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00:00:01,910 --> 00:00:09,910
We can defeat death... and it was really
our intention to do something that would

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go beyond what people used to see.

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00:00:14,830 --> 00:00:18,670
Otherwise, we're just going to be one of
the millions of movies that get made and

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00:00:18,671 --> 00:00:19,671
forgotten.

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00:00:21,270 --> 00:00:26,390
There's always this idea that really great
horror movies don't show the more horrific

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stuff.

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00:00:27,710 --> 00:00:28,710
Baloney!

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00:00:29,790 --> 00:00:34,270
I like when they just go... places you
would never guess.

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Dead?

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00:00:35,470 --> 00:00:36,470
Not anymore.

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I couldn't believe how audacious it was.

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Afterwards, I think we were all shocked by
what was going on.

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I was like, oh my god, did you see all the
blood?

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00:00:46,250 --> 00:00:47,250
It's so gross.

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00:00:49,370 --> 00:00:51,510
There's parts of it that are very funny.

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00:00:54,090 --> 00:00:55,910
And parts that are just gross.

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00:00:56,790 --> 00:01:01,650
It was definitely the most gruesome movie
I've ever worked on.

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00:01:04,010 --> 00:01:08,470
These guys are coming in with their
gallons with blood and cow and testing.

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And Stuart would go, no.

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You know, that's not enough.

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00:01:14,430 --> 00:01:18,590
And he was right because it's timeless in
its rashness.

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This is like the movie that will not die.

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I'm from Chicago and grew up there.

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I was the artistic director of the organic
theater company in Chicago for 15 years.

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My wife Carolyn, I started the company in
1969.

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00:01:57,500 --> 00:01:59,980
We started it with our wedding money.

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00:02:01,380 --> 00:02:06,600
The money that we received as wedding
gifts was put toward starting a theater

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company.

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00:02:07,960 --> 00:02:09,880
We were a theater that was dedicated to
the crew.

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The creation of original work.

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00:02:11,740 --> 00:02:12,980
And we did all kinds of things.

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We did the world premiere of sexual
diversity in Chicago.

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00:02:16,780 --> 00:02:19,900
We worked with a lot of really stellar
talents.

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Joe Montana, Dennis Franz, just a host of
really fine actors.

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And I felt, you know, here we have these
great, you know, performers.

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We really shouldn't create a movie for
them.

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And a friend of mine advised me that we
should do a horror film because he said it

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would be the easiest to kind of move you
to find backing.

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00:02:41,160 --> 00:02:45,860
I've always been a huge fan of horror
movies, especially with Frankenstein's story.

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00:02:46,160 --> 00:02:50,580
And my friend said, well, have you ever
read Lovecraft's Herbert West reanimator?

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00:02:52,500 --> 00:02:57,240
So I started looking for it and eventually
I ended up going to the public library and

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found six little stories that he wrote in
the 30s and in reading them, I was blown

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00:03:02,041 --> 00:03:02,540
away.

44
00:03:02,700 --> 00:03:07,340
I mean, they are fantastic and I could see
the potential as a film because they're so

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00:03:07,341 --> 00:03:08,341
packed with action.

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00:03:08,420 --> 00:03:12,800
I mean, jam packed with incredibly
shocking and often very gory proceedings.

47
00:03:13,050 --> 00:03:17,080
It's funny because since Lovecraft wrote
reanimator as a serial, my first thought

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was that we should do it as a series.

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00:03:19,425 --> 00:03:21,240
It's kind of hard to imagine that now.

50
00:03:22,020 --> 00:03:25,200
But I thought maybe PBS wouldn't be
interested in any of those six half hour

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00:03:25,201 --> 00:03:27,140
shows based on these stories.

52
00:03:27,580 --> 00:03:32,700
So we adapted the very first one of the
stories and actually was very literal

53
00:03:32,701 --> 00:03:33,100
adaptation.

54
00:03:33,360 --> 00:03:35,120
It was set in period and so forth.

55
00:03:35,520 --> 00:03:37,680
And PBS, of course, said this is too much
for us.

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00:03:37,820 --> 00:03:38,980
We're never going to do this.

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00:03:39,510 --> 00:03:42,800
So we took it around a few other places
and we're told that no one was interested

58
00:03:42,801 --> 00:03:46,260
in half hour shows anymore, that everyone
wanted our long shows.

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00:03:46,800 --> 00:03:49,520
And the original writer on the project,
the fellow named William G.

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Norris, he got kind of discouraged and
kind of turned it over to Dennis at that

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point.

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00:03:54,660 --> 00:03:59,160
I'm a teacher and did I teach Gothic
fiction among other things.

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00:03:59,500 --> 00:04:06,060
Stuart knew I knew the genre and asked if
I could take a look at this and maybe help

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00:04:07,040 --> 00:04:11,240
Gothic it up at the same time as maybe
expanding it.

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00:04:11,440 --> 00:04:15,220
So we went back to the drawing board and
we combined the first and the second story

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into an hour.

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00:04:16,300 --> 00:04:18,800
It was determined that the story should be
updated.

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00:04:19,780 --> 00:04:22,560
But we still wanted to be faithful to it.

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00:04:22,600 --> 00:04:26,840
Right about that time, a friend of mine,
Bob Greenberg introduced me to a fellow

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00:04:26,841 --> 00:04:27,680
named Brian Eusner.

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00:04:27,730 --> 00:04:34,260
I got into Reanimator back when I lived in
North Carolina and I was a horror fan.

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00:04:34,620 --> 00:04:39,401
So I was looking to make a low budget horror
movie and I wasn't the first of course.

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00:04:39,960 --> 00:04:42,140
George Romero did it with Neither Living
Dead.

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00:04:42,940 --> 00:04:45,380
Dave Friedman was doing it with Richard
Gordon Lewis.

75
00:04:46,500 --> 00:04:50,620
And I had saved up some money and felt
like I could borrow some.

76
00:04:50,920 --> 00:04:53,520
And so I was interested in the Reanimator
project.

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00:04:53,700 --> 00:04:55,460
So I went to Chicago.

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00:04:55,685 --> 00:04:58,820
He said, I think we should, you know,
expand this into a feature.

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00:04:59,700 --> 00:05:01,520
And I said, great, we can add the third
story.

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00:05:01,521 --> 00:05:03,521
And he said, no, I had all the rest of the
stories.

81
00:05:04,460 --> 00:05:08,520
So suddenly there were these opportunities
to make twists in the stories to throw in

82
00:05:08,521 --> 00:05:10,900
more gore, more excitement.

83
00:05:11,240 --> 00:05:14,940
Lovecraft pushes the genre in literary
terms.

84
00:05:15,820 --> 00:05:19,780
So we were going to have to push the genre
in filmic terms.

85
00:05:19,990 --> 00:05:24,160
And that was one of the original
directives we had on this movie.

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00:05:25,190 --> 00:05:28,460
I wanted to make it gory and sexy enough.

87
00:05:28,461 --> 00:05:30,700
And I didn't want to skimp on that.

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00:05:30,800 --> 00:05:33,680
Brian Usna said that you looked out all
back anything.

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00:05:34,220 --> 00:05:35,620
Which I think was very good advice.

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00:05:38,800 --> 00:05:42,940
So about every weekend we go to Brian's
house and we would watch videos of just

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00:05:42,941 --> 00:05:45,501
about every horror movie that had been
done in the last 10 years.

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00:05:47,600 --> 00:05:51,220
Our goal, of course, was to find a way to
how to do everything that we were seeing.

93
00:05:53,760 --> 00:05:57,160
Stewart's original idea was he wanted to
shoot it in black and white and 16

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00:05:57,161 --> 00:05:59,280
millimeter at the organic theater.

95
00:05:59,460 --> 00:06:03,680
When we finally did have the financial
backing and were ready to go, the board of

96
00:06:03,681 --> 00:06:07,460
the theater got horrified that we were
doing a horror film.

97
00:06:07,560 --> 00:06:09,720
They weren't having any part of any HP
Lovecraft.

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00:06:09,940 --> 00:06:11,500
That was just too weird for them.

99
00:06:11,501 --> 00:06:13,581
You know, they said you should be making
an art film.

100
00:06:13,620 --> 00:06:16,960
So if you want to allow me to do this
project, then I'll take a leave of absence

101
00:06:16,961 --> 00:06:17,961
from the theater.

102
00:06:18,215 --> 00:06:21,820
And I came out to Hollywood and directed
the movie.

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00:06:22,400 --> 00:06:25,940
Pre-production on this began with talking
to effects people, but how are we going to

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00:06:25,941 --> 00:06:26,500
achieve this?

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00:06:26,780 --> 00:06:32,120
We actually had the first meeting of mine,
so to speak, in my backyard over in

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00:06:32,121 --> 00:06:33,121
Panorama City.

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00:06:33,180 --> 00:06:34,660
The first thing is you get to script.

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00:06:35,060 --> 00:06:36,140
You go through and read it.

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00:06:36,660 --> 00:06:39,840
And, you know, the first time when I read
a script, I go through and start

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highlighting things that would be
classified as effects.

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00:06:43,590 --> 00:06:46,800
First, I thought, well, this isn't going
to be, you know, all that difficult,

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00:06:46,801 --> 00:06:48,401
but it turned out to be quite a project.

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00:06:48,660 --> 00:06:52,980
Because as we started listing out the
effects, it just got huge, huge,

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00:06:52,981 --> 00:06:53,160
huge, huge, huge.

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00:06:53,520 --> 00:06:56,160
I mean, there were 89 separate scenes that
had effects in them.

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00:06:56,220 --> 00:07:00,820
And we had to come up with a way to do
these effects that was on a budget and a

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00:07:00,821 --> 00:07:01,100
schedule.

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00:07:01,400 --> 00:07:04,340
I mean, I had six weeks to build all this
stuff.

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00:07:05,860 --> 00:07:10,320
Then I actually sat down and storyboarded
the effects sequences to make it clear to

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the effects people what I'm planning kind
of working out ideas as to how to

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00:07:13,981 --> 00:07:15,216
accomplish some of these things.

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00:07:15,240 --> 00:07:18,040
We also did a lot of research when we were
working on the film.

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00:07:18,760 --> 00:07:24,760
They gave me a layer-by-layer dissection
manuals and all that sort of stuff.

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00:07:25,200 --> 00:07:29,600
Stuart had a friend who was a pathologist
and this guy sent out some photographs of

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00:07:29,601 --> 00:07:30,780
an autopsy in person.

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00:07:31,020 --> 00:07:32,660
I'd never seen anything like that before.

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00:07:32,700 --> 00:07:34,000
And I was like, oh, man.

128
00:07:34,220 --> 00:07:37,220
But he wanted all that stuff to be
absolutely realistic.

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00:07:37,720 --> 00:07:42,940
The casting of Reanimator was done in the
classical low-budget Hollywood way.

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We were brought in on auditions and we were
paired together with a certain someone.

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And I got lucky enough to be paired up
with Bruce Abbott.

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My background was the stage as was all the
actors in this film.

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You know, I think we had to come straight
together and really liked each other

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00:08:00,761 --> 00:08:01,761
immediately.

135
00:08:02,120 --> 00:08:03,480
And we were the chosen ones.

136
00:08:03,780 --> 00:08:07,780
Jeffrey Combs was known by our casting
director for his stage work.

137
00:08:08,260 --> 00:08:12,060
And as soon as he read the role of Herbert
West, I knew he was the guy.

138
00:08:12,740 --> 00:08:20,700
I was banging around Hollywood, LA
trying to get to, you know, some work.

139
00:08:21,300 --> 00:08:23,480
I'm a lot of theater, but not a lot on
film.

140
00:08:23,640 --> 00:08:30,140
So for me, it was time in front of a
camera on a set with a pretty good role.

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00:08:30,290 --> 00:08:38,000
I went down, I picked up the sides and
played it like I stuck my fingers or

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00:08:38,001 --> 00:08:39,001
something.

143
00:08:40,300 --> 00:08:45,600
You know, you know, you know, I thought I
would fool of myself.

144
00:08:45,940 --> 00:08:51,300
But Stuart said, wow, I left one home and
got word later on that I had got it.

145
00:08:51,720 --> 00:08:54,620
David Gale was another one of these actors
that walked in.

146
00:08:54,760 --> 00:08:58,280
And when I met him, it was like,
oh my God, this guy is like Boris Karloff.

147
00:08:58,281 --> 00:08:59,440
I mean, he really is.

148
00:08:59,600 --> 00:09:02,220
It's funny, to say to someone,
you know, you know what?

149
00:09:02,240 --> 00:09:03,420
You belong in horror movies.

150
00:09:04,835 --> 00:09:06,340
But David really did.

151
00:09:06,880 --> 00:09:09,900
Stuart was staying at the Oakwood
apartments there on Barham Boulevard,

152
00:09:10,220 --> 00:09:12,800
and we went over there and ran through the
scenes.

153
00:09:13,300 --> 00:09:16,380
We did rehearse for a week before we
started shooting, and we rehearsed it like

154
00:09:16,381 --> 00:09:16,640
a play.

155
00:09:16,900 --> 00:09:19,660
And we're very, very rarely do movies have
rehearsals.

156
00:09:19,840 --> 00:09:24,480
But Stuart coming from the theater
believed that, you know, you need some

157
00:09:24,481 --> 00:09:25,940
rehearsal for the actors.

158
00:09:26,760 --> 00:09:30,100
I can't tell you how valuable that really
is.

159
00:09:30,180 --> 00:09:31,500
He really knew what he was doing.

160
00:09:31,560 --> 00:09:32,560
He was with us.

161
00:09:32,700 --> 00:09:34,220
And, you know, he was our leader.

162
00:09:34,920 --> 00:09:39,880
I took all of the actors to the LA County
morgue, just so that they could get a

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00:09:39,881 --> 00:09:42,560
sense of that world and what it's like.

164
00:09:42,620 --> 00:09:46,200
And that, you know, that was an incredible
experience.

165
00:09:46,400 --> 00:09:49,240
And it's being around a dead person is not
what you would imagine.

166
00:09:49,500 --> 00:09:50,220
It's very strange.

167
00:09:50,380 --> 00:09:54,020
If you get no vibe, you get no rhythm,
you get no... you get nothing.

