chiller blog

Posted Dec 7, 09 09:46 AM

The Guy Next Door

"The Girl Next Door is not a horror/sci-fi movie at all - All females should be incredibly angry. How an adult could write and show such a demented moview, is bad!" - Margaret, June 26, 2009
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How odd to find this post following an article in which I interviewed the late screenwriting master, Blake Snyder. Some readers think I'm CHILLER Central - confusing CHILLED 2 THE CORE with the network's message boards or viewer hotline. But what exactly was The Girl Next Door? It couldn't have been that Emile Hirsch movie from 2004 (I actually interviewed with producer Harry Gittes' creative exec at Sony). But who was Margaret? Apparently, she was so angry that she didn't proofread and hit the return button four times -- hence, four identical posts.

I IMDB'ed.

The Girl Next Door chronicles the sad tale of a young female and her polio-stricken sister in the care of their small town sadistic aunt who, along with her own evil agenda, opens the door to their ridicule and torture by local boys. In a milk-white period of pre-Kennedy innocence, author Jack Ketchum bases this harrowing tale of social rot on the true-life events leading to the death of Sylvia Likens in Indiana circa 1965. William Atherton is moving as David, the now-adult witness to the crimes; Daniel Manche is superb as the younger David, the film's innocence-lost focal point.

The parallels to The Last House on the Left came up immediately. I was intrigued. I thought of Margaret and the handful of other viewers who probably prefer their horror to be complete escapism. The illusion is a safe unreality. But when horror becomes increasingly realistic - and, therefore, closer to the genuine depths of true human depravity - some audience members simply do not want to go there.

But artistry is the balancing act of subject matter high wire. Ingmar Bergman's The Virgin Spring - the inspiration for Last House - is a beautiful, persistently thoughtful film about good human beings who still harbor the capacity for revenge. After the savage rape and murder of his saint-like daughter, Max Von Sydow's character lifts a ten year-old accomplice above his head and, shockingly, fatally throws the boy into a wall.

And yet, on the film's bare-its-soul honesty, we get it. Exploitation is nowhere in sight.

Back to the IMDB profile of one Andrew van den Houten, the film's producer (along with William M. Miller). Hmm. Former child actor turned fresh-faced filmmaker. He's got not one company (Moderncine) but two (the family entertainment-minded Doberman Productions).

Shane Belcher, Chiller's Director of Programming, suggested Andrew and I connect the dots. We did. I wanted to meet the mind behind all of these need-to-post's...

Chiller: Hiya, Andrew. Please excuse the obvious first question. Sweet child actor to independent horror filmmaker: What's the evolution?

Andrew: I remember being with my family on a car ride to somewhere and we were discussing growing up. All I knew was that I wanted to be a tractor driver one day. My sister thought that was ridiculous and said, "You know what you're going to do when you grow up, Andrew? You're going to make movies and star in them. I just know it!"

She was right about half the equation. It all started when I was in grade school at Columbia Preparatory on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. I was on a short list of "cute" and "outgoing" kids. I booked some small acting jobs from that list I was on. One job was even for Nickelodeon: a Linda Ellerbe special.

It was exciting growing up a New Yorker, especially being raised in a famous pre-war rent-controlled building. The Apthorp on 79th and Broadway, with its palatial gates and courtyard, was any kid's dreamland. Films were always being shot there when I was younger. To run downstairs and enter a fantasy world called the movies was incredible. My favorite part about all of it was candyland - better known as craft services. I was very intrigued. How could people NOT want to work in the movies?!

I even brushed shoulders with people like Dudley Moore as he shot Arthur II downstairs. And when I got older, I rented Mike Nichol's Heartburn to discover Jack Nicholson and Meryl Streep having marital issues close to home...on the marble benches in front of the fountains in MY courtyard!

