Invasion of the Undead! Starring Desmond and Jake, Paranormal Exterminators

by Torey Haas

When I was nine years old my parents took me to see Jurassic Park; to say the movie changed my life was a complete understatement. Sure, I loved dinosaurs just as much as the next kid, but there was something else about the movie that completely captured my imagination and I couldn't quite put my finger on. Later that week my mom bought me the Topps Official 'Making of Jurassic Park' magazine at the local Ingles; the magazine contained dozens of detailed pictures of Stan Winston's fabulous animatronic dinosaur creations, and upon seeing these images I realized what it was about Jurassic Park that had me so completely enthralled: the people who made the movie were literally living their imaginations. I saw myself standing next to an animatronic creature on a busy film set, and from that point on I knew I wanted to spend my life making movies.

While I always had an interest in monster and horror movies, fostered in large part by my equally genre-obsessed mom and grandpa (or "Poppy" as he will forever be credited in the 'Special Thanks' credits of my films), my interest skyrocketed to a whole new level after seeing Jurassic Park. Every week I would scour the TV Guide to check when all the horror and sci-fi movies were playing and set the VCR to record them (to this day I still sorely miss TNT's MonsterVision). I grabbed every book I could find on filmmaking (my fourth grade biography book report was on Roger Corman) and I read Fangoria religiously every month. When I was in fifth grade my dad made me a bootleg copy of Army of Darkness and I literally watched it every day when I got home from school- no joke, and I'm pretty sure I still have the entire movie memorized. As I grew older my interest only became more serious, and in 2009 I received my Master's Degree in Film Production from Georgia State University. Since then I've been working in the Georgia film industry as an editor and compositor, and I've been incredibly privileged to have some amazing experiences. I've worked on numerous commercials that have aired nationally on Cartoon Network and The Weather Channel, I regularly work with (and are friends with) the producer and director of a horror film I greatly admire (Dance of the Dead), and last year I edited An Elf's Story, a holiday special seen by millions(!) of people on CBS. I'm still blown away to think that something I played a significant role in creating has been seen by that many people.

So what does all of this have to do with MonsterBuster and this blog post? Well, everything. With the experience I've garnered over the past three years I established MonsterBuster Entertainment with the greatest people I've ever met and now I feel the time is finally right to take a leap, pursue my childhood dream, and make a feature film. If you've been reading this blog, checked out our website, and/or went to the MonsterBuster Film Festival last Fall (where the teaser trailer premiered) then you already know that the first MonsterBuster feature film will be Invasion of the Undead! starring Desmond and Jake, Paranormal Exterminators.

Invasion of the Undead is an eighties-style horror comedy (think Big Trouble in Little China meets The Evil Dead) that follows beautiful recent college grad Allison as she inherits a large mansion from a cousin she never knew she had. Her good fortune quickly turns sour when she discovers the mansion has something of a monster infestation, and she reluctantly enlists the aid of Desmond and Jake, two self-proclaimed 'paranormal exterminators', to take care of the problem. Unfortunately Desmond and Jake, who both work at a local grocery store for their day jobs, are not the most competent bunch and when a terrifying extra-dimensional evil from the mansion's past reveals itself the situation spirals completely out of control. Desmond, Jake and Allison soon find themselves fighting not only for their own lives but for the fate of the entire world as well.

We're currently in pre-production on Invasion and have been since early this past summer. Principal photography is slated to begin in January 2013 (edit: we've pushed back into Spring 2013 in the hopes that my preorder for the Black Magic Cinema Camera will be fulfilled by then) provided we raise the necessary funds (we will launch an Indiegogo campaign for a portion of the film's budget on January 1st, but that's a separate blog entry in of itself). Make no mistake though- even though Invasion is a feature film, it will nevertheless exemplify micro-budget independent filmmaking at its finest just like all of MonsterBuster's previous shorts. I won't reveal the estimated budget here (I'll save that for the Indiegogo campaign), but it's well under the cost of a new car. All of the film's major leads have been cast, and I couldn't be more thrilled with who will be appearing in the movie:

 Greg Garrison/"Desmond"- I first worked with Greg on my short film First Date back in 2009. I remember thinking he was a great actor and that I wanted him to someday audition for Desmond, but it wasn't until I saw him perform on stage in The Collective Project Inc.'s The Theory of Everything in 2010 that I knew he was Desmond. He showed such an incredible range and subtlety (the latter especially surprising considering it was theatre) that I realized he could completely pull off Desmond, a cocky, obnoxiously handsome, retro video game-playing jerk who turns out to be a pretty decent guy and who ultimately becomes a hero by the film's end. The funny thing is that Greg pretty much possesses all of these qualities himself; he's currently replaying the original Final Fantasy on a Nintendo emulator on his laptop, which is as Desmond-like of a behavior as anything I could have scripted. In addition to his work as an actor Greg is also one of the best writers I know; he wrote the Collective's sickeningly clever stage play The Red Herring and has several more plays in the works. I consider his endorsement of the Invasion script to be one of the best compliments I've ever received as a writer.