168
00:09:54,220 --> 00:10:00,100
When you see a dead body, it is a dead
thing.

169
00:10:00,260 --> 00:10:05,250
And it makes you realize just how magical
this idea is.

170
00:10:06,880 --> 00:10:10,640
How truly incredible it would be if
someone could bring the dead back life.

171
00:10:11,760 --> 00:10:15,140
We did reshoots after the movie was cut
together.

172
00:10:15,565 --> 00:10:18,260
And one of the reshoots was the opening
scene.

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00:10:18,910 --> 00:10:25,400
There was so little time and money to
spend on this that we decided it wasn't

174
00:10:25,401 --> 00:10:25,820
necessary.

175
00:10:26,340 --> 00:10:30,760
But after we had cut the material
together, Brian felt we really needed to

176
00:10:30,761 --> 00:10:31,836
go back and get that scene.

177
00:10:31,860 --> 00:10:39,360
I was very concerned that the audience
wouldn't be ready for the tone of the

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00:10:39,361 --> 00:10:43,260
movie if they didn't get a taste of it up
front.

179
00:10:44,780 --> 00:10:45,800
Dr. Gruma!

180
00:10:47,140 --> 00:10:48,260
Hey best!

181
00:10:48,580 --> 00:10:49,580
How's Paulman?

182
00:10:49,780 --> 00:10:51,760
Looking at the film now, I think he was
right.

183
00:10:54,800 --> 00:10:57,720
I get a call from Brian.

184
00:10:58,400 --> 00:11:00,320
He said we need a pre-title sequence.

185
00:11:02,520 --> 00:11:08,540
And it was fun because I got to do some
cool things with bladders and eyes.

186
00:11:08,880 --> 00:11:11,540
And what we did is sculpted the eyelids
shut.

187
00:11:12,080 --> 00:11:14,820
And I created a bladder that went over
each eye.

188
00:11:15,020 --> 00:11:19,600
It was basically people on these rubber
bladders.

189
00:11:20,180 --> 00:11:23,120
So you got these big old red eyes bulging
out.

190
00:11:23,680 --> 00:11:29,240
Then we filled up the tubes with blood and
put a lot of air into it.

191
00:11:32,020 --> 00:11:35,540
It was just one extra day to get that
sequence.

192
00:11:36,100 --> 00:11:38,220
And that scene kick starts the movie.

193
00:11:38,221 --> 00:11:39,221
It is told.

194
00:11:39,460 --> 00:11:41,760
And it's a better intro for my character.

195
00:11:41,761 --> 00:11:43,000
You killed him.

196
00:11:43,260 --> 00:11:44,260
No, I did not.

197
00:11:46,040 --> 00:11:47,680
I gave him life.

198
00:11:48,880 --> 00:11:50,300
The young mad scientist.

199
00:11:51,640 --> 00:11:55,700
Who doesn't mind that chaos is in his
wake.

200
00:12:01,500 --> 00:12:05,240
We were thinking that maybe there'd be a
series of Lovecraft films.

201
00:12:05,720 --> 00:12:09,660
With Lovecraft's name above the title.

202
00:12:09,661 --> 00:12:15,520
And the title sequences in those movies
are members being very vivid.

203
00:12:16,060 --> 00:12:17,060
Like really colorful.

204
00:12:17,960 --> 00:12:20,520
And so that was kind of what we were going
for.

205
00:12:20,720 --> 00:12:23,940
With those really hot pinks and bright
colors and so forth.

206
00:12:25,700 --> 00:12:28,380
The opening titles were done by Bob
Dawson.

207
00:12:28,900 --> 00:12:32,220
Who has gone on now to be like the title
sequence guy in Hollywood.

208
00:12:32,380 --> 00:12:34,140
I mean, there's a lot of Tim Burton's
movies.

209
00:12:35,045 --> 00:12:36,760
And those titles I think are so great.

210
00:12:37,000 --> 00:12:38,960
And they really get you into the mood of
the film.

211
00:12:42,560 --> 00:12:45,300
Stuart wanted a Bernard Hermannest score.

212
00:12:46,360 --> 00:12:47,640
And we know where that went.

213
00:12:47,860 --> 00:12:50,000
Richard Ban got into a lot of trouble with
this score.

214
00:12:50,080 --> 00:12:53,300
Because people thought that he'd ripped
off Bernard Hermann Psycho.

215
00:12:54,180 --> 00:12:56,140
And it was just really awful.

216
00:12:56,400 --> 00:12:57,636
Because he was doing it as an homage.

217
00:12:57,660 --> 00:13:01,260
And Richard Ban had a great influence on
this movie.

218
00:13:01,630 --> 00:13:06,500
He felt like that the music should at
points indicate the comedy.

219
00:13:06,850 --> 00:13:11,180
Richard found a way to let the honest note
was okay to laugh.

220
00:13:11,560 --> 00:13:14,560
Without getting into the nudge nudge wink
wink kind of stuff.

221
00:13:15,000 --> 00:13:18,860
It's a sensational score and you can't
imagine reanimator without this music.

222
00:13:22,360 --> 00:13:25,860
The budget ended up being about a million
bucks.

223
00:13:26,440 --> 00:13:30,760
And the advantage reanimator head going in
was that there was nobody to answer to.

224
00:13:31,040 --> 00:13:32,280
You know, it was my money.

225
00:13:32,480 --> 00:13:33,480
It was at stake.

226
00:13:33,660 --> 00:13:35,000
I was taking the risk.

227
00:13:35,300 --> 00:13:38,800
The people that I borrowed money from,
I personally guaranteed it back.

228
00:13:38,820 --> 00:13:41,440
So it was really a stupid thing to do.

229
00:13:41,700 --> 00:13:44,200
But I was young and I just did it.

230
00:13:44,860 --> 00:13:46,620
We shot it at SandA Studios.

231
00:13:47,020 --> 00:13:49,000
Which was a very old studio.

232
00:13:49,520 --> 00:13:51,500
Merry Pickford headshot material there.

233
00:13:51,860 --> 00:13:57,060
I mean, you couldn't find them or run down
sound stage.

234
00:13:57,340 --> 00:13:59,760
Our dressing rooms were pretty pathetic.

235
00:14:00,035 --> 00:14:02,700
Chipped paint, ricky staircases.

236
00:14:03,480 --> 00:14:05,620
And we'll watch out, you know,
holes in the floor.

237
00:14:06,180 --> 00:14:09,300
So it wasn't the best of the sound stages
that I've been on.

238
00:14:09,360 --> 00:14:13,120
And it just kind of like shows you how low
budget this was.

239
00:14:13,220 --> 00:14:15,700
But I definitely feel that we had a
special connection.

240
00:14:15,701 --> 00:14:18,040
All of us working on this movie.

241
00:14:18,041 --> 00:14:19,800
And we all loved it from the very
beginning.

242
00:14:20,140 --> 00:14:21,380
And we were all in it together.

243
00:14:21,540 --> 00:14:25,360
And what makes a successful movie is when
everybody is on the same way.

244
00:14:25,810 --> 00:14:30,160
Like, if you can get everybody to pull
together and focus on the same goal,

245
00:14:30,440 --> 00:14:31,760
then you've got something.

246
00:14:31,880 --> 00:14:34,900
Well, I was back in Chicago by then we had
two children.

247
00:14:35,120 --> 00:14:39,020
So I left them with a sitter and flew out
here to do my piece in the movie.

248
00:14:39,185 --> 00:14:41,000
And I was truly a novice.

249
00:14:41,240 --> 00:14:42,060
But it was exciting.

250
00:14:42,061 --> 00:14:43,220
I was excited.

251
00:14:43,700 --> 00:14:44,700
Good.

252
00:14:45,150 --> 00:14:51,980
We tried to be as faithful to the
Lovecraft as we could be.

253
00:14:52,810 --> 00:14:56,480
But it does get problematic because he
leaves a lot to the imagination.

254
00:14:57,860 --> 00:15:02,760
And the fact is, as an adaptor,
you really need to make changes.

255
00:15:03,980 --> 00:15:06,500
For example, we created a character of Dan
King.

256
00:15:08,180 --> 00:15:10,300
She just needs a little more time for the
drug system.

257
00:15:11,220 --> 00:15:12,980
Everybody in the story is so insane.

258
00:15:13,540 --> 00:15:18,100
Then you needed a normal guy in the midst
of all this so that you could identify

259
00:15:18,101 --> 00:15:18,460
with.

260
00:15:18,560 --> 00:15:22,040
King, we have done everything that can be
done for this woman.

261
00:15:22,620 --> 00:15:24,040
She has not responded.

262
00:15:26,380 --> 00:15:27,380
She's gone.

263
00:15:28,200 --> 00:15:31,200
I described Dan as the audience's response
to this movie.

264
00:15:31,440 --> 00:15:33,320
She's going to emotionally connect to the
movie.

265
00:15:33,520 --> 00:15:35,040
It's probably going to be through Dan.

266
00:15:35,260 --> 00:15:35,800
He's kind.

267
00:15:35,860 --> 00:15:36,380
He's sweet.

268
00:15:36,540 --> 00:15:37,160
He's naive.

269
00:15:37,360 --> 00:15:39,720
Okay, your optimism is touching,
but a waste of time.

270
00:15:39,840 --> 00:15:41,320
A good doctor knows when to stop.

271
00:15:41,940 --> 00:15:43,320
I related to him really easily.

272
00:15:43,560 --> 00:15:45,260
Take her to the morgue.

273
00:15:46,590 --> 00:15:51,420
What we tried to do with that character
was to make the audience really care about

274
00:15:51,421 --> 00:15:52,060
him.

275
00:15:52,061 --> 00:15:53,140
That's the key.

276
00:15:53,440 --> 00:15:53,720
That's the key.

277
00:15:53,721 --> 00:15:54,721
That's the key.

278
00:15:55,900 --> 00:16:01,220
And so the back story that we created for
him was that this is a poor kid who,

279
00:16:01,221 --> 00:16:03,560
through scholarships, has gotten into
medical school.

280
00:16:03,820 --> 00:16:06,180
And he has got a real chance at a real
future.

281
00:16:07,000 --> 00:16:08,600
Everything is looking very rosy for him.

282
00:16:09,260 --> 00:16:11,740
Until all of that gets destroyed during
the course of the film.

283
00:16:12,035 --> 00:16:13,520
Oh, I'm sorry, Dan.

284
00:16:13,560 --> 00:16:14,460
I didn't mean to scare you.

285
00:16:14,540 --> 00:16:15,380
Oh, it wasn't too bad, Dean.

286
00:16:15,440 --> 00:16:16,840
I just didn't know anybody was here.

287
00:16:16,860 --> 00:16:19,160
Until he meets this Herbert West.

288
00:16:19,260 --> 00:16:20,540
Dan, this is Herbert West.

289
00:16:20,680 --> 00:16:22,360
He'll be joining you in your third year.

290
00:16:22,720 --> 00:16:25,900
He was doing independent research and
Switzerland with Dr. Boober shortly before

291
00:16:25,901 --> 00:16:26,300
he died.

292
00:16:26,680 --> 00:16:30,940
The West, this is Daniel Cain,
one of Miss Catonic Medical's best young

293
00:16:31,040 --> 00:16:32,360
hopes for the future of medicine.

294
00:16:33,840 --> 00:16:34,920
What were your researching?

295
00:16:35,120 --> 00:16:36,120
Death.

296
00:16:36,320 --> 00:16:38,600
Herbert is a force to be reckoned with.

297
00:16:39,050 --> 00:16:45,160
I think right away I kind of like thought
how, you know, fun this guy could be.

298
00:16:45,580 --> 00:16:50,411
Mr. West, this is our eminent brain
researcher and grant machine, Dr.

299
00:16:50,412 --> 00:16:51,801
Carl Hill.

300
00:16:52,020 --> 00:16:59,780
Herbert appeals to all of our notions of
never having to compromise.

301
00:17:00,480 --> 00:17:02,220
I know your work, Dr. Hill.

302
00:17:02,240 --> 00:17:03,240
Quite well.

303
00:17:04,200 --> 00:17:08,220
Your theory on the location of the wheel
and the brain is... interesting.

304
00:17:08,520 --> 00:17:14,420
We spend our days bending over
acquiescing.

305
00:17:14,460 --> 00:17:16,640
And Herbert doesn't see the point.

306
00:17:17,140 --> 00:17:20,840
Though derivative of Dr. Groober's
research in the early 70s, so derivative

307
00:17:20,841 --> 00:17:23,580
in fact that in Europe it's considered
plagiarized.

308
00:17:23,700 --> 00:17:24,700
Arrogant?

309
00:17:24,970 --> 00:17:26,370
Okay, somebody might say, Arrogant.

310
00:17:27,090 --> 00:17:30,220
But from his point of view, he's stronger
than you.

311
00:17:30,480 --> 00:17:31,000
Intellectually.

312
00:17:31,200 --> 00:17:34,920
And your support of the 12 minute limit on
the life of the brain stem after death.

313
00:17:34,921 --> 00:17:38,420
Six to twelve minutes, Mr. West.

314
00:17:39,300 --> 00:17:39,980
Herbert West.

315
00:17:40,120 --> 00:17:44,060
And he's annoyed when someone is wasting
his time.

316
00:17:44,120 --> 00:17:49,440
Frankly, Dr. Hill, your work on brain
death is outdated.

317
00:17:50,480 --> 00:17:54,440
I mean, I'm a student of his and I'm
calling him on his shit, you know.

318
00:17:54,441 --> 00:17:56,900
Looking forward to seeing you in class,
Mr. West.

319
00:17:57,140 --> 00:17:58,500
I think that was just delicious.

320
00:17:59,040 --> 00:18:00,040
I love that.

321
00:18:02,980 --> 00:18:06,460
The thing about Lovecraft is that you very
seldom has any women in his stories.

322
00:18:07,040 --> 00:18:09,300
And, you know, Herbert West's animator is
no exception.

323
00:18:12,440 --> 00:18:16,160
So the whole idea of the Dean's daughter
was invented for the film.

324
00:18:16,161 --> 00:18:17,161
I don't know.

325
00:18:18,720 --> 00:18:18,720
I know.

