as a form of punishment, and her relationships are all coloured with a kind of self-disgust… perhaps the idea behind Simpson’s sporadic use of spot red throughout the film. Menstrual red? The rest of the cast also does a fine job, but you can see how Simpson has carefully set them up so less acting becomes more acting. Nadine’s “boyfriend” Wayne rarely moves or talks. Not only does this make him more enigmatic (he’s supposed to be an artist), it does away with virtually every amateur fault! This basic technique – keep it simple when you have to – works well with the sparse style and B&W format Simpson has chosen, and actually adds to the vacancy of these people’s lives, where their social status and possibility of escape is so low that any intellectual concerns are completely dominated by the instinctual emotions, by addictions, by the need for action – any action – to postpone a death by boredom.

In this way Nadine covers more cultural ground than the shoes of its heroine. Simpson’s overall landscape of tenement despair allows him to take a good look at other social issues of the poor and the young, such as crime, rascism and morality, and works up his plot to generously reveal the fears and hates of Britain’s version of American white trash, as well as the dog-eat-dog choices of their youthful black neighbours, who may be thugs and drug pushers, but who dress better and have more money. And get most of the white girls. Hmmm, unsurprisingly similar.

Nadine… you’re always doing something else, you wacky outsider. Is that you? This Nadine is, and if you get a chance to hang out for a day or two in her neighbourhood, I’d highly recommend a visit. But don’t stay to long, OK?

Saturday 26 June 2010

and then sometimes...

Where you goin' love?

He had treated the waitress rather mean but still left a five bucks tip, that was more than reasonable in this neck of the woods.
The late September rain fell gently against the tinted windows of the small town steakhouse restaurant ‘Tim and Toms’, where George had eaten a T-bone steak with potato fries and green runner beans preceded by an egg mayonnaise salad. His wife Fanny had a small bowl of minestrone soup to start and a main course Caesar salad. Although it did not entirely satisfy her hunger, at thirty eight years of age she was becoming incessantly aware about the descent of her once taunt and slender physique, hence the unfinished bowl of Ceaser salad. George several years her senior never had any quarrels with his oversized bear-like frame and finished his plate triumphantly quickly ordering the apple crumble and cream dessert, whilst Fanny opted for a fruit salad.
They had been married for fourteen years, and were celebrating that very fact. Conversation between the two was cheerless and uninspired, like the wine they had ordered, well the wine George had ordered claiming he had some knowledge since he had spent a few months in Paris once upon a time just before he had met Fanny. In fact Fanny who had never been abroad was charmed by this young mans escapades who appeared to her as an adventurer who had left his small town of Middleton Midwest USA, to venture overseas to big ole Europe.
But on this occasion let’s leave the frivolity of how they met in peace. The wine was a beaujolais, dull and fairly cheap.
The chubby and red-faced waitress gratefully took the five bucks tip and smiled as husband and wife left the restaurant, George leading the way as if he were in a hurry for some unknown reason. But this is George always in a hurry for some unknown reason.

They drove no more than three kilometres when Fanny declared that she had an instant need to pee. The drive home had been even less talkative than the ‘Tim and Toms’ steakhouse restaurant episode and equally dismal. The radio played Elvis Presley’s classic song ‘love me’ which they both loved. Yes they both loved.
He stopped the car by the side of the calm yet still rainy countryside road. She steps out of the car closing the door behind her. Her walk starts steadily then begins to gather pace. Soon she is running. Running away. Never once looking back. George leaves the car, door open gathering small drops of rain.
‘Where you goin’ love?' he yells as she fades into the distance.

Sunday 20 June 2010

Les Dernières Nouvelles d'Alsace

Ian Simpson- A short biography




 


Born in Balham south London on 1st December 1967.

After studying at a polytechnic for media and film studies Ian Simpson worked as an assistant to chief documentary editor Jane Val Baker at the BBC. In 1989 as part of the BBC British Art Week, Ian Simpson assisted the Scottish contemporary sculptor David Mac.

