October 27, 2009

Filmmaker Ti West has built up an interesting catalog of films within the horror genre over the course of the last several years. Having debuted with the impressive indie creature feature The Roost, then followed by the minimalist yet tense Trigger Man and eventually moving on to Cabin Fever 2, West is back with his most ambitious effort, The House Of The Devil.

The film follows college student Samantha Hughes, who is desperate to get out of her living situation and takes an odd babysitting job to help pay the deposit for her new pad. Unbeknownst to her, it also happens to be the evening of a rare full lunar eclipse, and her new employers aren’t all that they seem to be.

We sat down and chatted with Ti about the origins of the project, how he pulled off such an authentic looking ’80s film and working with genre vets Tom Noonan and Mary Woronov.

Robg.: Now, this is a story you’ve had since right after your first film The Roost, right?

Ti West: Yeah, it was supposed to happen right after The Roost but it sort of fell apart. And when it fell apart, I called Larry (Fessenden) up and said “Fuck that movie. It fell apart. I have another idea for a movie. And it’s about snipers.” And he said, “Well….” I said, “It’s only going to cost $15,000 dollars.” He was like, “Greenlit!” So then I went and did Trigger Man. After Trigger Man, the Cabin Fever 2 thing happened, and as I was doing Cabin Fever 2, these people got their act together and came back to me saying, “OK, now we have the money.”

Robg.: So the timing was just a bit off.

Ti: Yeah, it’s probably a better movie now then if I had made it back then. We’ll never know, but I think everything turned out for the best.

Robg.: Let’s talk a bit about casting. Obviously you worked with Tom Noonan on The Roost. And with Mary Woronov, she told me you approached her for Cabin Fever 2, but she objected to having a harelip for it?

Ti: That’s right. On this movie, I called her back and she invited me to her house and she was like, “Ugh, this guy (again)”. We totally hit it off and got along great. She said, “If I had met you, I would’ve done the hairlip for Cabin Fever 2!” I’d always been fascinated with Mary so I wanted to get her for this. She doesn’t really do acting anymore, she’s mostly focused on her painting, so to get her to come back out and do this was a total dream for me.

Robg.: How about finding Jocelin Donahue for the lead in The House Of The Devil? Because she had this great innocent quality, kind of like Jessica Harper in Suspiria. She reminded me a lot of her. I appreciate the way you shot her for this movie, you really captured her spirit. Did you know her from JT Petty’s movie, The Burrowers?

Ti: No, actually. She came in the first day of auditions and I got a tape of her and I made her come back and meet with me again. And then I had her come back and meet with me again. I kept pushing her to see how long she would put up with it. But from the very beginning, she was always very good, and she completely understood the movie and looked at it from a very intellectual standpoint, which is not what a lot of actresses that came in were doing. But she got it. She understood it and it made it easier for me, because this is a movie that she has to carry on her shoulders. Once she got the part, it became her movie now. So, that’s a lot to handle, but she was OK with that responsibility. She probably photographs better then any other human being I’ve ever seen, so that helped also. It was the standard audition process and I put her through the ringer to make sure she was dedicated and she was.

Robg.: Stylistically, how’d you approach explaining how some of these scenes would play off to your cast and crew? For example, I love the opening title credits and Jocelin’s headphone dance around the house. You don’t see that kind of stuff in movies anymore!

Ti: Well that scene is a true testament to Jocelin, because in the script it said, “she puts on her headphones and starts recklessly dancing around the house.” That’s what that said. Everything about it is all her. That’s an example of an actor elevating the material. But yeah, I was really obsessed with the idea of being in a stranger’s house by yourself and the weirdness that you find yourself snooping around. You think “Why am I doing this?” For some reason, you’re inclined to do that. There’s little private moments that you have in a stranger’s house and there’s uncomfortable things like dancing around and someone seeing you, just things like that. That idea was something I always wanted to explore, so that’s where scenes like that one came from. It wasn’t like “I love Risky Business” so I did a scene like that. I didn’t want to do that, but I wanted to have this carefree moment scene like that. Also, it’s a big moment because that’s the last sequence where you get to know her as a character and she has the job of being the straight man and carrying most of the movie that when it gets to her exploring the house or dancing or watching TV, those are the moments where she doesn’t have responsibility in the movie. She can just be her own interesting character.

Robg.: I wanted to talk a bit about the production design that Jade Healy did on the house, because the level of detail to make it look like it was the early 80’s was incredible…

Ti: You also know that the house looks nothing like that, right? Did you see it before?

Robg.: No! I didn’t.

Ti: Jade transformed the whole house. Every room was carpeted or linoleumed or wallpapered. The house doesn’t look anything like that.

Robg.: Well, I know I spoke to AJ (Bowen) a bit about how much thought you put into all the little details, for example – there’s one moment on campus where you wanted to hear the church bells ringing in the background a holiday song to establish it was a Sunday, during winter break, which is why there’s no one really on campus.

Ti: I think there’s a lot of stuff in there if you see the movie more then once that you’ll pick up on. A lot of little details and foreshadowing. I’m a big fan of movies that are benefited by repeat viewings and contain new information every time you see it. So I hope that there’s a lot of stuff in there that people will pick up on in later viewings.

Robg.: I really liked the moments between Jocelin and Greta Gerwig because there’s not a false moment in their dialogue together. I really bought them as best friends, especially in the pizza parlor scene…

Ti: Yeah, that and the scene when they’re arguing outside the house by the car, I think that’s their best acting. Actually, I think that’s the best acting in the whole movie.

Robg.: As much as I love Tom Noonan, Mary Woronov and Jocelin Donahue in this movie, I wanted to talk a bit about AJ Bowen, because I think he steals the show. How’d he get involved in this project? Had you met him before working with him?

Ti: We met at South By Southwest after The Signal and I had Trigger Man. Jacob (Gentry) who had directed The Signal had known a lot of the actors on Trigger Man so that’s how we all met. So, when AJ and I hung out, I realized we were both really into Iron Eagle and Teen Wolf and movies like that. So we hit it off and when the time came for this movie, I thought he’d be good for this, so I called him about doing this movie. I just knew based on the conversations we’ve had about other movies that our sensibilities were the same so I knew he’d be able to do it.

Robg.: One of the things that’s been cool about House Of The Devil is the gradual buzz it’s attained. The word of mouth from early screenings and festivals has been really, really good. How’s that been for you? Have you had the chance to watch it with audiences?

Ti: I don’t really watch it with an audience. I mean, I have and I pop my head in for certain scenes like the “Are you not the babysitter?” part, just to be amused. But I’m a very personal filmmaker and I make films for my own personal reasons – I can’t watch my own movies. It’s the same as like hearing your voice on tape? I’m not into it. But I am very, very proud of this movie. And after the whole debacle at Tribeca with the scenes, I got to put everything back exactly the way I wanted. Magnolia has been the greatest, most supportive distributor I’ve ever worked with. As far as building buzz, they’ve been a huge part of it. They’ve been really good to the fans and they really respect the movie. They’ve treated me very well. I hope people realize it’s a movie you should check out. Maybe you’ll like it, maybe you won’t, but you should support movies like this and companies like Magnolia over the mainstream stuff that doesn’t need your help as much. Everyone loved Let The Right One In. That’s Magnolia. So keep supporting that! If you like movies like that or movies like this, if you stop going to see them, they can’t put them out anymore. These are the people you want to support and in my opinion, the good guys.

The House Of The Devil opens in limited theatrical release on October 30th and is now available for VOD.