My building was alive. To find out Rosemary's Baby was written in and inspired by The Apthorp! Ira Levin lived and wrote the cult classic movie there, despite it being shot in the Dakota a few blocks south. Fun fact: The Dakota is the SAME building that John Lennon lived in. Not so funfact: The Dakota was also the same building he was shot outside of.

Chiller: Hmm. So what films were your influences? And what horror tiles are in your permanent DVD collection?

Andrew: Jaws. Halloween (1978). The Fog (1980). Anything from Cronenberg. Videodrome,Rabid and even Existenz.

I was always interested in Polanski's style. Rosemary's Baby, I always thought was fascinating in how he foreshadows a scene using the camera as the force behind the motivation. Hitchcock does this often, too, and so subtly. I think subjectivity is a big part of a horror filmmaker's bag of tricks. True horror lays in the unknown. Not showing certain things is a device which (director) Greg Wilson uses in The Girl Next Door. It's the scariest way to serve any macabre story. Our minds become our own worst enemies when things are left to the imagination.

Chiller: Roddy McDowall once talked about not "gilding the lily": don't play the obvious. A lot of The Girl Next Door is shot in that bright '50s –

Andrew: -- Picket fence America. The type of fabric that couldn't be destroyed.

Chiller: Like the opening of Blue Velvet... So you produced Jack Ketchum's The Girl Next Door. The film has earned comparisons to The Last House on the Left, another work (especially the remake) that explores the dark recesses of human capability. Just treading on certain subjects alone brings about knee-jerk reaction from very conservative audiences. But how do you make a film ABOUT evil without being perceived AS evil, as having gone "too far?"

Andrew: It's all about what you don't see - and avoiding exploitative imagery. If you read Jack Ketchum's novel, The Girl Next Door, the reason it has such impact is that there are no direct answers as to "WHY" such evil things do happen. Ruth is clearly a mix of poverty, helplessness and insanity. She runs her home like a car with a drunken driver behind the wheel. Much of the story for The Girl Next Door was written and inspired by true facts from the real-life case of Sylvia Likens.

With an adaptation of a novel that is based in fact, it is the filmmaker's job to further emphasize and highlight the motivation of the truth behind the events that actually did occur. Films like Saw and Hostel exploit violence and suspense for a visceral reaction; however, Gregory Wilson and Jack Ketchum focus on the psychological and, through that, create suspense. The violence is suggestive, yet utterly real - and therefore, far more tragic and horrifying. It is truly an inescapable nightmare for an hour and a half to slowly watch what Meg, through the eyes of a young David, endured leading up to her death.

It was a purely EVIL incident that happened to Sylvia Likens, and the movie is meant to raise awareness and cause discussion about child abuse. If people want to call us EVIL for focusing on how and why such tragedies happened, they need to look deep inside themselves. It certainly raises the question as to whether people want to face reality or live in denial about what STILL happens in our culture today!

Chiller: Tough question: Did you foresee the controversy of The Girl Next Door?

Andrew: I always knew making this film would be controversial. When I first read the book, I was in the Peruvian jungle. I was actually bedridden at the time with a fever and food poisoning. My four days in the middle of the jungle, sick, reading The Girl Next Door, was a big mistake. It made me feel worse and so angry! It was a horrific tragedy with no redemption that leaves a bitter taste in the mouth. I was very lucky to have found the right director to handle such powerfully fragile material. Gregory Wilson focused on all the right elements, avoiding exploitation and violence for the sake of violence.

When he first pitched the film, I remember it gave me the chills. The Girl Next Door film was to be about coming of age, with an unfulfilled love story, all told within the backdrop of a social horror setting. Greg then proceeded to pitch his idea of Meg staring back at us at the end of the film through the ripples in the water, as an older David looks on.

It was a very exciting film to pursue, regardless of the controversy, especially because it was a period piece we could make on a budget. People actually guess we spent six times as much as we did.

Chiller: ... What budget ranges do your films tend to be? They are dramatically grounded and look a lot more expensive, especially with some of the above-the-line talent onboard: Atherton, Olivia Hussey, Sean Young, Udo Kier, Dee Wallace, Patrick Warburton, Bijou Phillips...