Throughout the 1990’s he work in several different fields- in Television, Pop Videos, for companies such as 3D Productions and Hard Metal Films. In 1991 Ian Simpson made his first short film ‘Ingredients’, a visual poem exploring such themes as loss, violence, eroticism, birth and death in an ode to cinema.

Several short experimental super 8 and 16mm projects followed, before independently directing and producing a documentary on the popular hip- hop group the Fugees.

Another short ‘Actress’ was shot in late 1999 with the Parisian production Mic Mac, a wry and vicious comedy about an Actresses love affair with her co-star.

2000 brought Ian Simpson first feature film ‘Toothache’ A.KA ‘Rage De Dent’ a bitter satirical comedy following a group of bored middle class artist and their troubles in love during a weekend in Paris. Starring Julie Depardieu, Ludivine Sagnier, and Marc Barbe, Toothache was produced by Arte France cinema and Mic Mac productions.
 
 Ian Simpson second feature ‘Nadine’ was shot in September 2006. The film follows a teenage self-harmer who suffers regular abuse from the locals and her family.  Nadine premiered at the Odyssee Cinema Strasbourg in July 2007 as part of british cycle of films with Ken Loachs ‘The wind that shakes the barley’ and Stephan Frears ‘The Queen’. It was also shown in competion at Ghent film festival and Cork film festival. 

‘i am Kombi’ (2012) a documentary directed by Claudia Marschal for France Television was co-written by Ian Simpson.  His third feature ‘Man in Wood’ is currently in production. 

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm2351091/

Friday 18 June 2010


A Script reading session with the actress Ludivine sagnier in Meisenthal, a commune in the Moselle department in Lorraine in north-eastern France, where part of the film Man In Wood is intended to be shot.
As far back as I can remember the presence of God bewildered me. I did not know what to believe. Perhaps my
very first memory of God as image was the clichéd portrait of the bearded white fellow a cross between Victor
Hugo and a faded Orson Welles. By my late teens my minor doubts had grown into utter scepticism. The book
of Revelations provided me with sleepless nights of ghastly visions of hell, this terrifying chapter that is filled
with prophecies of doom. But it was not the book of Revelations that flabbergasted me as much. It was Genesis.
The Genesis.
The beginning. ‘ In the beginning’ it is boldly announced. They are the very first words obnoxiously written. I
scratched my head. What about before the beginning? I quietly questioned. In fact wouldn’t ‘in the middle’ be a
far more responsible opening. Oh the worries. The doubts the uncertainty, that possessed my very being since
day one.
Where do we come from? Where do we go? Who are we?

Wednesday 16 June 2010

The Films


"TOOTHACHE"
(Comedy - Color - 75mn - France - 2002)
Written and Directed by Ian Simpson
Produced by Eric Margolis
Executive Producer Hervé Pennequin
Mic Mac - Arte France Cinéma
Starring Marc Barbé, Ludivine Sagnier, Julie Depardieu, Oliver Milburn, Sophie Renoir

"NADINE"
(Drama - B&W - 75mn - UK - 2008)
Written, Directed and Produced by Ian Simpson
Executive Producer Michael De'Sioye
Matchstix Productions
Starring Lisa Jane Gregory, Abdoule Mboob, Lucy Flack, Doris Zajer, Michael De'Sioye, Paul Slater

"MAN IN WOOD"
(Drama - Expected to be shot in fall 2010)
A woman wakes up from a nightmare involving a sexual encounter with a decomposed corpse in an isolated mountain cottage. An old hotel houses a dead spirit of her mother and the rotting carcass of a goatlike animal while a jukebox inexplicably plays her favored childhood pop songs. These are but a taste of the twisted insides that make up artist/filmmaker Ian Simpson's next horror-tinged outing, Man in Wood.

Toothache and Nadine online

By using the link below you can have a chance to see both Toothache and Nadine, my two first feature films. Toothache a bitter satirical comedy concerning a quartet of bored spoilt bourgeois, who spend a weekend in Paris, troubled by the trivialities of their love affairs.
Starring Ludivine Sagnier, Julie Depardieu, Marc Barbé and Oliver Milburn.