326
00:18:19,640 --> 00:18:19,740
I know.

327
00:18:20,000 --> 00:18:21,000
I know.

328
00:18:21,160 --> 00:18:23,980
Those early scenes were very intimate
scenes.

329
00:18:24,320 --> 00:18:29,660
And working in front of 50 people,
you sort of have to a nest to size

330
00:18:29,661 --> 00:18:36,080
yourself to what's going on and and forget
that the people are there and really

331
00:18:36,081 --> 00:18:37,680
concentrate on your partner.

332
00:18:37,820 --> 00:18:41,760
Bruce is a lovely person and we had a
really nice time together.

333
00:18:42,830 --> 00:18:49,300
I had some great chemistry with Barbara
and she was just lovely.

334
00:18:50,080 --> 00:18:51,080
Really nice.

335
00:18:51,220 --> 00:18:53,140
I mean, you know, it can be really
uncomfortable.

336
00:18:53,320 --> 00:18:56,200
That was, I think, one of the first scenes
that we shot in this movie.

337
00:18:56,201 --> 00:18:59,120
And, you know, it was a real bonding thing
for us.

338
00:18:59,260 --> 00:19:02,360
We'd only known each other for a few weeks
and it seemed as if we were boyfriend a

339
00:19:02,361 --> 00:19:02,780
girlfriend.

340
00:19:03,360 --> 00:19:05,080
We were very comfortable with one another.

341
00:19:05,470 --> 00:19:07,740
The minute you get your MDL married you.

342
00:19:07,940 --> 00:19:12,140
I think the ease that we felt with one
another was evident on film.

343
00:19:12,740 --> 00:19:16,140
After half a day in bed with somebody
you're hardly uncomfortable anymore.

344
00:19:16,240 --> 00:19:20,820
A lot of really wonderful things happened
in that scene that weren't necessarily

345
00:19:20,821 --> 00:19:23,940
scripted like the whole being under the
covers thing.

346
00:19:25,940 --> 00:19:32,240
The original script had a lot more to do
with Dan Cain and Meg.

347
00:19:34,200 --> 00:19:39,620
It was a movie about lovers getting caught
up in this situation.

348
00:19:40,860 --> 00:19:44,640
And Herbert West was kind of the sort of
annoying catalyst.

349
00:19:44,720 --> 00:19:46,026
You're on a hear about the apartment.

350
00:19:46,050 --> 00:19:51,860
Yes, but not really quite as front and
center as he kind of became in the final cut.

351
00:19:52,200 --> 00:19:53,200
Did we meet this morning?

352
00:19:53,820 --> 00:19:54,300
You're West.

353
00:19:54,840 --> 00:19:55,840
Herbert West.

354
00:19:56,430 --> 00:20:00,270
So, for me, I thought of it as sort of a
nice supporting role.

355
00:20:03,490 --> 00:20:04,540
I startled you.

356
00:20:04,840 --> 00:20:05,840
Yes, you did.

357
00:20:07,030 --> 00:20:08,840
He's the other side to Dan.

358
00:20:08,841 --> 00:20:12,060
May I introduce my fiance, Megan Holsey?

359
00:20:12,660 --> 00:20:13,840
Miss Holsey.

360
00:20:14,220 --> 00:20:14,980
Mr. West.

361
00:20:15,230 --> 00:20:17,200
He's going to drive the action.

362
00:20:17,250 --> 00:20:19,200
Does this building have a basement?

363
00:20:19,280 --> 00:20:21,600
All of us were really young in this movie.

364
00:20:22,410 --> 00:20:24,700
And we wouldn't know how to steal a scene
at that time.

365
00:20:24,965 --> 00:20:26,280
Oh, yes.

366
00:20:26,800 --> 00:20:29,180
But, Jeffrey is an amazing actor.

367
00:20:29,880 --> 00:20:30,880
Yes.

368
00:20:32,240 --> 00:20:35,120
I think this will be just fine.

369
00:20:35,220 --> 00:20:39,720
I mean, he was just so much this character
and gave it its life.

370
00:20:40,140 --> 00:20:43,380
I think you and Mr. West have a lot to
discuss before you decide anything.

371
00:20:43,405 --> 00:20:44,820
Oh, I've decided.

372
00:20:45,220 --> 00:20:48,240
And he's so quirky and so bigger than
life.

373
00:20:48,280 --> 00:20:50,340
You'll never even know that I'm here.

374
00:20:50,560 --> 00:20:52,720
Dan, of course, on the first of the month.

375
00:20:52,940 --> 00:20:53,940
Mr. West?

376
00:20:54,020 --> 00:20:56,520
He turned into sort of the star of the
movie.

377
00:20:57,360 --> 00:20:58,920
Do we have a deal?

378
00:21:03,640 --> 00:21:08,400
At that time, I was doing business with
Empire Pictures, Charlie Band.

379
00:21:08,660 --> 00:21:10,300
He didn't put a nickel into the movie.

380
00:21:10,810 --> 00:21:13,220
But he did provide some support.

381
00:21:13,370 --> 00:21:16,320
For instance, the first DP was getting Bob
Ebencher.

382
00:21:17,120 --> 00:21:20,600
And he shot the entire first week of the
film.

383
00:21:21,340 --> 00:21:22,700
And actually, he was quite good.

384
00:21:23,460 --> 00:21:27,000
But Charlie Band felt that Mac Alberg
would be a better choice.

385
00:21:27,320 --> 00:21:28,500
They called me at night.

386
00:21:28,680 --> 00:21:30,520
I think, and I started next day in the
morning.

387
00:21:30,840 --> 00:21:33,560
And I never met Stuart Ward on in my life.

388
00:21:35,400 --> 00:21:36,860
But I came to the set.

389
00:21:37,200 --> 00:21:40,840
And he took me half an hour to literally
fall in love with the guy.

390
00:21:40,841 --> 00:21:44,760
Of course, he is such a warm and wonderful
person and very talented.

391
00:21:45,580 --> 00:21:48,980
But then, on the other hand, he was
totally inexperienced when he came to

392
00:21:48,981 --> 00:21:50,500
Mullewood making at that time.

393
00:21:50,740 --> 00:21:54,560
The crew, I think, you know, at first they
were going, who the hell is this guy?

394
00:21:54,940 --> 00:21:57,236
You know, and he doesn't seem to know what
the hell he's doing.

395
00:21:57,260 --> 00:21:59,516
They would always be finding myself
standing in the wrong place.

396
00:21:59,540 --> 00:22:00,700
They'd be blocking the light.

397
00:22:01,180 --> 00:22:04,320
In one instance, I even run over by the
dolly.

398
00:22:04,340 --> 00:22:07,180
You know, the dolly guy ran over my foot.

399
00:22:07,200 --> 00:22:11,100
And it was completely clueless about
things like the screen direction and I

400
00:22:11,101 --> 00:22:13,436
remember someone saying, well,
Stuart, you've just crossed the line,

401
00:22:13,460 --> 00:22:14,560
and I'm going, where?

402
00:22:14,870 --> 00:22:15,870
What line?

403
00:22:16,580 --> 00:22:20,820
Luckily, Mack Alburn was very, very
helpful and kind of explained things to me.

404
00:22:21,080 --> 00:22:27,760
I think Mack is the guy who kind of
carried Stuart through his first picture.

405
00:22:28,200 --> 00:22:30,600
Every first time director needs support.

406
00:22:30,980 --> 00:22:32,660
He was a theoretical director.

407
00:22:33,380 --> 00:22:39,120
And a theoretical director who works on a
stage what he sees when the light and

408
00:22:39,121 --> 00:22:40,380
everything is what he got.

409
00:22:41,200 --> 00:22:43,240
But we'd feel something totally different.

410
00:22:43,900 --> 00:22:49,020
Mack Alburn would sometimes say,
Stuart, Stuart, I'm sure this looks

411
00:22:49,021 --> 00:22:52,760
absolutely fabulous from what you're
standing, but you should really look

412
00:22:52,761 --> 00:22:55,600
through the camera because from here,
this looks like shit.

413
00:22:56,600 --> 00:22:58,420
Stuart, we can't do this.

414
00:23:00,700 --> 00:23:02,380
Stuart, you're editor is going to hate
you.

415
00:23:02,420 --> 00:23:08,140
I always say that the most important thing
to be a happy cinematographer is to learn

416
00:23:08,141 --> 00:23:11,580
how to bite your tongue, exactly in a good
marriage.

417
00:23:11,780 --> 00:23:13,140
You learn how to bite your tongue.

418
00:23:13,640 --> 00:23:15,940
I remember a few times when we had
disagreements.

419
00:23:17,020 --> 00:23:20,660
And behind Stuart's back, I said,
you are a testadura.

420
00:23:21,420 --> 00:23:25,600
You are really a too stubborn person for
this world.

421
00:23:25,780 --> 00:23:27,620
I said, Stuart, let's do it two ways.

422
00:23:27,720 --> 00:23:29,760
Let's do your way and lose my way.

423
00:23:30,240 --> 00:23:33,960
Most of the time, when we saw the day,
Stuart said, oh, was that my way,

424
00:23:34,060 --> 00:23:35,580
oh, you were right.

425
00:23:36,160 --> 00:23:40,460
And actually, Stuart and I got very well
alone and he's a very good director.

426
00:23:40,700 --> 00:23:46,820
Mac and I ended up really bonding and I
ended up doing seven more movies with him.

427
00:23:47,925 --> 00:23:49,360
And as I said, he's the professor.

428
00:23:49,780 --> 00:23:51,300
You know, I'm still learning from Mac.

429
00:23:53,965 --> 00:23:57,440
The majority of the medical science that
shown on the film is accurate.

430
00:23:57,780 --> 00:24:02,900
For the autopsy victim, we created a foam
latex prosthetic that was designed in

431
00:24:02,901 --> 00:24:03,901
reverse.

432
00:24:04,340 --> 00:24:07,360
So that actually all the detail was on the
inside of it.

433
00:24:07,540 --> 00:24:09,840
And the outside of it was covered by a
wig.

434
00:24:10,340 --> 00:24:12,620
So it used an extra with a bald head.

435
00:24:13,040 --> 00:24:16,500
And I painted his bald pay to look like
the skull.

436
00:24:16,960 --> 00:24:20,690
And then I put the prosthetic over it and
glued it down.

437
00:24:21,120 --> 00:24:26,040
And when we shot the scene, the actor
grabbed it and peeled that back.

438
00:24:26,090 --> 00:24:28,860
It was very much like feeling a large
orange.

439
00:24:29,845 --> 00:24:30,860
And it worked real well.

440
00:24:33,080 --> 00:24:41,080
Once the skull is plainly visible,
you take the bone saw and you cut around

441
00:24:41,081 --> 00:24:42,081
the perimeter.

442
00:24:43,120 --> 00:24:48,780
But then we cut to a replacement body that
was made in the same proportions as this

443
00:24:48,781 --> 00:24:49,100
guy.

444
00:24:49,340 --> 00:24:51,260
The whole top had been opened up.

445
00:24:51,340 --> 00:24:56,280
We had taken a plastic skull and I had
cast the skull into it and inside of it,

446
00:24:56,400 --> 00:24:58,020
I used cow brains.

447
00:24:58,300 --> 00:25:00,300
And there you have it, ladies and
gentlemen.

448
00:25:02,060 --> 00:25:03,440
The human brain.

449
00:25:04,100 --> 00:25:08,900
I hate to admit this, but one of my big
suppliers on this film was a local meat

450
00:25:08,901 --> 00:25:09,300
market.

451
00:25:09,660 --> 00:25:14,040
Once the brain's stem of an individual,
I'm talking about the reticular activator

452
00:25:14,041 --> 00:25:17,740
system, heart regulation, respiratory
center.

453
00:25:18,520 --> 00:25:23,580
Once these activities cease, the brain can
only survive in additional six to twelve

454
00:25:23,581 --> 00:25:24,581
minutes.

455
00:25:24,715 --> 00:25:29,720
David is the quintessential ominous sort
of authority figure.

456
00:25:29,820 --> 00:25:32,280
Six to twelve minutes.

457
00:25:32,900 --> 00:25:33,920
But he's a fraud.

458
00:25:37,530 --> 00:25:41,740
Until brain death brings about an
irreversible conclusion.

459
00:25:42,900 --> 00:25:48,820
And he's enraged that I would have the
audacity to call him on that.

460
00:25:49,320 --> 00:25:53,860
Mr. West, I suggest you get yourself a
ten.

461
00:25:54,560 --> 00:25:57,640
David Gayle was on a little bit bigger
than life.

462
00:25:57,920 --> 00:25:58,920
The class dismissed.

463
00:25:59,320 --> 00:26:03,000
And so we were kind of on the same page
stylistically.

464
00:26:04,060 --> 00:26:05,820
How can you teach such dribble?

465
00:26:06,040 --> 00:26:08,580
These people are here to learn and you're
closing their minds before they even have

466
00:26:08,581 --> 00:26:08,900
a chance.

467
00:26:08,960 --> 00:26:14,620
We all both understood that it was a motto,
a motto between these two characters.

468
00:26:14,880 --> 00:26:17,900
You know, you should have stolen more of
group as ideas than at least you'd have

469
00:26:17,901 --> 00:26:18,260
ideas.

470
00:26:18,261 --> 00:26:20,160
Mr. West was war.

471
00:26:21,000 --> 00:26:23,020
And who's going to win out?

472
00:26:23,145 --> 00:26:25,500
There's got to be a pleasure to fail you.

473
00:26:26,040 --> 00:26:29,100
David Gayle, he knew how to work a scene.

474
00:26:29,580 --> 00:26:32,260
And so, you know, we really worked well.

475
00:26:33,380 --> 00:26:35,420
Working with Barbara was really easy.

476
00:26:35,680 --> 00:26:36,680
Please.

477
00:26:37,800 --> 00:26:41,320
Because you get your performance from
what's, you know, coming at you.

478
00:26:41,520 --> 00:26:43,660
Look, it's not you, really.

479
00:26:44,300 --> 00:26:46,040
It's just a lot of little things.

480
00:26:46,490 --> 00:26:50,680
I feel like I have to totally be in the
moment with whoever I'm acting with.