Andrew: All of our Moderncine films so far have been made anywhere from low-six figures to low-seven figures. We work under the SAG INDY film contracts.

Chiller: They're dramatically grounded and look a lot more expensive than they are. Craft services still good?

Andrew: The most important thing on a movie set! Ever since I was a kid growing up in The Apthor, I learned that.

Chiller: Back to TGND. You guys leave so much off screen; it reminds me of a dinner party that Andrew Kevin Walker - the writer of SE7EN - attended. When a woman found out that he'd written it, she chewed him out. "How could you have shown that?!" "But we didn't show that." And she refused to believe him.

One thing that really resonates about your movie is that you see the seed of mob mentality. There's a safety within losing your individuality by going with the crowd.

Andrew: It is very Lord of the Flies. Kids are easily egged on by peer pressure, many times doing regrettably stupid things.

Chiller: Like a younger version of The Ox Bow Incident.

Andrew: Jack Ketchum's The Girl Next Door is one of the most challenging films I'll ever make in my career. The subject matter is so dire, especially with all the young kids involved. Films with such tragic truth don't come along that often. In that vein, the film really stands on its own legs as a drama, as much as a horror.

Chiller: A lot of accomplished directors kick-started their careers with horror. Coppola: Dementia 13. Oliver Stone: Seizure and The Hand. Do you foresee the genre as your "in," or are you geared towards building a name within horror?

Andrew: I enjoy identifying what I think is a good story, regardless of genre. I follow my gut and enjoy reading all kinds of material. I also have a knack for putting the ingredients together for what makes a successful team. Whether we go on to make a successful movie or not is ultimately decided in the end, however, I am all about enjoying the process. It's challenging but very exciting and lots of fun!

Chiller: Why choose, for now, the independent route vs. developing projects with studio production companies?

Andrew: I don't like waiting for other people to choose my destiny. I started independently because I didn't want to wait for someone to help me to be a filmmaker. I went out and did it.

Ultimately, if telling stories through film is a need rather than a desire, you will grab a camera, get some friends to act and use a credit card to pay for all or part of it. Friends and family are a great way to start. Why be reliant on other peoples' resources when you are starting out? It's certainly a more honest way to maintain your vision and creative control.
Now that I am more established, I am open to developing projects with studios for sure, however, I wall always be optimistically cautious when a project evolves outside of the independent spirit.

Chiller: I like any film that's successful in what it tries to be - it's all about maintaining the illusion. Do you feel there's a stigma that low budget films have to overcome from financiers to distributors to audiences? And I will add that there are other low budget films that aren't well produced as yours are that give good low budget film a bad name.

Andrew: There is always a stigma but it's not something you think about when you are in the process and doing it. Doing it means you are not worrying or focusing on the negative perceptions. If you bring those thoughts into the process, you will muddy the waters and it will affect the end result... the illusion. I always go out positive believing in my team and the story I am selling. I am a firm believer that good work leads to a good home.

Chiller: Blair Witch cost $68,000 but it maintained the illusion.

Andrew: It certainly did in terms of the marketing. Paranormal Activity is another example of a great marketing "illusion," but not such a great film.

Despite my opinions of the films, both have made millions and I am happy for the filmmakers and their independent spirit. May that spirit lead to many delicious steak dinners!

Chiller: Headspace is most intriguing - I'll never look at migraines the same way.

Andrew: I hope it encourages you to take more aspirin. Chris Denham does "migraine" so well, doesn't he?

Chiller: I remember when Sissy Spacek was doing In the Bedroom: hauling chairs, everyone pitching in.

Andrew: You do what you have to. I have shoveled snow and cleaned garbage cans on films I have produced. It's all about understanding teamwork and bringing up the environment around you. I don't know about large studio films, but making smaller indies is all about morale. Morale is everything!