Nadine a gritty south London drama on the subject of teenage self harm, sexual abuse, bullying, and suicide. The film stars Lisa Jane Gregory in her first lead role and a group of non- professional actors. Both films were shot with minimum budget in less than two weeks.


http://www.vimeo.com/user4054751

Monday 14 June 2010

nadine

In this area of south London where alcohol flows as free as the river Thames violence is always on the agenda, we just don’t know when, how, or why….

nadine

Monday 7 June 2010

My research was thorough and passionate,

taking the road through the French regions of Lorraine, throughout Moselle, the mountains of




the Vosges along the valley of the Rhine, to Germany into the depth of the black forest, down to Berlin, the Baltic and its remote islands, Poland and further still. It had seemed never-ending. Yet what was I searching? Well tales of inspiration naturally. Images of timber, wood, kindling and the mythologies of trees, yet more was required, barren landscape, fruitful gardens, ancient cemeteries, cathedrals, asylums, architectural monuments of yesteryear, folks both young and old. I wrote, photographed, filmed things of majestic magnitude and of course things that at times seemed of no importance, but later would revive relevance. I interviewed clergymen, politicians, journalists, arboriculturalists, professors, cobblers, stonecutters, doctors, bankers, bakers…people. I interviewed people, ordinary village folks and ended up with rushes of film that resembled a dizzy kaleidoscope of an anxious mind.

In 2006 I shot my 2nd feature with a cast of mainly non-professionals. The film was Nadine. Nadine tells a story of a teenage girl who is a regular self-harmer, subjected to a hostile mother, a sexual abusive stepfather, a drug addicted boyfriend and violence attacks from the locals who all live on a desolate council estate surrounded by the beauty of nature where Nadine finds occasional solace. However, the profound weight of indifference, injustice and cruelty finally proves too much or Nadine who’s life enters a rapid downward spiral.
The film was shot on a shoestring budget in 18 days.

The performance of Lisa Jane Gregory amongst others is a joy to behold. I was also lucky enough to work with the experience and two times Emmy Director of Photography Steve Downer who captures the natural environment superbly.

www.hdcinematography.co.uk www.wildlife-cinematography.co.uk

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fC1yYqUbZug

http://movie-preview.tv/22801/nadine/
http://www.quietearth.us/articles/2008/09/30/Trailer-for-Ian-Simpsons-NADINE

A pain in the.... mouth !

Toothache was my first feature film, a bitter satirical comedy concerning the trivialities of the bourgeoisies and their silly little love affairs. The film was shot in 11 days. Ludivine Sagnier and Julie Depardieu took the staring roles along side the two male leads Marc Barbé and Oliver Milburn. Marc Barbé (who I had previously seen giving an outstanding performance in Philippe Grandrieux dark and atmospheric serial killing film sombre) brought harsh humour and spontaneous wit to his character a self obsessed writer called Andrew. He plays the part as an almost tribute to the screwball comedies of the thirties, Cary Grant mixed with a devilish James Cagney
Julie Depardieu despite the trouble at the time with her level of English added a strong and emotional presence to the film. Ludivine Sagnier was charming, funny, youthful and incredibly professional, whilst Oliver Milburn I guess was simply an Englishman in Paris for the weekend, exactly what was required.
I am saddened yet joyful about my experience with this film. The politics of production companies I will not laboriously go through, yet with a few extra weeks and a producer of some statue, Toothache could have been a far better film than the semi-disaster it is. In saying that there are those who have seen it and been thoroughly entertained, and like certain fine wine it does seem to grow better over the years.

Toothache was shot in the summer of 2000 and co-produced by Arte France cinema.

Friday 4 June 2010

Les Dernières Nouvelles d'Alsace

Critique parue dans DNA reflets
nadine
un film de Ian Simpson
avec Lisa Jane Gregory
GB - 2007 - 1 h 15 - VOST


Nadine des esprits

Nadine, deuxième long-métrage de Ian Simpson, un Britannique établi à Strasbourg, entend selon son réalisateur « raconter l’histoire et l’existence solitaire d’une adolescente à travers un récit réaliste et dépouillée ». Ce pitch, comme on jargonne dans les professions de l’audiovisuel, n’est qu’à moitié exact.