481
00:26:51,010 --> 00:26:52,540
West is always in his room with the door
closed.

482
00:26:52,541 --> 00:26:52,700
No.

483
00:26:52,760 --> 00:26:54,380
I mean, do you ever see him?

484
00:26:54,780 --> 00:26:55,780
Does he ever eat?

485
00:26:56,200 --> 00:26:59,020
I have to really see what is going on
between us.

486
00:26:59,400 --> 00:27:00,400
Really feel that.

487
00:27:00,820 --> 00:27:01,820
He bothers you too.

488
00:27:02,420 --> 00:27:07,280
And that to me is as important as doing
the individual work on my own character.

489
00:27:07,700 --> 00:27:09,120
Rufus is terrified of him.

490
00:27:09,300 --> 00:27:11,000
When West comes in, he runs and hides.

491
00:27:11,160 --> 00:27:12,800
Rufus runs and hides all the time.

492
00:27:12,940 --> 00:27:13,820
It's standard characters.

493
00:27:13,940 --> 00:27:16,480
Yes, but not when we're together but then
he's all over us trying to get your

494
00:27:16,481 --> 00:27:16,800
attention.

495
00:27:17,400 --> 00:27:18,740
I really liked Megan.

496
00:27:19,200 --> 00:27:20,220
Where is he?

497
00:27:20,400 --> 00:27:21,920
I haven't seen him since we got here.

498
00:27:22,260 --> 00:27:25,960
So I think she's a strong character,
which I also liked.

499
00:27:26,080 --> 00:27:27,080
Rufus.

500
00:27:27,880 --> 00:27:33,060
Because frequently in horror or slasher
movies, the girls aren't very intelligent.

501
00:27:34,120 --> 00:27:36,140
And Megan was...

502
00:27:36,141 --> 00:27:38,560
She's definitely not a bubble-headed co
-ed.

503
00:27:40,800 --> 00:27:43,080
She is a grounded girl.

504
00:27:43,860 --> 00:27:45,020
Rufus, are you right here?

505
00:27:45,260 --> 00:27:46,260
Very real.

506
00:27:46,680 --> 00:27:48,580
And we bring ourselves to every role.

507
00:27:49,740 --> 00:27:52,600
So whoever she ended up being,
I am part of that.

508
00:27:52,800 --> 00:27:54,340
And she is part of me as well.

509
00:27:54,720 --> 00:27:56,440
Barbara was perfect for that role.

510
00:27:56,900 --> 00:27:58,460
She just gave her whole heart and soul.

511
00:27:58,540 --> 00:28:01,100
She's really knocked yourself out.

512
00:28:02,820 --> 00:28:03,300
Wow!

513
00:28:03,800 --> 00:28:04,840
Great screamer too.

514
00:28:04,860 --> 00:28:06,000
Oh, my God.

515
00:28:06,140 --> 00:28:07,420
What are you doing on that role?

516
00:28:07,880 --> 00:28:08,200
Dad!

517
00:28:08,860 --> 00:28:09,340
Dad!

518
00:28:09,820 --> 00:28:12,400
I could be in my dressing room and hear
her scream.

519
00:28:12,650 --> 00:28:15,420
I thought I was wearing a private room,
Dan.

520
00:28:15,700 --> 00:28:17,060
I mean, what the hell are you doing in
here?

521
00:28:17,061 --> 00:28:18,061
In the fridge!

522
00:28:18,920 --> 00:28:20,520
We dealt with a lot of gross things.

523
00:28:20,960 --> 00:28:22,620
And yet, it's funny.

524
00:28:22,990 --> 00:28:25,000
There's parts of it that are very funny.

525
00:28:25,710 --> 00:28:27,800
It was dead when I found you.

526
00:28:28,200 --> 00:28:29,540
You killed him.

527
00:28:29,680 --> 00:28:33,220
It does have sort of a farcical quality,
but it would be a real mistake to play it

528
00:28:33,221 --> 00:28:33,900
like that.

529
00:28:33,940 --> 00:28:34,940
What happened?

530
00:28:35,580 --> 00:28:36,580
It suffocated.

531
00:28:37,670 --> 00:28:40,260
It knocked the garbage over and it got its
head stuck in a jar.

532
00:28:41,710 --> 00:28:43,270
You weren't home, so I put it in there.

533
00:28:43,380 --> 00:28:47,800
I recall Stuart being approaching it very,
very seriously.

534
00:28:47,900 --> 00:28:50,080
And I did not want to stink the place up.

535
00:28:50,160 --> 00:28:50,960
I was going to show you.

536
00:28:50,961 --> 00:28:52,020
This is not funny.

537
00:28:52,800 --> 00:28:53,520
This is not funny.

538
00:28:53,540 --> 00:28:54,540
There's no humor here.

539
00:28:54,620 --> 00:28:56,280
You couldn't call or write a note.

540
00:28:56,281 --> 00:28:57,840
I was busy pushing bodies around.

541
00:28:57,980 --> 00:28:59,920
As you well known, what a note said,
Dan.

542
00:29:00,100 --> 00:29:01,380
Capped dead, details later.

543
00:29:01,700 --> 00:29:08,340
And it's made even more funny sometimes by
not playing the funny parts, but playing

544
00:29:08,341 --> 00:29:09,080
for the truth.

545
00:29:09,081 --> 00:29:12,080
Because then you're not hit over the head
by it.

546
00:29:13,200 --> 00:29:14,320
The garbage took garbage.

547
00:29:15,940 --> 00:29:18,880
The other guy's all have these kind of
flamboyant flashy moments.

548
00:29:22,020 --> 00:29:24,760
But the unsung hero of the movie,
I think, is Bruce Abbott.

549
00:29:27,440 --> 00:29:30,280
He's the one that I think is really
carrying the movie on his shoulders.

550
00:29:33,940 --> 00:29:35,256
You know, Bruce were not in the movie.

551
00:29:35,280 --> 00:29:36,500
The movie would not work.

552
00:29:36,740 --> 00:29:37,740
West!

553
00:29:38,680 --> 00:29:41,100
And Bruce is fantastic in the film.

554
00:29:43,390 --> 00:29:47,140
I think I enjoyed that scene just about as
much as I enjoyed shooting any of them.

555
00:29:48,220 --> 00:29:50,040
It's such a physical movie.

556
00:29:52,640 --> 00:29:54,400
I think the swinging light was an
accident.

557
00:29:54,640 --> 00:29:58,240
We hit the light and that took the camera
off the stand.

558
00:29:58,600 --> 00:30:01,600
And, you know, things started to get very
active very quickly.

559
00:30:02,760 --> 00:30:06,340
And shot it extremely late at night and we
shot the hell out of it.

560
00:30:06,341 --> 00:30:09,140
The cat is a lot of trickery.

561
00:30:09,500 --> 00:30:10,880
There was a stuffed cat.

562
00:30:10,940 --> 00:30:12,160
Not even a real cat.

563
00:30:13,320 --> 00:30:15,820
But they pinned to my back.

564
00:30:15,821 --> 00:30:19,140
And I sort of make it move around and pull
it off and throw.

565
00:30:20,880 --> 00:30:22,660
You know, it was like, did you get that?

566
00:30:22,760 --> 00:30:23,840
Because the light's just...

567
00:30:24,040 --> 00:30:28,760
There was a very small key light source
and the light swinging back and forth to

568
00:30:28,761 --> 00:30:30,161
illuminate sort of what's going on.

569
00:30:30,200 --> 00:30:34,780
If you watch that sequence most of the
time, I never saw a cat.

570
00:30:35,420 --> 00:30:36,420
There it goes.

571
00:30:36,720 --> 00:30:40,880
It's an illusion of what the actors are
doing, what the lights are doing.

572
00:30:41,020 --> 00:30:45,460
Most importantly, what sounds just doing.

573
00:30:47,420 --> 00:30:51,740
Till that wonderful last shot of the cat
just coming right at the camera.

574
00:30:54,100 --> 00:30:56,100
It's a great topic to pull through.

575
00:30:58,270 --> 00:31:00,100
Everybody always talks about the cat
sequence.

576
00:31:00,480 --> 00:31:01,780
Most of the time...

577
00:31:01,781 --> 00:31:04,780
There was no cat.

578
00:31:09,880 --> 00:31:11,760
Death is the ultimate disease.

579
00:31:12,640 --> 00:31:15,160
And, you know, what Wes is trying to do is
to conquer death.

580
00:31:15,240 --> 00:31:16,420
It's really quite simple.

581
00:31:16,660 --> 00:31:18,720
All life is a physical and chemical
process.

582
00:31:19,540 --> 00:31:24,540
It stands to reason that if one could find
extremely fresh specimens and recharge

583
00:31:24,765 --> 00:31:27,140
that chemical process back, we have three
animations.

584
00:31:27,300 --> 00:31:31,420
Talking to doctors about what Wes was
doing, they all kind of thought that,

585
00:31:31,421 --> 00:31:32,701
yeah, that's a pretty good idea.

586
00:31:32,820 --> 00:31:36,160
The theory is not new, Wes, but my reagent
is.

587
00:31:36,260 --> 00:31:40,840
If you were able to succeed, it would be
the greatest achievement, you know,

588
00:31:40,865 --> 00:31:42,060
of all time, really.

589
00:31:42,260 --> 00:31:44,400
We can achieve every doctor's dream.

590
00:31:45,030 --> 00:31:48,140
You'll be famous and live life times.

591
00:31:48,360 --> 00:31:50,760
We think of Wes as being such an insane
doctor.

592
00:31:50,840 --> 00:31:52,356
You wouldn't have done this on people.

593
00:31:52,380 --> 00:31:56,160
But what's so crazy about trying to
prolong life?

594
00:31:56,370 --> 00:31:57,440
You will help me.

595
00:31:57,460 --> 00:31:59,420
No, because I don't believe you.

596
00:31:59,421 --> 00:32:01,000
Wes wasn't dead to begin with.

597
00:32:01,180 --> 00:32:02,956
You've dragged him and reduced his vital
signs.

598
00:32:02,980 --> 00:32:04,076
You lowered his body temperature.

599
00:32:04,100 --> 00:32:04,880
He couldn't have been dead.

600
00:32:04,960 --> 00:32:06,660
Do you agree that he's dead now?

601
00:32:07,840 --> 00:32:09,380
Do you agree that he's dead now?

602
00:32:10,140 --> 00:32:13,600
The whole concept of reanimation has to be
bought with the cat.

603
00:32:14,070 --> 00:32:18,840
So it's real important moment in the
movie.

604
00:32:19,560 --> 00:32:20,560
Wes, no!

605
00:32:20,600 --> 00:32:25,620
He's the one with doubt, and I'm the one
who's sure beyond sure.

606
00:32:25,621 --> 00:32:26,621
Wes, stop!

607
00:32:26,700 --> 00:32:28,880
She's in and Yang, it's point counter
-point.

608
00:32:29,140 --> 00:32:30,300
I'll show you.

609
00:32:31,160 --> 00:32:32,240
Then you'll help me.

610
00:32:32,620 --> 00:32:32,920
No!

611
00:32:33,120 --> 00:32:34,120
Yes, you will.

612
00:32:34,760 --> 00:32:37,516
That is why I brought the infernal beast
back to life in the first place.

613
00:32:37,540 --> 00:32:37,900
What?

614
00:32:38,460 --> 00:32:41,920
This is groundbreaking research here,
and I need help.

615
00:32:42,540 --> 00:32:43,540
It's infectious.

616
00:32:43,820 --> 00:32:44,320
To the brain?

617
00:32:44,700 --> 00:32:45,120
Of course.

618
00:32:45,540 --> 00:32:49,260
He's got to go along because he knows I'm
right.

619
00:32:49,540 --> 00:32:51,120
Don't expect it to tango.

620
00:32:51,280 --> 00:32:52,280
It has a broken back.

621
00:32:58,090 --> 00:32:59,870
Why can't you ignore us?

622
00:33:01,220 --> 00:33:02,750
Birth is always painful.

623
00:33:03,450 --> 00:33:08,890
So they were like two geeks in high school
that both like, you know, World War II

624
00:33:08,891 --> 00:33:10,570
airplane models or something.

625
00:33:10,670 --> 00:33:11,670
It was thick.

626
00:33:12,430 --> 00:33:12,730
Why?

627
00:33:13,190 --> 00:33:14,350
They were having a good time.

628
00:33:15,190 --> 00:33:17,390
The only annoying thing is that he has
this girlfriend.

629
00:33:17,650 --> 00:33:18,650
Woo!

630
00:33:19,250 --> 00:33:20,390
What is happening?

631
00:33:20,830 --> 00:33:21,470
What are you doing here?

632
00:33:21,730 --> 00:33:22,130
What is happening?

633
00:33:22,290 --> 00:33:24,370
She just saps his energy.

634
00:33:24,371 --> 00:33:27,430
It makes him think about soft stuff.

635
00:33:28,450 --> 00:33:28,710
And what?

636
00:33:28,790 --> 00:33:29,790
Really why?

637
00:33:30,690 --> 00:33:33,210
Oh, I think there was definitely all
triangle in the movie.

638
00:33:33,211 --> 00:33:34,610
Dan, what happened?

639
00:33:34,730 --> 00:33:35,370
It was incredible.

640
00:33:35,430 --> 00:33:37,270
I mean, it was an incredible experiment.

641
00:33:37,710 --> 00:33:39,930
Herbert West has overcome physical death.

642
00:33:40,120 --> 00:33:44,570
And it was myself, and Dan, and Herbert
West.

643
00:33:44,810 --> 00:33:46,050
That's why I came.

644
00:33:46,530 --> 00:33:48,030
I tried to call, but no one answered.

645
00:33:48,400 --> 00:33:49,400
I was so worried.

646
00:33:49,430 --> 00:33:52,810
Megan and Herbert West were foes,
fighting for the same man.

647
00:33:52,910 --> 00:33:56,190
Frankenstein stories are masturbatory
stories.

648
00:33:56,750 --> 00:33:58,950
Because they're all about creating life
without a woman.

649
00:33:59,250 --> 00:34:01,850
And it was interesting because Meg Halsey.

650
00:34:01,970 --> 00:34:05,610
She is the one who really is aware that
how completely wrong this is.

