Reykjavík Grapevine - 28.08.2009, Qupperneq 16

16
The Reykjavík Grapevine
Issue 13 — 2009
Film | Interview
Dance with Us!
Laugavegi 21 - 101 Reykjavik - 551 6464 Kl
ap
pa
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íg
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Laugarvegur
We are here:
SIGURÐUR KJARTAN KRISTINSSON
JULIA STAPLES
So, we haven't seen this Reykjavík Whale Watching Massacre fi lm yet. But we
love us some slashing blood guts kill fun. So we're hoping it's pretty awesome.
Don't get all angry at us if it ain't, tho. We just got all excited about ICEGORE.
Finally! The first Icelandic slasher
f lick! Icelandic films have hitherto
been characterized by bleak and
gloomy stories of depressed Icelanders
trying out every option available to turn
tails from their down-in-the-dumps
existence: There’s been a lot of drama, a
lot of drinking, and a lot of sex.
But isn’t there something missing?
Any imbecile can see that essential
accessories to the aforementioned sex,
drama and drinking are blood and gore.
Luckily, The Reykjavík Whale Watching
Massacre.
The man behind it all is the
notorious Júlíus Kemp, both famed for
making controversial guerrilla f licks
such as Blossi 810551 and Veggfóður,
but also films that address societal
issues such as Strákarnir Okkar. We
caught up with the good man at his
headquarters.
Whale Watching Massacre, you say.
How did you guys come up with such
a project?
It all began about five years ago,
in 2004, when we were working on
a different screenplay with Sjón,
RWWM’s screenwriter. He attended
a conference, some sort of animation
gathering, where he met some
enthusiastic Danes that just kinda
put forward the question why anyone
hadn’t already made a movie called
Whale Watching Massacre, where
this controversial issue was addressed
in this horrific way. The blame can
probably be placed with them. When
Sjón returned, he asked us if we’d want
to participate in a project with that kind
of theme. Naturally, we jumped at the
chance.
The project was originally meant to
boast a budget of 200 million dollars,
but you might say we hit a few obstacles
right away. In time, we decided to lower
the guillotine and make it more local
and just go for it, instead of letting it
fade away in an endless hunt for money.
And are you passionate about these kind
of films? Are you a big fan of splatter?
I go all around the circuit, but yeah,
I’ve stood steadily on the sideline of the
splatter biz through time, especially
during my adolescence years. In those
days, westerns and splatters were my
bread and butter. But Sjón definitely
has a more extensive background in
these area; I would even bet he’d seen
every single movie ever made. Whale
Watching Massacre goes all around
though, and doesn’t only pass as a
splatter; you can find references to
every single existing genre in film
history, one way or another.
Tell me about the plot and its origins, is
the story based on any myths or urban
legends—or is it just a fabrication?
It’s no folktale, it’s merely make-believe
fabricated by Sjón. The basic idea was to
create a platform where the two worlds
would collide; the whale watching
business and the whale-hunting racket.
It might be an overstatement to call
what’s going on turmoil, but there sure
is quite a conf lict. The story isn’t biased
in either direction, and isn’t political at
all. The hunters are of course illustrated
as foul, but the tourists are as well.
Everyone has their dark sides, and in
the end everybody deserves to die. As
they do.
How about the funding, was it more
strenuous to gain funding for a feature
of this genre rather than a more
“sophisticated” one?
It really came as a surprise when
the Icelandic Film Centre, as well as
the other Scandinavian patrons, didn’t
have anything against our slasher f lick.
The co-producers also saw potential in
distribution, which is the main thing
in all this: potential. The moneybags
proved to be pro-splatter, eventually.
The mainstream movie industry
keeps getting more and more bloody,
movies such as Angels and Demons—
featuring Tom Hanks—parade these
immensely gory scenes, so you know
the crowd must be supportive of this
evolution.
And how gory is it exactly? What’s the
actual body count in WWM?
Well. Everybody dies except, one
person. You could just count the names
on the poster and subtract one. It’s as
basic as that, a genuine splatter f lick.
Producing a gore-fest such as this must
include procedures different from the
ones in, well, less bloody filmmaking,
especially in terms of producing the
sound, etc. How would you describe the
difference?
There is of course a vast difference
between these kinds of productions
and more regular ones. We had to ship
in a British sound technician who’d
previously worked on projects like
Alien vs. Predator, building up a sound
library with ludicrous budgets behind
him. He basically brought his sound
library over. We’re lucky to miss out
on the lawsuit-hide and seek involved
in the sound business, with the big
studios overseas, so we could utilize
previously fabricated sounds.
In my previous works I’d always used
Icelandic sound guys and always gotten
top-notch results, so I undoubtedly had
some cynic feelings about handing it
all over to a foreigner. In this situation,
though, I felt I had to. The sound and
aural ambiance amounts to about 80%
of horror f licks like these, so it had to be
superb. And I am happy to say it is. The
production as a whole was a very slow
process, the film took over forty days to
shoot. It’s set on a boat in a rural area,
so it always took at least two days to get
there and get things going before the
cast could be transported over. Weather
is also important, but we were really
lucky.
How do you think the Icelandic crowd
will react to this new genre in Icelandic
film?
It’s an unwritten book to me, of
course I hope they’ll like it, but who
knows? One thing I’m sure of is that
the whale watching business will be
busy once the movie’s been distributed
overseas. It’s definitely a positive
injection for those tourist companies.
How do you look at this film compared
to your previous two, are they similar in
any way. Is there perhaps a red thread
running through your work?
This is of course a totally different
thing from what I’ve done before as
a director; we now have professional
actors, a genuine crew, some money
behind us... So it’s black and white.
Incomparable. But in this one, as in my
previous work, you could say I’m valiant.
I’ve always liked to take chances. Blossi
was a big risk, where we wanted to
make a f lick about teenagers that really
didn’t tell any story. It’s of course a
cliffhanger to produce a splatter movie,
as well as making a film about role-
playing youngsters such as in Astrópía
and a gay soccer team, as in Strákarnir
Okkar. So you could maybe say my f lair
is to take risks. And if RWWM causes
some kind of outburst and gets people
mad, it would of course be great!
SLASH, KILL, BLOOD, GUTS, LOVE, AWESOME
Júlíus Kemp Premieres the first Icelandic slasher f lick
Kemp’s Top
Ten All Time
Favourite
Horror Movies
1. TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE
2. ALIEN
3. THE HILLS HAVE EYES (THE
ORIGINAL ONE)
4. HIGH TENSION
5. THE THING
6. PSYCHO
7. SCANNERS
8. THE DEVIL’S REJECTS
9. WOLF CREEK
10. CABIN FEVER