Dans les quartiers les moins favorisés du sud de Londres, on y suit le quotidien de cette Nadine fragile, tangente, instable, qui tente désespérément de trouver une raison de survivre entre une mère méchamment hostile, un beau-père abusif et probablement fasciste, un petit ami défoncé, au centre de tous les sévices sexuels et agressions verbales ou physiques qu’on attache à celle qui serait, de notoriété publique, « la pute du quartier ». Nadine promène, le long des rues dévastées, en bordure de voies rapides et de barres d’immeubles grisâtres, sensiblement plus qu’un spleen existentiel : la violence sociale dans toute sa brutalité, cristallisée dans un noir et blanc somptueux et glaçant, nappée parfois d’une suite pour violoncelle de Bach.

Cette pure chronique sociale est à vrai dire la part la moins réussie du film de Ian Simpson : parce qu’il faut, face à ce genre de sujet, choisir son point de vue, et s’y tenir avec une grande résolution. Il y a autour de Nadine, dans ces cadres impeccablement (su)composés et dans cette velléité d’y introduire un peu de transcendance, trop de beauté formelle, ou peut-être de coquetterie, pour que la force du propos n’en pâtisse pas. Est-il bien nécessaire de passer l’image au filtre rouge lorsque Nadine tente pour la énième fois de s’ouvrir les veines ?
Faut-il comprendre que Nadine serait un film raté ? Pas du tout. D’abord parce que la densité de ses comédiens, pour la plupart non-professionnels, suffit presque à elle seule à emporter l’empathie, à donner le ton juste. Mais aussi, mais surtout parce que Ian Simpson offre à sa pauvre héroïne, et au spectateur, de splendides respirations oniriques : au milieu de tout ce désastre urbain, sans explications aucun, apparaissent soudain des troupeaux entiers de biches et de cerfs. Une forêt frémit au vent du soir. Deux bad boys s’y métamorphosent à vue en mendiants magnifiques paraissant sortis des contes de Chaucer. Le film bascule, comme si La Nuit du chasseur s’invitait coeur d’un documentaire sur le nouveau lumpenproletariat du blairisme.

La beauté qui se révèle à ces instants n’a rien à voir avec celle, toujours un peu frelatée, de l’émotion fabriquée. C’est celle, irradiante, d’un regard exact sur ce qui est, et sur ce qui est derrière ce qui est. Il faut faire, pour ses films suivants, confiance dans le cinéaste Ian Simpson.

Jérôme Mallien

Cinéma l’Odyssée - 3 rue des Francs Bourgeois - Strasbourg - 03 88 75 10 47

Thursday 3 June 2010

Nadine at the cork film festival 2008

http://www.corkfilmfest.org/2008/ccff/images/left_top.gif
Sunday 19th | 5.00pm | Triskel Arts

Nadine

Ian Simpson
England | 2006 | 127mins | Beta | Black & White
Nadine, a teenage girl who is a regular self-harmer, is subjected to a hostile mother, an abusive stepfather, a drug addicted boyfriend and crude sexual violence from the locals. She lives on a desolate council estate surrounded by nature where she finds occasional solace. However, the profound weight of indifference, injustice and cruelty proves too much for Nadine whose life falls into a rapid downward spiral.

With its imposing tower blocks, unflinching close ups and emotionally naked performances Nadine makes for challenging viewing but Simpson imbues the intensity with an artistic sensibility. The monochrome has a painterly quality with muted reds seeping up from the screen. The writing is honest and there is beauty in the tower block where it’s set, rising out like a sleeping giant as a green area nestles near by. It’s a harsh world that Simpson portrays – or, as Nadine says: It’s a horrible world – but he achieves such an intimacy with the characters and there’s plenty of poetry to be found amongst the heartache. Strong performances are coaxed from the young cast but none as powerful as Lisa Jane Gregory’s.