651
00:34:05,611 --> 00:34:06,550
I tried to save him.

652
00:34:06,610 --> 00:34:07,770
How unnatural it is.

653
00:34:08,010 --> 00:34:09,010
No, you'll tell Halsey.

654
00:34:09,050 --> 00:34:12,250
Dan Wright will tell him, and you'll be
out of here so fast your head will spin.

655
00:34:12,290 --> 00:34:14,010
The subtext for her character really is.

656
00:34:14,810 --> 00:34:16,730
Look, you know, you can create life with
me.

657
00:34:16,830 --> 00:34:18,510
Don't you understand what he's done?

658
00:34:19,050 --> 00:34:20,190
What we could do?

659
00:34:21,350 --> 00:34:23,130
What about what we could do?

660
00:34:23,970 --> 00:34:28,930
So I have to really hypnotize him to get
him to stay on track.

661
00:34:29,895 --> 00:34:30,895
Meg, he's right.

662
00:34:30,950 --> 00:34:31,990
Your father's wrong.

663
00:34:32,850 --> 00:34:34,570
Herbert represents work.

664
00:34:34,810 --> 00:34:37,330
Meg represents love and relationship.

665
00:34:38,010 --> 00:34:39,090
And can you have both?

666
00:34:39,110 --> 00:34:39,890
The only way is that.

667
00:34:40,130 --> 00:34:41,530
Herbert would say no.

668
00:34:41,890 --> 00:34:42,890
Dan.

669
00:34:43,450 --> 00:34:46,610
As far as Herbert's concerned,
women are a distraction.

670
00:34:48,860 --> 00:34:51,730
There was one sequence that I was very
proud of.

671
00:34:51,990 --> 00:34:53,146
I ended up getting cut out of the movie.

672
00:34:53,170 --> 00:34:54,170
That was great.

673
00:34:54,670 --> 00:34:57,330
Your daughter has gone into an enchanting
young woman.

674
00:34:57,750 --> 00:34:58,750
Oh, yes, she has.

675
00:34:59,350 --> 00:35:02,630
And David and I were sitting around a
table having dinner.

676
00:35:03,010 --> 00:35:05,330
And he's hypnotizing me.

677
00:35:05,430 --> 00:35:09,570
Meg has matured a great deal in the past
few years.

678
00:35:10,130 --> 00:35:12,650
But she's still young and impressionable.

679
00:35:13,895 --> 00:35:17,710
And now Cain is rooming with that West
character.

680
00:35:18,190 --> 00:35:22,730
Originally, there was a whole subplot in
the film about how Dr. Hill had hypnotic

681
00:35:22,731 --> 00:35:23,350
powers.

682
00:35:23,690 --> 00:35:25,770
Cain is dangerous.

683
00:35:28,170 --> 00:35:30,251
And he was able to make the people do what
he wanted.

684
00:35:30,390 --> 00:35:34,410
That was a way to explain why he could
control all these zombies.

685
00:35:34,930 --> 00:35:36,450
Well, as it turns out, who cares?

686
00:35:36,990 --> 00:35:41,690
And it sort of slowed things up and gummed
up the works at certain points where you

687
00:35:41,691 --> 00:35:43,890
just wanted to keep going.

688
00:35:44,470 --> 00:35:45,470
So it was cut.

689
00:35:47,010 --> 00:35:52,530
But actually, it was his hypnotic
suggestions that made the Dean expelled

690
00:35:52,531 --> 00:35:53,650
and Cain from the college.

691
00:35:53,690 --> 00:35:57,470
You will submit to me a written apology
for this entire affair.

692
00:35:58,390 --> 00:36:02,810
You will in any case have your student
loan rescinded.

693
00:36:03,710 --> 00:36:05,071
That's one of my favorite moments.

694
00:36:05,290 --> 00:36:09,850
He's just seen the reanimation of dead
animal tissue to life.

695
00:36:10,000 --> 00:36:12,850
And suddenly, what's more important to him
is a student loan.

696
00:36:13,480 --> 00:36:14,890
I won't be able to continue school.

697
00:36:15,030 --> 00:36:17,030
But that's close to reality.

698
00:36:17,540 --> 00:36:18,730
That won't be all, Mr. Cain.

699
00:36:18,900 --> 00:36:22,590
I wanted to show how absolutely cutthroat
it is.

700
00:36:23,190 --> 00:36:24,510
Medical school is war.

701
00:36:24,630 --> 00:36:27,670
It's war between the students and faculty
to see who survives.

702
00:36:28,590 --> 00:36:33,530
We did the makeup in an old sound facility
called Sun West Productions down on Sunset

703
00:36:33,531 --> 00:36:33,790
Western.

704
00:36:34,290 --> 00:36:36,530
I would not say that it really was a
studio.

705
00:36:36,670 --> 00:36:39,110
It was just a big space in the middle of
Hollywood.

706
00:36:39,210 --> 00:36:43,370
John was at that time teaching classes on
how to do makeup effects.

707
00:36:44,010 --> 00:36:45,106
And so that's how we got our crew.

708
00:36:45,130 --> 00:36:47,230
Our crew was my makeup class.

709
00:36:47,270 --> 00:36:49,450
A lot of them had virtually no experience.

710
00:36:49,950 --> 00:36:52,130
So we thought, okay, here's some free
labor.

711
00:36:52,970 --> 00:36:55,050
And given the chance to start building
their resumes.

712
00:36:55,130 --> 00:36:56,950
And remember, I said we had 89 effects.

713
00:36:57,680 --> 00:37:01,370
That's pretty darn tough even when you're
using my students as the crew.

714
00:37:01,850 --> 00:37:05,950
We got to the point where we just had to
say, we're running out of time and we're

715
00:37:05,951 --> 00:37:06,951
out of money.

716
00:37:07,420 --> 00:37:08,430
What can we do?

717
00:37:08,431 --> 00:37:09,270
Charlie Bann.

718
00:37:09,390 --> 00:37:13,750
So, well, we can't give you any more
money, but we can get access to John

719
00:37:13,751 --> 00:37:14,830
Beakler in a shop.

720
00:37:15,430 --> 00:37:21,490
I was working with Charlie Bann's empire
pictures, doing a lot of special makeup

721
00:37:21,690 --> 00:37:22,690
and creature effects.

722
00:37:23,510 --> 00:37:25,250
And that's how I sort of fell into the
fold.

723
00:37:25,835 --> 00:37:27,730
And it was a great experience.

724
00:37:28,190 --> 00:37:30,950
By and large, you work in a lot of crap.

725
00:37:31,335 --> 00:37:37,750
But I think in this particular instance,
we saw by virtue of the material.

726
00:37:38,000 --> 00:37:40,130
Yes, I think you.

727
00:37:40,370 --> 00:37:41,530
By virtue of the director.

728
00:37:41,990 --> 00:37:44,730
By virtue of all the people working on it.

729
00:37:44,731 --> 00:37:46,810
John Doe apparently just dropped it.

730
00:37:47,070 --> 00:37:48,070
The same crap.

731
00:37:48,450 --> 00:37:48,970
This is good.

732
00:37:49,465 --> 00:37:50,530
He's been dead for hours.

733
00:37:51,390 --> 00:37:54,190
Any evidence of reanimated consciousness
will justify proceeding.

734
00:37:55,370 --> 00:38:00,050
Stuart's motto was more and Stuart lived
by that.

735
00:38:00,070 --> 00:38:02,150
15 cc's of reagent being administered.

736
00:38:02,630 --> 00:38:03,950
He would keep pushing.

737
00:38:04,010 --> 00:38:05,830
You know, more blood, more foamy drilled.

738
00:38:05,850 --> 00:38:07,170
More emotion or passion.

739
00:38:07,171 --> 00:38:07,770
More of this.

740
00:38:08,050 --> 00:38:09,050
More that.

741
00:38:09,130 --> 00:38:10,130
You can't stop me.

742
00:38:10,250 --> 00:38:10,850
I followed you here.

743
00:38:10,970 --> 00:38:12,810
I'm going to follow you until you listen
to me.

744
00:38:12,850 --> 00:38:13,210
I love it!

745
00:38:13,290 --> 00:38:15,050
And my daughter and you'll do is you're
told.

746
00:38:15,750 --> 00:38:16,750
More everything.

747
00:38:17,510 --> 00:38:19,450
And sometimes more is not enough.

748
00:38:19,910 --> 00:38:21,150
So the truth happened by now.

749
00:38:21,570 --> 00:38:23,130
But nevertheless is more.

750
00:38:23,750 --> 00:38:25,910
Increasing the dosage 20 cc's of reagent.

751
00:38:26,170 --> 00:38:29,310
Oh, you'll never hear Stuart say you've
gone too far.

752
00:38:29,750 --> 00:38:31,510
All of our choices were quite large.

753
00:38:32,290 --> 00:38:33,970
Driven very much by Stuart.

754
00:38:34,070 --> 00:38:39,630
Stuart didn't try to tone things down to
make them more natural.

755
00:38:39,910 --> 00:38:40,910
But you know what?

756
00:38:41,130 --> 00:38:42,130
He was right.

757
00:38:42,210 --> 00:38:44,770
Especially in the context of that movie.

758
00:38:47,250 --> 00:38:50,910
And that's what makes a Stuart Gordon
movie exciting.

759
00:38:54,930 --> 00:38:55,570
Little Melvin.

760
00:38:55,890 --> 00:38:57,450
Well, Peter can't.

761
00:38:57,490 --> 00:39:00,490
He had doubled Schwarzenegger on a couple
of earlier things.

762
00:39:00,491 --> 00:39:06,710
Peter was actually doubling Arnold on
terminator while we were doing reanimator.

763
00:39:06,990 --> 00:39:11,740
And we had a membrane of bladders on us
forehead so we could inflate them.

764
00:39:12,930 --> 00:39:14,290
And, you know, make them undulate.

765
00:39:16,570 --> 00:39:19,330
And then Peter went nuts with it.

766
00:39:19,370 --> 00:39:20,750
He had a great time.

767
00:39:20,990 --> 00:39:22,110
I mean, this is pretty wild.

768
00:39:26,180 --> 00:39:28,490
It was fun.

769
00:39:28,491 --> 00:39:29,870
That was fun.

770
00:39:30,145 --> 00:39:32,450
And we did it in sequence.

771
00:39:32,560 --> 00:39:34,110
May knock the door down.

772
00:39:34,190 --> 00:39:36,330
It was on top of me.

773
00:39:37,370 --> 00:39:38,830
And Peter, he was powerful.

774
00:39:40,010 --> 00:39:41,010
Powerful guy.

775
00:39:41,390 --> 00:39:42,670
And totally free, naked.

776
00:39:43,190 --> 00:39:45,750
And then he picked me up and he froze me
against the wall.

777
00:39:46,650 --> 00:39:49,010
There was a thing where he chewed off a
couple of my finger.

778
00:39:49,950 --> 00:39:51,490
That kind of gets your attention.

779
00:39:52,530 --> 00:39:54,650
They don't get to do any of this stuff
every day.

780
00:39:55,225 --> 00:39:58,590
And then they had a stuntman that stood on
a platform.

781
00:39:59,055 --> 00:40:01,550
And he ran and threw himself at the wall.

782
00:40:02,710 --> 00:40:05,850
I'd never seen anybody do a stunt like
that before in my life.

783
00:40:06,650 --> 00:40:07,730
So it was fun.

784
00:40:07,750 --> 00:40:12,490
And it was really easy to let it all go
and to be there in the scene.

785
00:40:13,710 --> 00:40:18,230
We made a very unusual prop for Peter.

786
00:40:18,490 --> 00:40:22,130
We took a casting of his chest and made a
fake chest.

787
00:40:22,480 --> 00:40:24,610
But he's leaning forward like this.

788
00:40:24,850 --> 00:40:27,030
This chest, fake chest is coming down like
this.

789
00:40:27,450 --> 00:40:32,450
I'm down on the floor and I've got a fake
bone saw in my hand with ground beef

790
00:40:32,451 --> 00:40:34,030
around it and a blood tube.

791
00:40:34,310 --> 00:40:35,770
And we had pre-scored it.

792
00:40:35,810 --> 00:40:39,970
So as Jeff's coming up and working his
action, I'm coming up and pushing this

793
00:40:39,971 --> 00:40:40,971
thing out in front.

794
00:40:41,160 --> 00:40:44,650
It's a very, very simple gag, but it was
really effective.

795
00:40:45,010 --> 00:40:47,270
We went through gallons of blood.

796
00:40:48,940 --> 00:40:51,310
Yeah, so the floor has got very sticky.

797
00:40:51,410 --> 00:40:53,630
And of course right afterwards,
they yell, launch.

798
00:40:54,190 --> 00:40:55,190
Anybody hungry?

799
00:40:56,990 --> 00:41:00,330
But this is the freshest body that we could
come across as a killing one ourselves.

800
00:41:00,470 --> 00:41:03,590
And every moment that we've been talking
about it, cost us results that you'll give

801
00:41:03,591 --> 00:41:04,591
me a hand.

802
00:41:04,790 --> 00:41:07,470
Everybody in this movie has a wonderful
arc.

803
00:41:08,070 --> 00:41:14,390
Robert Sampson starts this movie as the
most amiable, capable, dean of a medical

804
00:41:14,391 --> 00:41:15,030
school.

805
00:41:15,031 --> 00:41:18,850
And in a minute he's smashed by a door
thrown against the wall.

806
00:41:19,190 --> 00:41:20,650
He's killed, he's destroyed.

807
00:41:21,430 --> 00:41:23,290
He's dead, he's out of the movie,
right?

808
00:41:24,650 --> 00:41:25,770
Apparently not.

809
00:41:25,790 --> 00:41:28,410
I'll show you.

810
00:41:29,110 --> 00:41:30,230
17 seconds.

811
00:41:30,290 --> 00:41:31,590
Reanimation at 17 seconds.

812
00:41:31,690 --> 00:41:32,190
The eye's open.

813
00:41:32,650 --> 00:41:34,850
Today, and then to be brought back.

814
00:41:35,070 --> 00:41:37,950
Dr. Welcome back to my...

