Brad Sykes is a multi talented kind of guy who seems to be at home performing most tasks for his movies whether it be directing, writing, producing or even acting. He directed Zone Horror favourites Goth and Death Factory and his latest movie, Plaguers is premiering on Zone Horror on November 20^th. We tracked down this busy and in demand all rounder to discover his influences and his plans for future projects. Be warned, the interview contains small spoilers so if you don’t want to know too much about Plaguers come back on November the 21st!

 

 

BS: In the summer between my third and fourth year at Boston University, I did two film internships in L.A. The first was at Paramount working as a production assistant on Kiss The Girls, and the second was at Scott Free as a script reader. I was there for a few months, reading scripts, writing coverage and attending meetings while Ridley was out shooting G.I. Jane. They had quite a few interesting scripts in their library, including one for a Blade Runner sequel! The whole thing came full circle for me recently as a year or so ago, I produced a short film called Burying The Ex for a friend who was at the time working as an exec at Scott Free. I ended up spending quite a bit of time at their offices. They’re a lot busier now than they were back then.  

 

 

BS: I guess it’s always been in my blood, so to speak. The first movies I started to read about seriously (in Fangoria, DarkSide Magazine, etc.) were horror films. At first I was attracted to the special effects, gore, and so on, but over time I came to recognize the storytelling possibilities inherent in the genre. There are certain themes that are easier to address in horror films than in mainstream cinema, and you can certainly be more visually daring. I think at their best horror films can take you to other worlds but still show you something of yourself, too. That’s what I try to do each time I make a new film.

 

 

BS: Death Factory was a work for hire situation, and it was always intended as a “body count” movie. So I said if that’s what we’re going to make, let’s make it as crazy and bloody as possible. I also wanted the monster to be something we’d never seen before. I made her female, which you don’t see too often, and gave her a biomechanical, almost cyberpunk, look. And she’s kind of sexy in a warped way. Casting Tiffany Shepis against type in the role (to my knowledge she’s never played any kind of creature before or since) was the finishing touch. 

 

With Goth, I had always wanted to do a reality-based horror film set in the Goth subculture. I approached Brain Damage Films with the title and concept, and they went for it. It’s much more my kind of movie, more character-driven, more psychologically disturbing, and visually pretty inventive. We shot the whole thing hand-held, almost doc-style, and the producer hated that look, in fact, he pretty much hated the whole movie, period. It’s a very polarizing movie; there’s not a lot of middle ground. It does have one thing in common with Death Factory: again, the killer is female. I just find that more interesting to watch for some reason.  

 

 

BS: For a long time I had felt that there just weren’t enough sci-fi/horror hybrids out there. Back in the eighties, we had Lifeforce, The Thing, the Alien films, and of course lots of lower-budget but fun stuff like Creature or Galaxy Of Terror…but for some reason, nowadays sci-fi and horror had stopped interbreeding! So years ago, I came up with the concept of “zombies on a spaceship”. I felt that would be the perfect sci-fi/horror mix and space was the one place zombies hadn’t been at that time! The issue, of course, was money. That’s one of the reasons nobody makes those type of films anymore – they’re damn expensive! So I filed the Plaguers script away and moved on to other projects. Then in 2003, I was invited on a location scout, to look at some stages in the San Fernando Valley – which happened to have a bunch of standing spaceship sets built back in the early 90’s. This was exactly what I needed. I adapted my script more or less to the sets, and then started pitching Plaguers to various people. It wasn’t till 2005 that I finally found some backers for the project.

 

 

BS: Well, it took almost two years from when I first saw the stages till we got a “yes”. During this time, my wife and producer, Josephina, and I made two smaller films through our own production outfit, Nightfall Pictures. I was also writing scripts on the side for a group called Rockaway Pictures. They had been trying to package my scripts as multimillion dollar, studio-level projects and we were all getting tired of the waiting game. So I presented Plaguers to them as a project they could finance independently. It would their first movie and Nightfall’s third, and biggest, production. The investors liked the script and knew we had the experience to pull it off. To seal the deal, Josephina shot a “video tour” of the spaceship sets and mailed it to them. Rockaway went for it – though it still took a full year to raise the money. 

 

 

BS: Oh, boy. Anyone who’s seen the film probably knows the answer to that question. But yes, many of my childhood favourites were in mind when I was writing the script, even more so once I found the sets. They have a particularly “80’s” quality, all exposed pipes and ductwork, like something James Cameron might’ve built for a Roger Corman production. And I mean that as a compliment! Actually, the challenge while shooting was not to be too referential, because you want the audience to get involved and experience something new. But the homages are certainly there, not just in the production design, but the FX, costumes, miniature ships, etc.

 

BS: We saw a lot of actors for the various roles – somewhere around 100 total – in a whirlwind series of casting sessions. We taped everything and watched it later so we’d remember who came in that day! I ended up getting all of my first choices, which rarely happens. The one role I had written with a specific actor in mind – and I almost never do this – was Tarver, played by Steve Railsback. Steve was always a favourite of mine since I saw him in Lifeforce, The Stunt Man, and so many others. Josephina got the script to him and after meeting with us, he agreed to take the part. Just having Steve in the movie was cool enough, but he turned out to be one of the most generous and creatively involved actors I have ever worked with.

 

It wasn’t easy gig for many of the cast, as they all have a lot of physical action to perform, and some of them spend a good portion of the film in heavy makeup and prosthetics. It was a tall order and they were up to the challenge. 

 

BS: We did devote a sizable chunk of the budget to FX, both on-set makeup/gore and visual FX. I really wanted to deliver the same type of thrills as the movies that inspired Plaguers for a fraction of the cost. One of the first things we did was hire Monster FX, whom I had worked with many times before, to handle all the special makeup effects and build the main props, like Thanatos and the “space coffin”. They also brought a miniature builder to construct the two spaceships. So that was a lot of work and not a lot of money to do it. But I was very involved during prep and together we solved any problem areas early on. I’m happy to say that pretty much everything that was in the script, we did shoot and it’s in the film, which is not always the case.

 

It’s also worth mentioning Adam Lima, our VFX supervisor, who did a marvellous job on the more than 100 visual effects shots. Again, not a lot of money to spend but Adam loves what he does and we worked together slowly but surely to get each shot right. He even “added” a few shots that weren’t budgeted just because he felt the film could use them. Thanks, Adam!

 

 

BS: Absolutely. As much as I like the 80’s aesthetic, I wanted to bring in other time periods when I felt it worked. The pirate girls’ costumes are inspired by Planet Of The Vampires and Barbarella, both of which are firmly placed in the 60’s. I like the streamlined, iconic design of the costumes in these two movies and wanted to import that over to our film. The idea of a “retro-future”, where a film supposedly set in the future actually takes place in the past, or rather in the movies of the past, is something I wanted to explore whenever possible.

 

 

BS: It was a great moment and we really appreciated the recognition. We had a terrific screening at the festival a few nights before, with the audience applauding and whooping throughout the film, which was just about the coolest thing a filmmaker can ever experience. Witnessing the audience reaction and then winning the Unicorn for Best Screenplay at Estepona made all the years of hard work on the film worthwhile.

 

 

BS: Right now I’m working on a new supernatural horror script. It’s contemporary, the most political script I’ve ever written and about 180 degrees from Plaguers. It’s also an idea nobody’s done before, so I can’t talk about it too much. Hopefully we’ll be shooting next year. All this time in space has been fun, but now I’m ready to come back down to Earth! 

 

BS: Thank you, and I hope all the Zone Horror viewers enjoy the movie!

Plaguers is being shown on Zone Horror on November 20^th at 22:55.