Producer Michael Adesioye

Leading Players Lisa Jane Gregory, Abdoulie Mboob, Michael De’Sioye, Paul Slater, Hannah De’Sioye

Photography Steve Downer

Script Ian Simpson

Editor Martin Frederic Kahn

Music Sebastian Bach

Print Source michael.adesioye@btinternet.com

Website www.nadinethemovie.co.uk
Corona Cork Film Festival, Emmet House, Emmet Place, Cork, Ireland | E info@corkfilmfest.org, | T + 353 21 4271711 | F +353 21 4275945


Grant Aided By :

Tuesday 1 June 2010

In the beginning….

man in wood

After beginning a film project with the distinguished German artist Stephan Balkenhol, an intensely productive wood sculptor, whose sculptured figures are far from heroic or romantic but somewhat ordinary everyman type, his work inspired me to search deeper into the quest of what it means to be human. I felt the necessity to be free of all types of film categorization to explore the depth of both the artist’s work and the medium of filmmaking.

After months of deliberating I stumbled on a story that questioned creation of mankind, a contemporary examination of the theological account of Adam and Eve.

My research was thorough and passionate, taking the road through the French regions of Alsace, Lorraine, throughout Moselle, the mountains of the Vosges along the valley of the Rhine, to Germany into the depth of the black forest, down to Berlin, the Baltic and its remote islands, Poland and further still. It had seemed never-ending. Yet what was I searching? Well tales of inspiration naturally. Images of timber, wood, kindling and the mythologies of trees, yet more was required, barren landscape, fruitful gardens, ancient cemeteries, cathedrals, asylums, architectural monuments of yesteryear, folks both young and old. I wrote, photographed, filmed things of majestic magnitude and of course things that at times seemed of no importance, but later would revive relevance. I interviewed clergymen, politicians, journalists, arboriculturalists, professors, cobblers, stonecutters, doctors, bankers, bakers…people. I interviewed people, ordinary village folks and ended up with rushes of film that resembled a dizzy kaleidoscope of an anxious mind.

I quarrelled with friends, family, strangers, myself. I was gradually falling into a gulf of despair. Then I awoke.

It were to be my own dissimilar, I believe, childhood that woken me to the obvious, the very apparent and clear reason of the story I had to tell. Right there at the tip of my nose.

The enforced and severe religious background I had lived.

As far back as I can remember the presence of God bewildered me. I did not know what to believe. Perhaps my very first memory of God as image was the clichéd portrait of the bearded white fellow a cross between Victor Hugo and a faded Orson Welles. By my late teens my minor doubts had grown into utter scepticism. The book of Revelations provided me with sleepless nights of ghastly visions of hell, this terrifying chapter that is filled with prophecies of doom. But it was not the book of Revelations that flabbergasted me as much. It was Genesis.

The Genesis.

The beginning. ‘ In the beginning’ it is boldly announced. They are the very first words obnoxiously written. I scratched my head. What about before the beginning? I quietly questioned. In fact wouldn’t ‘in the middle’ be a far more responsible opening. Oh the worries. The doubts the uncertainty, that possessed my very being since day one.

Where do we come from? Where do we go? Who are we?

My father was a man of wood. For most of his working life he worked with timber. In a timber yard he worked, chopping, sawing, carving, carrying, and selling all types of wood for all types of reasons, to all types of customers, for all types of…

My father would wearily arrive home. He had chips of wood in his hair, sawdust on his sleeves, and smelt of sweet timber. The Oak, the Birch, the Cedar, Ash, the Pine, and oh the Mahogany (now that’s something special, costly, but what texture and what aroma)

At age fifteen and couple of months an opportunity arose for me to have a summer job at the timber yard.

But working in a timber yard is no playground. Carrying half a dozen 12 x 4 planks over the shoulder in a well-practiced manner contains a certain knack. Besides I was the labour boy, you know ‘the go get it lad’, so my slender frame could hardly bear the toils of waking up at 5 am working like a mule until 6pm like Dad. It didn’t very last long. I quit after several days.

I had made two previous feature length films ‘toothache’ a satirical quasi-political comedy shot in Paris and a docu/drama ‘ nadine’ shot in the desolate suburbs of south London.

Then along came the opportunity to make another film ‘man in wood’.

After traveling across the wooded regions of France and Germany as earlier mentioned I thought the most suited film to make was a type of poem that would amplify the aesthetic encounters collectively with the wood and religious experience that was discerning during childhood.