815
00:41:37,951 --> 00:41:40,170
I thought, wow, I can do that.

816
00:41:40,410 --> 00:41:41,410
Dan?

817
00:41:41,810 --> 00:41:42,810
Dan, bitch.

818
00:41:43,230 --> 00:41:43,450
Meg?

819
00:41:43,675 --> 00:41:46,210
It must not be unlike if you were
unconscious.

820
00:41:46,710 --> 00:41:49,250
And came back and figured out you were
still here.

821
00:41:49,510 --> 00:41:50,550
And I couldn't talk.

822
00:41:51,670 --> 00:41:53,150
But I could make sounds.

823
00:41:54,670 --> 00:41:56,150
What is it, are you all right?

824
00:41:56,390 --> 00:41:58,290
He would still have his thoughts.

825
00:41:58,570 --> 00:41:59,830
And when he sees his daughter.

826
00:42:00,230 --> 00:42:01,230
No!

827
00:42:01,270 --> 00:42:02,270
He's ashamed.

828
00:42:02,890 --> 00:42:03,950
So I went over and I hid.

829
00:42:04,170 --> 00:42:05,750
No, don't make, don't go near.

830
00:42:05,990 --> 00:42:07,610
I wasn't playing somebody else.

831
00:42:07,611 --> 00:42:09,770
I was playing me in that situation.

832
00:42:09,970 --> 00:42:11,370
What the hell happened here?

833
00:42:11,570 --> 00:42:12,170
Then you all right?

834
00:42:12,171 --> 00:42:16,070
And then that's the only thing that we can
do.

835
00:42:16,200 --> 00:42:17,210
That is Dean Holsey.

836
00:42:17,990 --> 00:42:23,890
That's the kind of stuff Stuart would work
with you on, the reality of the situation.

837
00:42:25,330 --> 00:42:27,610
Bob is perfectly cast as the dad.

838
00:42:28,130 --> 00:42:31,970
He's the kind of man you would want to
have in your life as your father,

839
00:42:32,350 --> 00:42:33,130
playing opposite him.

840
00:42:33,310 --> 00:42:35,090
I felt all those things for Bob.

841
00:42:35,560 --> 00:42:40,310
And when he goes from being the dad,
and the really grounded person to being

842
00:42:40,311 --> 00:42:42,110
the crazy, reanimated person.

843
00:42:42,250 --> 00:42:45,650
It was very easy to feel really upset.

844
00:42:46,730 --> 00:42:48,370
I thought he did a great job.

845
00:42:49,290 --> 00:42:52,930
The thing that's really interesting is
that in the first half of the film,

846
00:42:52,950 --> 00:42:54,290
West is the villain.

847
00:42:54,890 --> 00:42:56,590
Good evening, Mr. West.

848
00:42:57,810 --> 00:42:58,810
What do you want?

849
00:42:58,890 --> 00:43:04,890
And then Dr. Hill kind of emerges as even
a bigger villain because he's a thief.

850
00:43:04,891 --> 00:43:07,070
He's trying to steal West's ideas.

851
00:43:07,300 --> 00:43:09,130
I want you to discover it.

852
00:43:10,130 --> 00:43:13,050
You know, he knows how big an idea this
is.

853
00:43:13,430 --> 00:43:14,610
And once the credit for it.

854
00:43:14,810 --> 00:43:17,370
And our sympathies now shift to West.

855
00:43:17,950 --> 00:43:20,390
Paul, have you locked up for a madman?

856
00:43:21,550 --> 00:43:22,550
Or murder.

857
00:43:23,410 --> 00:43:24,690
You will do.

858
00:43:26,385 --> 00:43:28,770
What I tell you to do.

859
00:43:29,230 --> 00:43:31,410
Dr. Hill, he's got one goal.

860
00:43:32,270 --> 00:43:33,590
Power, he's a madman, really.

861
00:43:34,650 --> 00:43:36,450
A bigger villain than West.

862
00:43:36,690 --> 00:43:38,350
So West, you know, to protect his idea.

863
00:43:38,550 --> 00:43:40,470
You know, it was ready to kill him.

864
00:43:40,610 --> 00:43:41,930
I never said.

865
00:43:42,590 --> 00:43:44,150
We did a couple of different shovels.

866
00:43:44,290 --> 00:43:46,110
We had a real shovel.

867
00:43:46,450 --> 00:43:46,870
Okay.

868
00:43:47,110 --> 00:43:50,490
Then we made a mold of that and we cast up
a rubber shovel.

869
00:43:51,450 --> 00:43:54,030
And Jeff just hit David with the foam
rubber shovel.

870
00:43:54,310 --> 00:43:57,650
I will be famous.

871
00:44:00,090 --> 00:44:04,250
And they take a real shovel and go like
this, but it goes out of frame.

872
00:44:06,770 --> 00:44:08,630
And then you see it around his neck.

873
00:44:08,770 --> 00:44:10,010
Now that's a cut-out.

874
00:44:10,390 --> 00:44:13,750
The real shovel that we had cut a half
moon out of.

875
00:44:14,730 --> 00:44:17,290
We had the fake head and rolled over.

876
00:44:18,010 --> 00:44:19,386
And the camera is down at his feet.

877
00:44:19,410 --> 00:44:21,610
So the shovel was blocking his real head.

878
00:44:21,930 --> 00:44:22,930
Very effective.

879
00:44:23,150 --> 00:44:24,430
But it's a very simple game.

880
00:44:25,790 --> 00:44:31,470
Now we've got a fake head that has picked
up and brought over and put in the,

881
00:44:31,471 --> 00:44:32,970
you know, stainless steel tray.

882
00:44:34,560 --> 00:44:37,170
For that, we did a full head and shoulder
cast of David.

883
00:44:37,470 --> 00:44:39,570
And of course it had to be made as a prop.

884
00:44:41,110 --> 00:44:43,770
I mean, on this budget, optical effects
just wasn't in the cards.

885
00:44:44,410 --> 00:44:48,470
It was really a situation where what you
saw is what you got.

886
00:44:50,130 --> 00:44:51,130
The reanimator stuff.

887
00:44:51,750 --> 00:44:52,210
Arts.

888
00:44:52,730 --> 00:44:54,180
That was glow stick juice.

889
00:44:55,110 --> 00:44:57,970
I've never done whole...

890
00:44:59,510 --> 00:45:00,510
Arts.

891
00:45:00,810 --> 00:45:03,006
You know, you get these little ones and
you break them and they glow.

892
00:45:03,030 --> 00:45:04,050
That's what it was.

893
00:45:04,690 --> 00:45:06,570
I think we went through 900 sticks.

894
00:45:06,870 --> 00:45:08,250
This isn't stuff to play with.

895
00:45:08,410 --> 00:45:10,950
It's been acidic formula that,
you know, you wouldn't want to put it

896
00:45:10,951 --> 00:45:12,990
around people's eyes and things like that.

897
00:45:14,590 --> 00:45:16,790
And this was the first time it was ever
used on film.

898
00:45:17,550 --> 00:45:22,630
Then we had the headless torso,
which for close-up shots like this was

899
00:45:22,631 --> 00:45:24,830
basically a torso with the next stump on
it.

900
00:45:25,875 --> 00:45:29,610
But for all that performance stuff,
it's just the old, you know, head through

901
00:45:29,611 --> 00:45:30,690
the table routine.

902
00:45:31,130 --> 00:45:35,190
We would cut holes in the various
furniture pieces and slot him in,

903
00:45:35,191 --> 00:45:37,470
and he's down underneath with his head up
through it.

904
00:45:37,750 --> 00:45:39,910
We had a couple of stainless steel trays.

905
00:45:40,090 --> 00:45:42,810
And one of them we cut a hole in big
enough to get his head through.

906
00:45:43,220 --> 00:45:46,830
The makeup for the severed neck was also
our gasket.

907
00:45:47,010 --> 00:45:52,130
And we can stretch this piece over David
Gail's head right up to his neck.

908
00:45:52,131 --> 00:45:54,850
To do it to his neck, paint it right up to
that edge.

909
00:45:55,350 --> 00:45:59,270
And then we would pour the blood in,
and the blood is the saving grace.

910
00:45:59,490 --> 00:46:00,810
Because that's what hides things.

911
00:46:01,250 --> 00:46:03,930
Most of the time, it wasn't a dummy head.

912
00:46:04,930 --> 00:46:06,850
Most of the time it was even.

913
00:46:08,790 --> 00:46:09,950
Well, that thought cool.

914
00:46:10,430 --> 00:46:12,790
I get to play a scene with a head.

915
00:46:16,090 --> 00:46:20,690
There is sort of a camp kind of quality to
the movie.

916
00:46:20,740 --> 00:46:21,890
Yes, Doctor.

917
00:46:22,390 --> 00:46:29,170
And so it requires kind of a heightened
approach to the whole thing.

918
00:46:29,910 --> 00:46:34,190
It has its own unique style of that movie.

919
00:46:35,530 --> 00:46:36,930
Star-style.

920
00:46:39,700 --> 00:46:40,700
It's high theater.

921
00:46:43,690 --> 00:46:47,250
We had, I think, something like 48 pages
of a character walking around without his

922
00:46:47,251 --> 00:46:48,430
head in this film.

923
00:46:48,431 --> 00:46:50,770
So we had to figure out the money shots.

924
00:46:51,590 --> 00:46:55,070
We actually had eight separate gags just
for doing the severed head.

925
00:46:55,910 --> 00:46:59,250
And every time the camera angle would
change, we would change the gag.

926
00:47:00,110 --> 00:47:04,370
We came up with, like, a Chinese menu of
the head gags.

927
00:47:04,950 --> 00:47:08,130
We had a fake head with eyes closed and a
fake head with eyes open.

928
00:47:08,131 --> 00:47:09,410
And we had the mechanical head.

929
00:47:09,630 --> 00:47:12,010
And animatronics was sort of an infancy
back then.

930
00:47:12,170 --> 00:47:13,830
We were sort of playing with it.

931
00:47:13,880 --> 00:47:16,510
I made this animatronic head for a few
shots.

932
00:47:16,560 --> 00:47:18,041
It could actually put my hand inside.

933
00:47:18,530 --> 00:47:20,330
It was like a muppet.

934
00:47:20,810 --> 00:47:25,190
So the shots of him walking away from you,
we had a stump man who could put his head

935
00:47:25,191 --> 00:47:26,191
down real well.

936
00:47:26,390 --> 00:47:29,510
So what we did, we just put the next stump
on him here.

937
00:47:30,490 --> 00:47:33,110
And Mack would adjust the camera angle
down a little bit.

938
00:47:33,111 --> 00:47:38,530
So when you see Doctor Hill walking away,
it looks absolutely fabulous.

939
00:47:39,070 --> 00:47:40,850
Sometimes he's carrying the head.

940
00:47:41,250 --> 00:47:44,270
And now we've got the close-up shot of
David.

941
00:47:44,310 --> 00:47:45,310
I mean, that's him.

942
00:47:45,590 --> 00:47:49,070
And we had a full headless torso,
which we could put David Gale's head

943
00:47:49,071 --> 00:47:50,410
through at the belly.

944
00:47:50,540 --> 00:47:53,170
And then had another guy come around for
the arms.

945
00:47:54,170 --> 00:47:57,950
So we used a lot of old gags and cheats
and stuff like that.

946
00:47:58,450 --> 00:48:01,970
But one of the main primary gags was
David's head in the tray.

947
00:48:04,660 --> 00:48:08,050
That poor guy, we tortured him.

948
00:48:08,470 --> 00:48:11,410
He was in quite a bit of discomfort a lot
of the time.

949
00:48:11,910 --> 00:48:14,170
And he was really a trooper about all
that.

950
00:48:14,171 --> 00:48:15,650
Never complaining about it.

951
00:48:15,790 --> 00:48:17,590
And giving amazing work.

952
00:48:17,610 --> 00:48:20,690
When we finished, he came up to me and he
said, you know, Stuart, he said,

953
00:48:21,810 --> 00:48:26,970
he said, I want to thank you because this
movie has reanimated me.

954
00:48:27,745 --> 00:48:30,570
I'm very sorry to say that David Gale is
no longer with us.

955
00:48:30,610 --> 00:48:32,530
And he was wonderful to work with.

956
00:48:32,870 --> 00:48:36,170
There was a good career cut way too short.

957
00:48:54,290 --> 00:48:58,570
There's a tendency to sort of assume that
people who are great thinkers have no

958
00:48:58,571 --> 00:48:59,610
carnal needs whatsoever.

959
00:49:01,030 --> 00:49:04,610
But just because you are a brilliant
scientist doesn't mean that these other

960
00:49:04,611 --> 00:49:06,331
things aren't floating around in your
brain.

961
00:49:06,870 --> 00:49:10,190
And one of the ideas and grandimeters of
when you are reanimated, you have no

962
00:49:10,191 --> 00:49:11,750
control over your sex drive.

963
00:49:11,751 --> 00:49:17,170
So once Dr. Hill is freed from life,
suddenly it is gone completely berserk.

964
00:49:17,990 --> 00:49:21,310
He's no longer hampered by society's
rules.

965
00:49:23,910 --> 00:49:28,450
And suddenly it's all about kidnapping the
Dean's daughter and having his way with

966
00:49:28,451 --> 00:49:29,451
her.

967
00:49:30,370 --> 00:49:33,210
I think even then, we knew this was the
scene.

968
00:49:33,880 --> 00:49:36,001
This was the scene that people were going
to remember.

969
00:49:37,920 --> 00:49:39,790
That was for me the most difficult scene.

970
00:49:40,685 --> 00:49:42,006
And, you know, I'm strapped down.

971
00:49:42,230 --> 00:49:42,650
I'm naked.

972
00:49:43,130 --> 00:49:44,790
There's a gory head in front of me.

973
00:49:45,510 --> 00:49:47,606
I mean, you know, I was wondering,
am I going too far?

974
00:49:47,630 --> 00:49:49,450
Should I be doing something like this?

975
00:49:49,810 --> 00:49:52,410
There were some people that said,
no, you shouldn't do this scene.

976
00:49:52,770 --> 00:49:57,030
But I wanted to be able to commit to that
moment as much as I could commit to any

977
00:49:57,031 --> 00:49:58,830
other moments in that film.

