Satan's Orgy of Blood: Behind the Scenes

Practical Effects and Prop Creation

Currently in production in San Francisco, California, Satan's Orgy of Blood incorporates old school practical special effects and elaborate period costumes and props to bring to life a gothic horror comedy that lovingly invokes the classic Hammer Films of Britain and the "Poe Cycle" film collaborations of horror masters, Vincent Price and Roger Corman. Writer/Director Dan West (there's that weird, third person writing again) pulls as many rabbits out of hats as he can in this low-budget wonder, acting as not only production designer and costumer, but also as the creator of the movie's numerous and often ridiculous practical special effects. Gaze in wonder at his mastery of the craft as he creates throwback special effects that would make Herschell Gordon Lewis and Paul Blaisdell green with envy! Eat you heart out, Ed Wood, Jr.! Go fuck yourself, Don Dohler! I'm the new king of Schlock Mountain! And hey, I made my own skull-shaped crown! It's like a Hammer movie made on the budget of The Human Tornado!

Set Designs

Behind the Scenes Photos

Storyboarding and Constant Script Revisions

I like to pre-visualize each scene on paper before shooting, whether I follow my storyboards or not. I find it helps to have some visual idea of what you will be facing on each day of shooting, though I am rarely a stickler when it comes to strictly adhering to my storyboarded shots. I did storyboard the entire movie before any shooting began just to assure myself that I could visually realize what was written in the script. This confirmed that I could make the leap into shooting a gothic period feature movie on the budget I had to invest. My technique is a bit "set it and forget it." I sketch out a series of shots to review my possibilities and then whatever sticks around in my brain and works with my tight and often visually limiting sets ends up working or not working. Regardless of what does or does not end up on screen, it's always nice to have some sort of visual plan ahead of shooting.

I've tended to polish and rework a good portion of the screenplay since I began shooting Satan's Orgy of Blood, and the results have been for the better as I have moved through the production. This tendency varies from project to project, but for whatever reason this particular script has certainly benefitted from the re-writes. There has, thus far, been a lot of tinkering with the first section the screenplay as it is very dense with a lot of exposition and characters.

Costuming: A Key Element of the Movie

Making this movie without impressive costumes would be completely pointless, and I pride myself on having a decent eye for period costuming. Every costume is a key component in making the visual experience of the movie ring true and enhances the satirical elements. Without decent costumes this project is dead in the water. Everything else can be faked, but the costumes cannot. The jokes do not work if the costumes are distracting or cheap, unless that element is part of a visual joke and serves a purpose. In essence costumes are an essential visual effect.

Gimme My Props, Yo!

At this point, I'm really just milking this whole "behind-the-scenes" ballyhoo to show people what a goddamn, fucking pain in the ass it is to make a gothic period movie with only tens of thousands of dollars for those "lavish" sets and costumes. But it really does require an astounding amount of elements to make an even remotely effective movie set during the turn of the century. EVERYTHING COUNTS when it comes to creating a set that is supposed to invoke the feeling of gaslit homes and horse-drawn carriages. I like to haunt the local thrift stores in my area to see what treasures I can cull for my little period epic, and I have found some really beautiful pieces to decorate my sets with. Luckily, (i.e. cleverly) I have also written the movie in such a way as to be fairly forgiving when it comes to realism and authenticity so the audience is not immediately led to believe that they are viewing something akin to The Age of Innocence, but rather something more in the cinematic realm of Curse of the Living Corpse. My visual realization of Boston and other fictitious sections of New England in 1902 may leave something to be desired for anyone expecting something on the level of The Alienist, but I might get away with something visually comparable to Monty Python's Oscar Wilde Sketch. In the end, I am not a perfectionist, or a project like this would make my head explode. I am simply approximating the 1902 period setting as best as I can on a laughable budget and hoping these cartoonish results will play properly with the zany and madcap gags about vomit and people getting hit on the head with things.