Dylan Schettina/"Jake"- Desmond's shorter other half and the Egon to his Venkman will be played by Dylan Schettina. I've worked with Dylan on two short films now (Mario and Luigi and Making the Cut) and hopefully I won't offend anyone when I say that he is easily my favorite actor to work with. He is just the most pleasant, energetic, respectful and funny person to have on set and he really makes the long hours go by quickly.

Greg and Dylan as Desmond and Jake for a test shoot

I started casting for Jake after I had already cast Greg, and thus I needed an actor who had chemistry with Greg since Desmond and Jake are longtime best friends. Well, Dylan and Greg are actually best friends in real life who have never once acted together before, and when I paired them up for Dylan's audition their chemistry was palpable; they completely played off each other with some improvised banter and just had an overall compelling dynamic. Plus they look great together; when I first saw them standing side by side in costume for our FX and lighting test shoot I couldn't help but smile.

Marie Barker/"Allison"- Allison was by far the most difficult role to cast because a lot of really great actresses came and read for the part. My gut instinct was definitely Marie however; she had previously appeared in our 48 Hour Film Making the Cut and will soon be seen in "Tilt" (the pilot episode that we co-produced for the upcoming web series Horror Hotel) and heard in Fred Grant's Metroid fan trailer. Invasion is more or less told from Allison's point-of-view and she's the main identification point since the audience follows her on the path of discovery. What drew me to Marie's performance in her audition was how natural her reactions felt, especially in contrast to Desmond and Jake, who as characters are more seasoned and thus almost nonchalant about the supernatural occurrences. In her scenes with Greg and Dylan I really sided with her rendition of Allison, which was critical because being essentially the 'straight woman' of Invasion Allison runs the danger of being overshadowed by Desmond and Jake. Marie also has more than enough spunk to keep up with Greg and Dylan's banter, which is equally important for Allison.

Nathan DeRussy/"Guy Smiley"- Nathan starred in Troll Picnic, one of the first films I made in grad school. I remember I lost several points on my production notebook for the class because Nathan never gave me a headshot; fast forward five years later and he still doesn't have a headshot. Whatever Nathan, I'll just use this badass pic from our FX/Lighting test shoot instead. Anyway, Nathan has become something of MonsterBuster's go-to creature performer due to his enthusiasm, body type, and general willingness to do anything; he's like a low-budget version of Doug Jones. His character is Invasion's primary antagonist, a sword-wielding undead sorcerer who turns his victims into "Sons of Z'athax," monstrous slime-covered creatures. While his character doesn't officially have a name, he has become affectionately referred to as "Guy Smiley" due to his creepy permanent smile and a throwaway crack muttered by Desmond upon their first meeting in their script.

Invasion's antagonist. Artwork © Brian Hardison.

The "Sons of Z'athax". Artwork © Brian Hardison

I've thought a lot about how I want to present Invasion in this blog and I've decided that the best approach is just to be honest. I feel that what we're trying to do with Invasion- i.e. create a super ambitious, effects- and creature-laden feature film on a budget that wouldn't even pay for the catering on a typical straight-to-DVD movie- is interesting enough that I really don't need to sugarcoat it in any way. I plan to update this blog regularly from here onward with more news, both good and bad, as the project develops, and while I could certainly say a lot more about Invasion at the moment I'll instead close with this: I mentioned earlier that I used to watch Army of Darkness every day, and I've always loved movies like Army and Big Trouble in Little China (and lesser known cult films like Waxwork II: Lost in Time and House II: The Second Story) that are filled with memorable characters and creatures and are just fun and infinitely re-watchable. This is my chief goal with Invasion of the Undead: I want to make a movie that you will watch again and again and that some horror-obsessed ten-year-old will watch every day when he or she gets home from school. Your world won't change after seeing Invasion of the Undead but you will sure as hell have a good time. That is my promise, and I hope you stick around to see me make good on it.

Thank you for reading, and Happy Halloween!