978
00:49:59,890 --> 00:50:01,470
So I said, okay, what the hell?

979
00:50:02,235 --> 00:50:03,250
They cleared the set.

980
00:50:03,410 --> 00:50:04,610
We went for it.

981
00:50:08,140 --> 00:50:13,270
And it sort of broke some barriers of what
was acceptable to film.

982
00:50:16,430 --> 00:50:19,370
So the reanimated head is going to have
sex with the Dean's daughter.

983
00:50:20,570 --> 00:50:21,890
This poor girl.

984
00:50:22,935 --> 00:50:26,790
I think I've always loved you.

985
00:50:30,950 --> 00:50:34,010
But the question we had when we were
writing it was, now how is he going to do

986
00:50:34,011 --> 00:50:35,011
this exactly?

987
00:50:35,850 --> 00:50:38,910
And I remember Dennis calling that
shortling, you know, in the middle of the

988
00:50:39,260 --> 00:50:42,110
night saying, I think I've just written
the world's first visual pun.

989
00:50:42,590 --> 00:50:43,590
The head gives head.

990
00:50:43,630 --> 00:50:45,390
Oh my gosh!

991
00:50:46,910 --> 00:50:47,910
My love!

992
00:50:50,725 --> 00:50:54,190
When you're doing a scene like that,
it just... it seems like an eternity was

993
00:50:54,191 --> 00:50:56,630
three hours or something like that,
or more.

994
00:50:56,710 --> 00:50:57,350
Maybe more.

995
00:50:57,510 --> 00:50:58,290
I don't even know.

996
00:50:58,350 --> 00:50:59,550
I don't even want to remember.

997
00:50:59,610 --> 00:50:59,950
I don't know.

998
00:51:00,590 --> 00:51:05,750
Well, I must say, Dr. Hill, I'm very
disappointed in you.

999
00:51:06,390 --> 00:51:11,310
You steal the secret of life and death,
and here you are, trusting with the bubble

1000
00:51:11,311 --> 00:51:12,311
-headed co-ed.

1001
00:51:12,350 --> 00:51:16,290
We were very fortunate to get to do all
the end at the end.

1002
00:51:16,440 --> 00:51:18,490
You'll never get credit for my discovery.

1003
00:51:18,570 --> 00:51:20,350
Who's going to believe a talking head?

1004
00:51:20,690 --> 00:51:22,010
Get a job in a side, shall we?

1005
00:51:22,011 --> 00:51:26,250
Our last day was 16 long hours,
and it was right before Christmas.

1006
00:51:26,950 --> 00:51:27,630
That was it.

1007
00:51:27,830 --> 00:51:29,626
We're pulling the plug at the end of this
day.

1008
00:51:29,650 --> 00:51:31,350
We cannot go another day behind this.

1009
00:51:35,865 --> 00:51:43,690
Why an intelligent young man like yourself
should make such a foolish, fatal mistake

1010
00:51:43,790 --> 00:51:47,690
of coming here to challenge me.

1011
00:51:48,810 --> 00:51:53,030
Yeah, that was a grueling, very,
very long day.

1012
00:51:53,031 --> 00:51:54,790
I have a plan.

1013
00:51:55,890 --> 00:51:58,310
So do I.

1014
00:51:58,890 --> 00:52:03,750
That was the day with all the zombies
coming out of the bag, so a lot of action,

1015
00:52:03,850 --> 00:52:07,390
and we were just grabbing shots and
grabbing shots.

1016
00:52:09,610 --> 00:52:13,190
You know, we just kept going and going and
going into the wee hours.

1017
00:52:13,990 --> 00:52:15,290
What a roller coaster.

1018
00:52:18,730 --> 00:52:23,610
I was asked to come up with a few zombie
characters.

1019
00:52:24,450 --> 00:52:25,230
There were make-ups.

1020
00:52:25,330 --> 00:52:26,830
One guy was run over by a truck.

1021
00:52:27,030 --> 00:52:30,370
The other guy had a sort of shotgun wound
to the side of his face.

1022
00:52:30,910 --> 00:52:31,910
The burnt corpse.

1023
00:52:32,690 --> 00:52:33,690
And they had to be naked.

1024
00:52:34,110 --> 00:52:35,770
They were naked all the time.

1025
00:52:36,310 --> 00:52:40,550
I couldn't believe that they could
actually get a bunch of people to do this.

1026
00:52:40,600 --> 00:52:43,930
We had all those naked people running
around.

1027
00:52:44,315 --> 00:52:48,510
And the most important thing was not to
show any frontal nudity, as it's called.

1028
00:52:48,930 --> 00:52:53,510
So basically it fell to Mack Alberg to
just keep the camera away from it,

1029
00:52:53,530 --> 00:52:56,510
to keep it out of the realm of being a
porno movie.

1030
00:52:57,130 --> 00:52:58,290
It looked kind of distraught.

1031
00:52:58,950 --> 00:53:00,790
And I went over to Mack, as it's Mack.

1032
00:53:00,910 --> 00:53:01,410
You all right?

1033
00:53:01,830 --> 00:53:02,830
It's the Venus.

1034
00:53:03,050 --> 00:53:04,050
I see the Venus.

1035
00:53:04,110 --> 00:53:06,370
I got Venus vagging in my shot.

1036
00:53:07,490 --> 00:53:09,530
I don't know how to make them go away.

1037
00:53:10,230 --> 00:53:11,830
We got some framing issues.

1038
00:53:12,170 --> 00:53:13,170
Let's say.

1039
00:53:14,370 --> 00:53:17,570
I'm sure the car is dressed.

1040
00:53:18,130 --> 00:53:20,590
The lasers are taken through.

1041
00:53:20,950 --> 00:53:25,130
It takes possible a new technique in the
bottom of me.

1042
00:53:25,790 --> 00:53:29,790
The only obstacles in the picture was the
laser drill.

1043
00:53:31,790 --> 00:53:33,850
The smoke was cigar smoke.

1044
00:53:34,790 --> 00:53:35,990
Keep it simple, stupid.

1045
00:53:37,635 --> 00:53:38,750
Last day I shoot him.

1046
00:53:39,410 --> 00:53:40,870
It seemed like a big dance.

1047
00:53:41,130 --> 00:53:42,930
It seemed like a massive choreographed
dance.

1048
00:53:43,030 --> 00:53:44,510
Look at me!

1049
00:53:45,090 --> 00:53:46,890
Just sort of like grab that, grab that.

1050
00:53:47,250 --> 00:53:49,330
Okay, you do it, moving on, moving on,
moving on.

1051
00:53:49,770 --> 00:53:51,250
So you got all of this stuff going.

1052
00:53:52,270 --> 00:53:54,690
And everybody is running around and doing
their own thing.

1053
00:53:54,691 --> 00:53:56,410
And it is controlled, chaos.

1054
00:53:57,730 --> 00:54:02,730
You've got Barbara's father trying to
squeeze the head.

1055
00:54:03,010 --> 00:54:07,650
Then it went to a mass of hamburger that
Tony Dublin sculpted on set.

1056
00:54:08,000 --> 00:54:11,970
He used hamburger and gel blood and
managed to get a wig to stay on it.

1057
00:54:11,971 --> 00:54:13,670
It was just like a big hamburger patty.

1058
00:54:13,930 --> 00:54:15,290
But that's what Stewart wanted.

1059
00:54:15,990 --> 00:54:18,630
And again, as part of the humor,
as part of the gross out of humor.

1060
00:54:19,550 --> 00:54:20,870
He wanted to be able to throw it.

1061
00:54:22,190 --> 00:54:23,910
But it's stickin' run down the wall.

1062
00:54:24,450 --> 00:54:25,210
And it did.

1063
00:54:25,290 --> 00:54:26,050
It was great.

1064
00:54:26,150 --> 00:54:26,630
Yeah!

1065
00:54:26,631 --> 00:54:28,050
I told you I have a theory!

1066
00:54:29,310 --> 00:54:30,390
One more down!

1067
00:54:31,810 --> 00:54:35,170
Then you've got the body going nuts and
going around.

1068
00:54:35,890 --> 00:54:38,170
We went to a big chest.

1069
00:54:38,770 --> 00:54:42,750
And the rib cage was like the doors in a
saloon that would just open.

1070
00:54:42,870 --> 00:54:44,830
And there was an air mortar built into it.

1071
00:54:44,910 --> 00:54:48,850
And so we packed it full of meat and
rubber pieces.

1072
00:54:49,830 --> 00:54:51,810
And just everything we could find.

1073
00:54:52,030 --> 00:54:54,070
And then, of course, we've triggered the
air mortar.

1074
00:54:54,910 --> 00:54:59,470
The intestines thing was my first
experience with acting backwards.

1075
00:54:59,965 --> 00:55:02,050
They wrapped me in the intestines.

1076
00:55:02,051 --> 00:55:07,790
And then pulled the intestines through the
body and out into the next room.

1077
00:55:07,990 --> 00:55:15,410
So that when the film was reversed,
it looks like the intestines fly out and

1078
00:55:15,411 --> 00:55:16,411
grab me.

1079
00:55:20,730 --> 00:55:22,410
They've got longer.

1080
00:55:23,070 --> 00:55:25,330
But I was wrapped moderately early.

1081
00:55:27,290 --> 00:55:32,690
Once I was done and lost into the smoke,
they then moved on.

1082
00:55:32,910 --> 00:55:35,070
I was being torn limb from limb.

1083
00:55:36,470 --> 00:55:37,870
And it's very effective.

1084
00:55:39,690 --> 00:55:44,610
I remember that we were shooting the
sequence at the elevator around four in

1085
00:55:44,611 --> 00:55:46,210
the morning or something like that.

1086
00:55:46,530 --> 00:55:48,890
Bruce Abbott and his corpse are rolling
around on the floor.

1087
00:55:49,935 --> 00:55:53,070
It's a wonderfully ragged place to be
because it was the end of the movie.

1088
00:55:53,071 --> 00:55:54,130
We were very exhausted.

1089
00:55:56,140 --> 00:55:57,330
Just so tired.

1090
00:55:59,190 --> 00:56:02,810
So, you know, you could bring all of
yourself to that moment.

1091
00:56:04,950 --> 00:56:08,710
The actor who plays that corpse was a real
amputee.

1092
00:56:09,410 --> 00:56:12,990
I believe he was... his arm was amputated
just above the elbow.

1093
00:56:14,990 --> 00:56:17,930
And he was covered in gelatin to look like
he was burnt.

1094
00:56:18,470 --> 00:56:20,050
And then we had a poseable arm.

1095
00:56:20,670 --> 00:56:22,810
So I was able to make that as a prop.

1096
00:56:23,320 --> 00:56:27,310
And that also gave us the ability to
separate it at the elbow.

1097
00:56:28,430 --> 00:56:30,410
And that's what gave us the piece for the
cut-off.

1098
00:56:30,895 --> 00:56:33,310
It's literally just slid on and we hold on
with that.

1099
00:56:35,930 --> 00:56:42,570
So when it was pulled off, the arm gag on
the floor was essentially just that part

1100
00:56:42,571 --> 00:56:47,870
of the stump at the elbow so we could come
up through the floor like this.

1101
00:56:48,090 --> 00:56:49,246
Have the stump out like that.

1102
00:56:49,270 --> 00:56:51,046
And the guy's actually just through the
floor.

1103
00:56:51,070 --> 00:56:52,110
It was just pretty simple.

1104
00:56:54,150 --> 00:57:01,990
For me, during the death scene,
it was really Bruce's scene.

1105
00:57:02,230 --> 00:57:03,230
It was really about him.

1106
00:57:04,320 --> 00:57:08,730
And, you know, his loss and his feeling
and him trying to save me and not being

1107
00:57:08,731 --> 00:57:09,290
able to.

1108
00:57:09,650 --> 00:57:11,270
Before he heard, she's gotten up.

1109
00:57:12,550 --> 00:57:14,430
And I thought he did a wonderful job.

1110
00:57:14,970 --> 00:57:16,910
You really feel his grief.

1111
00:57:22,940 --> 00:57:30,940
Dan is... he's an idealist, but as soon as
he realizes she's dead, then he turns the

1112
00:57:30,941 --> 00:57:31,941
corner.

1113
00:57:33,160 --> 00:57:38,700
I see Dan sort of plunging deep into the
darkness and falling apart.

1114
00:57:42,310 --> 00:57:47,030
I don't think in the beginning of the
movie he would have chosen to reanimate

1115
00:57:47,031 --> 00:57:51,350
somebody, but you see through the course
of the movie what he's turned into.

1116
00:57:52,390 --> 00:57:54,550
And so at the end of the movie he makes
that decision.

1117
00:57:55,610 --> 00:58:01,010
I think he does what everyone would do had
they been placed in his situation.

1118
00:58:02,370 --> 00:58:05,270
But Dan also must have a terrible memory.

1119
00:58:06,070 --> 00:58:08,730
I mean, what part of this works?

1120
00:58:08,830 --> 00:58:10,570
You know, what part of this really works?

1121
00:58:11,890 --> 00:58:14,830
But that idea, for me, is what the movie's
about.

1122
00:58:15,170 --> 00:58:17,130
You know, life is what's important.

1123
00:58:17,815 --> 00:58:21,330
And even if there are complications,
you go for it.

1124
00:58:21,630 --> 00:58:25,970
And wouldn't we prefer to be able to save
someone even if it meant that they were

1125
00:58:25,971 --> 00:58:27,110
kind of messed up?

1126
00:58:30,350 --> 00:58:31,950
And that was it.

1127
00:58:32,150 --> 00:58:33,170
It was the greatest time.

1128
00:58:33,210 --> 00:58:35,090
And it all went by in three weeks.

1129
00:58:35,170 --> 00:58:37,290
It wasn't tense, but it was shortened in
tense.

1130
00:58:38,010 --> 00:58:40,290
I did the kind of rough cut of the
picture.

1131
00:58:40,650 --> 00:58:42,410
Then I went back to Chicago.

1132
00:58:42,920 --> 00:58:46,690
And the final cut of the movie was Brian
working with Lee Percy, the editor.

1133
00:58:47,470 --> 00:58:53,490
The cut that Stuart had of the movie was
135 minutes or something.

