Madison Horror Film Festival, a daylong marathon of independent horror films from around the country, will inspire nightmares this Saturday at the Orpheum Theatre. The Daily Cardinal spoke to the local filmmakers featured in the festival to get some insight into what drives these Wisconsinites to horrify.
Marquette graduate Will Gartside learned some valuable lessons during the shooting of Knife Fight,"" one of his entries in the festival.
""If we did it over again, I don't think we'd use real knives,"" Gartside said, describing the piece as a ""live action cartoon with realistic effects."" The horrifying ""Knife Fight"" centers on two men's epic struggle for the last soda in the fridge.
Gartside is glad to get some exposure for the film, which began as a project for the Marquette graduate program and was shot in Milwaukee.
""This is a validation of sorts for 'Knife Fight,'"" Gartside said. The film hasn't been screened for an audience before this weekend's festival.
Gartside's other entry, ""Massacre (the Musical),"" debuted last January in Madison to the glee of musical-gore fans. An adaptation of the stage play by Rob Matsushita and Morey Burnard, the film follows an adorable prude named Discordia as she resolves to slay her sinning, hedonistic friends. ""Massacre"" takes a decidedly tongue-in-cheek approach to murder and mayhem, Gartside explains. ""With comedy, you can make an audience feel comfortable and then pull the rug out from under them.""
Another film academic, Trevor Murray, shot ""Valentine's Massacre"" as a student project for a Madison Area Technical College film production class, but the film grew as his co-workers at a McFarland restaurant got involved.
""The chef ended up playing the main villain,"" Murray said, ""We mostly shot on location at the restaurant.""
The murder tale follows a detective as he seeks his missing daughter, only to uncover a maniacal cook who has been using slaughtered victims in dishes for his diner patrons.
Always seeking to learn from his work, Murray is eager to hear new audience reactions to his 2006 film.
""The first time I screened it, it came off a lot more comical than I expected, which wasn't necessarily a bad thing,"" Murray said. ""Watching how people react to it is one of the best experiences for understanding my work.""
Ben Wydeven derived his film ""The Medium"" from naturally occurring paranoia. An abandoned theater in Wausau drew Wydeven's attention and eventually served as the set for the film.
""I was actually obsessed with the place from the get-go,"" Wydeven said. ""The place was supposed to be haunted.""
The film follows Raven James, a man whose paranormal sensitivity leads him to a downtown theater, where the owner seems very uncomfortable at the mention of ghosts. Sensing a secret in the theater's basement, Raven prods the owner about the ancient building.
Preferring psychological terrors to buckets of blood, the UW-Stevens Point graduate drew inspiration from classic Hitchcock films in his work, going as far as to make an opening-scene cameo in the vein of his idol.
""When I was a kid, we would have film-a-night movie night and we went on an Alfred Hitchcock streak,"" he explained.
Looking forward to the festival, Wydeven too seeks the thrill of audience reaction and feedback to his work. ""No drug can compare to it. It is an absolute, unbelievable feeling. Your movie is not finished until you see it with an audience. That's all there is to it.""
