They Call Her Death - An Interview W/ Austin Snell

Austin Snell is a writer, director, and producer out of Lawrence, Kansas. His debut feature film Exposure was released in 2018, and his latest film, They Call Her Death is getting positive reviews and was just released on the streaming channel SHUDDER. Today we sit down with Austin to discuss his new film, and independent filmmaking.

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MAD: Austin, thanks for spending time with us today! I recently had a chance to watch your latest film, THEY CALL HER DEATH, and was pleasantly surprised. It exceeded expectations and was, overall, very enjoyable. Also impressive, especially when dealing in stylistic elements, is that you are a self taught filmmaker. You achieved an awesome blend of grindhouse-revenge movie meets acid-Western with ample amounts of practical effects, gore, and dark humor. When did you first become interested in filmmaking, and how did your voyage begin?

SNELL: I’ve been making films as far back as I can recall. I was the kid who would make movies with their action figures on VHS. I was always trying to rope my friends into making a movie at sleepovers or on weekends if we had a camera at our disposal.

Then in high school I was introduced to the notion of independent filmmaking by my friend Stephen Ferrell - who was one of the sound recordists on They Call Her Death, actually. He was my movie guru for the longest time and it was due to his appearance in my life that I started thinking about making movies as something I could take seriously. This is also about when my interest in 16mm film and celluloid in general kicked in. At that time, “real” movies were still shot on film pretty exclusively.

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MAD: They Call Her Death reminds me of my favorite Western, HIGH PLAINS DRIFTER, starring Clint Eastwood. What were your personal influences on They Call Her Death, and how did you decide upon the theme of a supernatural horror Western? Likewise, what were the challenges of shooting on 16mm film?

SNELL: Choosing to do a throwback supernatural splatter western was born out of the idea that I had already settled on the notion of doing a movie on 16mm. I was dying to start shooting film and leave digital behind. But I have a pretty old camera and lens combo to work with, so I knew the images would be softer than modern glass. And I knew with my amateur skills as a cinematographer, I was kind of bound to produce a certain image quality. So I approached it as what kind of movie would be appropriate to make with this gear and my skills? And my heart belongs to exploitation cinema so a grimy splatter western felt appropriate and also like a lot of fun to make. As for specific influences, I often reference “Four of the Apocalypse” by Lucio Fulci. A lot of Fulci films, actually. DNA from “The Beyond” is definitely peppered throughout. I also loved the kind of quiet, brooding tone of “Cemetery Without Crosses”. Also hard to not address Corbucci when you talk about violent spaghetti westerns.

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MAD: Before we get into any of the performances or characters here, I have to mention two things that really elevated TCHD, and that’s with the frontier town of “Sterling”, and a great soundtrack (you wrote a lot of the score yourself)! Please tell us more about the filming locations, and how the soundtrack came about.

SNELL: “Sterling” in real life is one of those living history museums called Old Cowtown Museum in Wichita, Kansas. We rented it for only two days, so all the stuff you see in the exteriors of Sterling or inside the saloon and funeral home were all shot in two days. They were very good to us during our whirlwind time there. We also filmed a bit in Lee’s Summit, Missouri at a similar living history site called 1855 Missouri Town. That’s where the Cartwright house is located. And a lot of the interiors - like Molly Pray’s homestead - were sets that were built in my single car garage.

The soundtrack was originally supposed to be completely licensed library music recorded in the 60’s and 70’s to really drive home that throwback vibe. So I placed all these songs into the assembly cut of the film and was prepared to pay for all the licensing fees, but then a lot of people I tested the film with said the music wasn’t working. Throughout production, our producer/vfx artist Adam Jeffers kept saying - wisely I should add - that the movie needed an original score. So he was right about that. I threw out all the licensed music except for the two songs by Night Powers (“Tonight We Fly” and “A Desperate Kind of Year”) and a choral piece by Alessandro Alessandroni. Then I wrote a new score myself in garageband in a little under three weeks time.

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MAD: The movie has a lot of cool characters with great performances by a group of actors you can tell are really committed to the material. Can you give us a little insight into the casting process? Group of friends?

SNELL: Yes, the cast is largely made up of civic theater actors from Topeka. There are a few Kansas City actors in there as well. But they are all friends of mine who were gracious enough to work for free. Pretty much every penny had to go to film stock, lab fees, costumes, and locations. So I’m forever grateful to this cast for sticking through a very long and disjointed shoot. We filmed over the course of two and a half years on weekends and stuff like that. So yeah, kudos to them.

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MAD: How big a part did online fundraisers play in the production of the film, and if you don’t mind me asking, what was the total budget?

SNELL: No online fundraising whatsoever. It all came out of my and Adam’s pockets. Hence the aforementioned free labor. We were able to do the film for about $40k. Which is miniscule for a film-shot movie, but fairly stressful for just two regular old dudes to put up. But that also guaranteed our freedom to do whatever we wanted and to move at whatever pace was necessary.