1134
00:58:54,170 --> 00:58:58,150
It was really long, and Lee started
cutting it down.

1135
00:58:59,090 --> 00:59:01,950
Moving scenes around, he really fashioned
the material.

1136
00:59:02,330 --> 00:59:04,970
A lot of the scenes that we cut out.

1137
00:59:05,470 --> 00:59:06,890
I don't really miss him.

1138
00:59:08,330 --> 00:59:11,610
And then, in the beginning of February,
we did the reshoots.

1139
00:59:12,550 --> 00:59:13,830
Like the opening.

1140
00:59:15,210 --> 00:59:19,150
Which I mentioned afterwards, Lee Percy
put it together.

1141
00:59:20,230 --> 00:59:22,610
And I remember sitting with him and
watching it.

1142
00:59:22,611 --> 00:59:27,590
I just thought this was the best shit I'd
ever seen, you know?

1143
00:59:28,410 --> 00:59:34,030
I did not see the finished film until I
came back to Los Angeles six months later.

1144
00:59:34,050 --> 00:59:35,610
And there was a cast in crew screening.

1145
00:59:35,650 --> 00:59:38,610
It felt like an opening night for a stage
play.

1146
00:59:38,870 --> 00:59:39,870
It was thrilling.

1147
00:59:41,410 --> 00:59:43,430
Everybody was really into it.

1148
00:59:43,790 --> 00:59:46,130
And just screaming and squealing.

1149
00:59:48,030 --> 00:59:50,090
When it closed my heart, we didn't watch.

1150
00:59:50,310 --> 00:59:51,310
But yes, I did.

1151
00:59:51,350 --> 00:59:53,670
I peeked.

1152
00:59:54,210 --> 00:59:55,750
We were all rather surprised.

1153
00:59:56,050 --> 00:59:58,090
And really surprised by how funny it was.

1154
00:59:59,310 --> 01:00:01,990
You know, it was just really, really
funny.

1155
01:00:03,410 --> 01:00:04,690
But also really bloody.

1156
01:00:06,070 --> 01:00:07,370
Oh, my God.

1157
01:00:07,620 --> 01:00:10,050
Everyone was shocked when I saw the movie.

1158
01:00:10,610 --> 01:00:11,990
What shot did I thought they'd be?

1159
01:00:13,810 --> 01:00:15,690
David Gail's wife was there.

1160
01:00:15,890 --> 01:00:17,150
And she was so shocked.

1161
01:00:17,650 --> 01:00:20,090
And she got up in the middle of the
screening.

1162
01:00:20,270 --> 01:00:23,030
And she said, David, how could you?

1163
01:00:23,250 --> 01:00:24,350
I think maybe she's not...

1164
01:00:24,351 --> 01:00:25,530
Is this what he's up to?

1165
01:00:25,850 --> 01:00:26,850
Is this?

1166
01:00:27,010 --> 01:00:30,010
His big job as an actor, you know?

1167
01:00:30,830 --> 01:00:33,090
Yes, my love.

1168
01:00:33,490 --> 01:00:38,330
I think it was incumbent upon David Gail
to give her a little bit of a heads up.

1169
01:00:38,410 --> 01:00:39,410
So sweet.

1170
01:00:39,930 --> 01:00:41,090
But that was going to happen.

1171
01:00:41,430 --> 01:00:42,430
Sorry.

1172
01:00:43,495 --> 01:00:44,750
Then we took it to Cannes.

1173
01:00:45,385 --> 01:00:47,470
And it was just the best audience.

1174
01:00:47,695 --> 01:00:51,530
At the end of the movie, they were
stopping their feet and clapping in time

1175
01:00:51,531 --> 01:00:52,531
with the music.

1176
01:00:53,230 --> 01:00:56,090
I was going, man, this movie business is
really great.

1177
01:00:57,020 --> 01:01:00,790
And then I got a notice that it had won
the critics award.

1178
01:01:01,290 --> 01:01:08,070
So, you know, my board at the theater
didn't realize it wasn't our film after all.

1179
01:01:08,930 --> 01:01:14,330
I decided not to take it to the MPAA
because I didn't like the idea of somebody

1180
01:01:14,331 --> 01:01:17,790
telling us what we could or couldn't do
with it.

1181
01:01:17,930 --> 01:01:22,531
It was a very brave choice of our
distributor to release the movie on Reddit.

1182
01:01:22,670 --> 01:01:27,410
And we realized that to cut this to an R
rating, a movie would be about 20 minutes

1183
01:01:27,411 --> 01:01:27,970
long, I think.

1184
01:01:27,971 --> 01:01:33,930
But going out without a rating meant that
we couldn't advertise the movie in a lot

1185
01:01:33,931 --> 01:01:34,931
of newspapers.

1186
01:01:35,510 --> 01:01:38,910
Most of the ads were white letters on
black background.

1187
01:01:39,230 --> 01:01:40,570
That's how the movie was sold.

1188
01:01:41,630 --> 01:01:44,030
There was no big ad campaign.

1189
01:01:44,530 --> 01:01:46,490
There was no PR for this movie.

1190
01:01:46,510 --> 01:01:50,910
And yet, it opened at the Paramount across
the street from Grauman's Chinese theater.

1191
01:01:51,310 --> 01:01:55,890
And there was a line from the Paramount
all the way down and around the corner.

1192
01:01:57,250 --> 01:02:02,850
And from that first scene, when they break
into Dr. Gruber's office, it was like,

1193
01:02:02,930 --> 01:02:03,930
whoa!

1194
01:02:03,990 --> 01:02:04,990
There was a hoot!

1195
01:02:06,310 --> 01:02:07,870
They already went crazy over here.

1196
01:02:07,970 --> 01:02:09,970
They don't know whether to scream or laugh
or both.

1197
01:02:10,270 --> 01:02:14,290
People standing up and screaming at the,
oh my god, what are you doing?

1198
01:02:14,530 --> 01:02:15,670
You're not gonna do that!

1199
01:02:16,010 --> 01:02:18,270
I can't believe this shit!

1200
01:02:18,510 --> 01:02:19,510
Oh, no!

1201
01:02:19,730 --> 01:02:21,490
Oh, oh, oh, they're not... Oh,
god!

1202
01:02:21,491 --> 01:02:26,490
It was the most vocal audience response
I've ever heard.

1203
01:02:26,830 --> 01:02:28,750
I remember we were coming out of the
theater.

1204
01:02:29,110 --> 01:02:30,630
And some guy comes with his groceries.

1205
01:02:31,170 --> 01:02:33,950
That's the best damn movie I've ever seen!

1206
01:02:34,430 --> 01:02:36,470
I thought, wow, this is great!

1207
01:02:37,640 --> 01:02:39,810
A lot of the reviews were fantastic.

1208
01:02:40,030 --> 01:02:43,870
I mean, the guy who really championed it
was Roger Ebert, who wrote one of the

1209
01:02:43,871 --> 01:02:44,450
first reviews.

1210
01:02:44,570 --> 01:02:48,090
I remember Pauline Kale put her on her top
10 list for the year.

1211
01:02:48,240 --> 01:02:52,150
And this was amazing to me because I had
assumed that the critics were gonna hate

1212
01:02:52,151 --> 01:02:53,151
the movie.

1213
01:02:54,590 --> 01:03:00,530
Soon I got a call from Brian saying that
Charlie Band was offering us both a three

1214
01:03:00,531 --> 01:03:03,890
-picture deal, including another Lovecraft
picture.

1215
01:03:04,690 --> 01:03:07,970
From the makers of Reanimated from beyond.

1216
01:03:08,750 --> 01:03:13,330
So it was at that point that I did
formally leave the theater and moved to LA

1217
01:03:13,530 --> 01:03:16,390
and only to discover that these three
movies were gonna be shot in Rome.

1218
01:03:17,850 --> 01:03:20,510
And which was another adventure.

1219
01:03:20,810 --> 01:03:22,250
I guess that's another story.

1220
01:03:23,630 --> 01:03:26,530
You know, Reanimated did well,
but it wasn't a huge blockbuster.

1221
01:03:27,050 --> 01:03:29,510
It wasn't some big box office smash.

1222
01:03:29,550 --> 01:03:32,230
I don't think it was as big a movie as
something like Halloween was.

1223
01:03:32,330 --> 01:03:36,570
It's a matter of fact, after it came out,
it was forgotten to a certain degree.

1224
01:03:36,870 --> 01:03:41,390
And I mean, it took a while before it
actually became something again.

1225
01:03:41,700 --> 01:03:44,670
And I think it had a lot to do with the
whole video revolution.

1226
01:03:45,595 --> 01:03:48,810
Most of the people that I talked to,
they got a hold of the tape.

1227
01:03:49,650 --> 01:03:50,966
Like, you know, it was in my basement.

1228
01:03:50,990 --> 01:03:53,270
I wasn't supposed to see it in me in a
couple of brands.

1229
01:03:54,070 --> 01:03:55,670
And I got in trouble, man.

1230
01:03:59,330 --> 01:04:07,330
This movie, it allowed a lot of films that
came after it to be a little more shocking

1231
01:04:07,430 --> 01:04:08,770
if they wanted to be.

1232
01:04:08,790 --> 01:04:12,710
To be a little braver than they thought
they could be.

1233
01:04:12,785 --> 01:04:14,950
Imagine if the movie had gone for a
rating.

1234
01:04:15,310 --> 01:04:17,770
Whatever works, the best is what they take
out.

1235
01:04:18,130 --> 01:04:20,890
So, Reanimator has a kind of an integrity.

1236
01:04:21,390 --> 01:04:25,910
And today, I think Reanimator has a much
wider audience than you could have

1237
01:04:25,911 --> 01:04:27,410
imagined 10 years ago.

1238
01:04:27,530 --> 01:04:30,450
It's funny, it's like, I'm reaching a
whole new generation now.

1239
01:04:30,530 --> 01:04:32,350
People are bringing their kids to see it.

1240
01:04:32,550 --> 01:04:36,570
So many people talk about that movie with
interest, you know.

1241
01:04:37,160 --> 01:04:40,690
I was doing a movie a few years ago where
David Bowie was one of the actors.

1242
01:04:40,691 --> 01:04:44,550
and David came over to me and said,
Mac, Mac, I heard you shot Reanimator.

1243
01:04:44,930 --> 01:04:46,290
That's my favorite movie.

1244
01:04:46,610 --> 01:04:49,610
I'm not surprised that this is a favorite
coat film.

1245
01:04:49,650 --> 01:04:51,330
I'm not surprised at all.

1246
01:04:51,945 --> 01:04:53,510
I'm delighted to have been part of it.

1247
01:04:53,730 --> 01:04:55,890
It's the highlight of my career as an
actor.

1248
01:04:56,730 --> 01:05:00,570
It's probably the part that most people
remember me for.

1249
01:05:00,930 --> 01:05:02,830
I think it really holds up today.

1250
01:05:03,110 --> 01:05:03,690
It's still shocking.

1251
01:05:04,090 --> 01:05:04,830
It's still out there.

1252
01:05:05,030 --> 01:05:07,050
But I think it's a great story as well.

1253
01:05:07,200 --> 01:05:10,690
I think the film holds up beyond its shock
value.

1254
01:05:11,010 --> 01:05:16,070
There's a lot of realness going on between
the characters, a lot of real drama.

1255
01:05:16,390 --> 01:05:18,970
There's heart, there's love, there's
heartbreak.

1256
01:05:19,070 --> 01:05:21,270
It's satirical, it's brightening.

1257
01:05:21,290 --> 01:05:25,390
You're lucky to be in one film that works
that well.

1258
01:05:25,530 --> 01:05:27,630
It's a mere 86 minutes.

1259
01:05:30,465 --> 01:05:32,430
And, you know, it fairly flies.

1260
01:05:32,555 --> 01:05:35,510
It's kind of like going on a new roller
coaster.

1261
01:05:35,950 --> 01:05:38,930
It's thrilling, and it's over before you
know it.

1262
01:05:38,931 --> 01:05:40,491
And you go, my God, what just happened.

1263
01:05:40,990 --> 01:05:41,990
Let's go again.

1264
01:05:42,450 --> 01:05:47,370
Reanimator is one of those rare movies
where everything worked well.

1265
01:05:48,330 --> 01:05:52,190
But we were just doing a little movie and
trying to make the best that we could with

1266
01:05:52,191 --> 01:05:52,810
what we had.

1267
01:05:53,170 --> 01:05:59,810
Looking back, I realized how incredibly
lucky I was to have just the right people.

1268
01:06:00,210 --> 01:06:01,910
Everyone was on the same way.

1269
01:06:02,090 --> 01:06:04,070
Everyone was doing their best work.

1270
01:06:04,790 --> 01:06:07,390
And it was one of these things that
doesn't happen very often.

1271
01:06:07,550 --> 01:06:09,050
It may never happen for me again.

1272
01:06:09,690 --> 01:06:11,290
Reanimator is now my middle name.

1273
01:06:11,650 --> 01:06:13,310
It's always Stewart, Reanimator Gordon.

1274
01:06:14,110 --> 01:06:18,990
And it's enabled me to work, you know,
for 20 years, you know, and do more films.

1275
01:06:21,150 --> 01:06:23,430
And so I can't complain about that at all.

1276
01:06:23,750 --> 01:06:27,050
On the other hand, you know, people are
always expecting me to how to reanimator.

1277
01:06:27,475 --> 01:06:29,066
They're always able to say about my films.

1278
01:06:29,090 --> 01:06:30,890
Well, it was good, but it wasn't
reanimator.

1279
01:06:31,570 --> 01:06:33,250
I guess you could say it's my Citizen
Kane.

1280
01:06:33,750 --> 01:06:35,566
You know, this is the film that will be
remembered.

1281
01:06:35,590 --> 01:06:37,070
I don't follow the film to have done.

1282
01:06:37,650 --> 01:06:42,110
I'm very, very pleased that people are
watching the movie at all 20 years later

1283
01:06:42,111 --> 01:06:43,111
later.

1284
01:06:43,670 --> 01:06:45,830
And that it still seems to have its power.

1285
01:07:10,290 --> 01:07:12,010
Thank you very much.