As a lover of cinema, there are certain films that had an immense impact on my life. I was drawn towards the independence of so-called ‘art-house cinema’ films that often dealt with issues such as bleakness and despair. Films filled with existential questions of morality, loneness and religious faith.

But it was the horror aesthetics of these films that had enlightened me to the wonders of this type of cinema. Horror films were for me the most traumatic but equally the most treasured. As terrified as I was I would watch these films which earnest enthusiasm. And then one blessed d ay I discovered the most bizarre horrors of them all. Giallo.

“Giallo" films are usually distinguished by extensive murder sequences featuring disproportionate blood-spattering, stylish camerawork and bizarre operatic musical arrangements. There is usually the Agatha Christie/James Hadley Chase who-done-it element, but this takes a backseat to the renowned amount of blood-letting and liberal amounts of nudity and sex.

I threw myself into the works of Sergio Martino, Lucio Fulci, (‘The Beyond’ a surrealist masterpiece of supernatural horror) Dario Argento or Mario Bava, and totally unknown filmmakers like Romano Scavolini whose ‘Nightmares in a Damaged Brain’, remains a landmark in psychological/horror/mystery/slasher/ exploitation field.

So after months of searching through the bargain baskets of cheap DVD stores and watching about every ‘Giallo’ type film available I was ready for my own take.

But despite my new obsession with the Giallo films I was fully aware that making a film that was purely horror exploitation was far beyond me, and that my universe was still firmly rooted in making a film that spoke the language of insightful and meditative cinema- Poetic rather than straight narrative.

I wanted the road. A couple. Man and Woman. Doomed mismatched lovers on the run. A dangerous love affair. An obsession. The man would leave his wife and the woman her fiancé; together they would hit the road to nowhere, making love, fighting, leaving each other, reuniting, getting lost and ending up living out their last days in a ghostly cottage on the edge of a haunted forest where they’d eventually wander into and fade out into oblivion. Blinded by love. Returning to nature as they succumb amongst the debris of the forest.

It would be told in a non -linear structure, and filled with surrealist and symbolic imagery an alteration, so to say, of Adam and Eve. But most importantly it would be essential to connect with the fundamental nature of what it means to be human in its rawness and uninhibited form.

I found myself looking at paintings from the Finnish symbolist painter Hugo Simberg, whose painting’s depicts gloomy and otherworldly scenes. I would think about representing and reenacting these images, from other symbolist painters too. Mostly I was stuck in the Nordic and Scandinavian folklore blended with Christianity and early paganism. A blend that would bring an appealing yet unsettling feel.

The use of very long uninterrupted takes and sophisticated camera movement giving the sensation of something real and perhaps unexpected will emerge; Whilst also allowing the viewer to unconsciously contemplate on the horror that may eventually unfold.

The richness of the color (After all we will travel to a avant-garde Eden) and the gloom and mist of purgatory where our lovers spend most of their time, these elements are fundamental to the films look.

Conclusively the camera work must tread the delicate line of the work of cinematographic innovation in the horror genre.

Visual effects will be carefully planned and choreographed in pre-production and prepared on production by a skilled and experienced artist. Miniature sets and models, animatronics and matte paintings and stills: digital or traditional paintings or photographs will be used along with the artistry of an onset magician.

Post-production special effects will be limited if nonexistence. The gruesome visual effects and make up design of the work of Giannetto De Rossi is one to be admired, a true artist in this field whose work both shocked and astounded cinema goers, and certainly have the artist flair incomparable to the often tasteless special effects seen in contemporary horror today.

The sound in current horror films depends far too much on the long eerie musical build-up of strings or horns as the victim approaches his/hers destined fatality. It informs the audience of the fate of our protagonists as if we were born yesterday.

In this film however it is important that the sound leans towards the naturalistic, almost vague in it’s presence. There will be one 1980’s pop song that will be disconcertingly repeated throughout that is integral to the female characters memories and of course to the story itself.

It is my true desire to make this intriguing tale of what it is to be human in a unique and imaginative way and to prove that cinema can be a powerful, insightful and imaginative art form.

Ian Simpson