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MAD: Please tell us a little more about your production companies, Sunrunner Films, and Trash Nite Home Video, and what fans might expect in the future?

SNELL: The simple answer would be Sunrunner is me and Trash Nite is Adam. I wouldn’t want to spoil anything Adam has in the works for his imprint, but I know he has some very cool and exciting things planned. I know I definitely plan to make more films and am actively working on getting my next one off the ground. And there’s also a third creative entity at play when it comes to who produced They Call Her Death, and that’s MMBN Productions. MMBN is Jake Jackson’s company, and he was our practical effects makeup artist. He does a lot of solid effects work and is branching out into doing more producing and directing himself these days. It takes a village.

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MAD: Who are some of your cinematic influences, in terms of writers, actors, and directors?

SNELL: Oh, wow. Too many. Troma played a big part in my early indie filmmaking days. I always loved “Night Beast” and “Pigs”. “Dawn of the Dead” is a perfect movie. I already mentioned Fulci earlier, as well as some of my favorite westerns. “The Hills Have Eyes” and “Evil Dead” were both very impactful to me as a younger guy. I like Walter Hill’s filmography a lot, especially “The Driver”. “The Swimmer” is a masterpiece. “Ms. 45”, “Lady Terminator”, I watch a fair amount of Cat 3 Hong Kong movies. Corey Yuen’s 80’s output like “Righting Wrongs” and “Yes Madam” are high on my list and I recently rewatched both. A couple recent discoveries for me are the Korean thriller “Suddenly in the Dark” and the Japanese film “Funeral Parade of Roses”. Does Godzilla count as a favorite actor? Carpenter, Cronenberg, DePalma…Lynne Ramsay is a genius. Ralph Bakshi. Lau Kar-Leung. Movies, man. They’re cool as hell.

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MAD: Favorite authors and books? Bands and musicians?

SNELL: I’m really into the John MacDonald “Travis McGee” books. I’m not getting through them as quickly as I’d like, I’ve only read four of them so far. But “The Deep Blue Good-by” is so good. My friend and crew member Allison Lloyd turned me on to “Sleazoid Express” by Bill Landis. It’s a collection of his zine writings from the 80’s about attending 42nd street grindhouse movies and I find myself pulling that off the bookshelf all the time. I live in Lawrence, Kansas so there is a fair amount of William Burroughs on the shelf too.

As for music, it really runs the gamut. I listen to Bob James a lot and always have. Lately it’s been a lot of Les Baxter, Nelson Riddle, and other exotica. I go for stretches where I listen to nothing but Ricky Nelson and Elvis. I also listen to a fair amount of citypop and J-pop. The last four artists I searched for on Apple music appear to be Bon Iver, The Damned, Lucero, and Atlanta Rhythm Section.

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MAD: What advice would you give to independent filmmakers or artists and creative types out there who are trying to hone their craft and reach a wider audience?

SNELL: There’s really no better advice than don’t quit. It has been said many times by much more famous and well qualified people than me, but this is a patience game. Creativity is obviously part of it, but it’s not the most talented who get there - it is the folks with the most patience and discipline. Just keep at it and you’ll naturally improve in the craft and the audience will naturally find you along with that.

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MAD: Have we seen the last of Molly Pray? This would make for a great series of books or comics!

SNELL: If she were to come back in some form, I’ve always thought comics or animation would be the way to do it. I don’t particularly see myself making a sequel to this film but her look is so fun and would translate easily into comic form. So if any animators who love to work for free are reading this and they want to take a stab at an incredibly violent cartoon done in the style of Hanna Barbara, they should hit me up!

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MAD: Would you like to give a random shout-out to any other people, projects, or websites today?

SNELL: Vinegar Syndrome! They’ve been so cool to us by handling the theatrical distribution of the film. They even struck a 35mm print that has been making the rounds, which is an absolute dream come true for me. Their whole team has been great to work with. Shudder picking up the film was also rad and I appreciate them as a company so much. Also our distribution team in Japan, Cinemago. They put a lot of effort and resources into making a dubbed version of the film that is currently doing the rounds theatrically over there. We flew out in April to visit them and had the time of our lives. Lastly I suppose I should call out the fact that we have some merch for sale at theycallherdeath.com! You can buy tees and posters there. The amazing domestic poster art was designed by producer/vfx artist Adam Jeffers.

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MAD: Once again, thanks so much for enduring the terrifying tomb of torment and torture at HORROR TO CULTURE! I definitely look forward to your future works. In close, what would you like to leave the readers with today?

SNELL: Thank you for the kind words and thank you for having me! They can They Call Her Death streaming on Shudder right now, and I’m easy to find on instagram as @16mm_guy and on Facebook.

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Michael A. Dyer is the host of the HORROR TO CULTURE podcast, vidcast, and website.