Damien Leone talks about reimagining iconic monsters.
Damien Leone loves horror.
it’s possible for you to hear it in his voice.
He gets enthusiastic about his craft and appreciates all the movies that led up to his own movies.
Leone is matching up two horror icons who have never been mashed before: Frankenstein and The Mummy.
In his upcoming film,Frankenstein vs. You didnt use any nobs on the neck.
Damien Leone: No nobs on the neck, very funny because its very scary.
Youre not going to yo half of them because your treading on sacred grounds with these characters.
I have a go at put a modern twist on it, what Id like to see.
Thats all I can really do.
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I looked at a lot of different versions ofFrankensteinover the years.
I looked at all the Hammer versions.
I didnt want to recreate the Boris Karloff look.
Which is fine because I wanted to put my spin on it.
I found myself really attracted to the Bernie WrightsonFrankensteincomic book.
That was a cool Frankenstein that Id never seen before.
I wanted to venture to make a living version of that.
I took basically the physique: I really wanted him to be tall and masculine.
I thought that was a cool take on Frankenstein.
I also took the long hair.
Hes described as having flowing, black hair in the book.
I was very happy with the way he came out.
I gave him the yellow eyes.
I thought he was scary.
I wanted to make him look like the male version of Regan fromThe Exorcistalmost.
He played it really well, really creepy.
How big a fan of classic universal horror are you?
I grew up watching those, actually.
I think my favorites, I gravitate more to the 70s and 80s horror movies.
Those were the big three that I watched when I was very young.
I was most inspired byFrankensteinto make this movie because I always wanted to make aFrankensteinmovie.
I just wanted to start with a Frankenstein story.
Boris Karloff played both Frankenstein the Mummy, which part was scarier?
Id have to go with Frankenstein.
When I did the film, I tried to imagine what people saw when they first saw that.
That makeup, it works and will always work.
It stood the test of time.
He turns around and those three jump cuts shoot him.
Theres no music or anything.
I tried to do a little bit of that when you first see my Frankenstein.
We just cut to him and theres no music and hes just standing there.
I would have to say Frankenstein.
Hes going to be remembered for all time.
How is a director like a Dr. Frankenstein?
You get to a point, when youre putting on all these prosthetics.
In the beginning stages its just rubber on the actors face.
You say to yourself its alive, Ive created a living, breathing creature that wasnt here before.
You actually do feel that way.
As a director, youre creating characters.
Youre creating a world that does not exist.
Especially as the writer, I created the characters so, Im their puppet master.
Im in charge of how they live, if they kill somebody, if they die.
That was Tom Savini, another hero, thats what hes known for, that anatomically correct gore.
He was always adamant about that, studying the real thing.
He was in combat in Vietnam so he saw the real, real stuff.
If you’re free to make it look as real as possible, people know.
Theres a real visceral thing that happens and they know thats what it must really look like.
I actually dont like looking at any of that stuff.
It really turns me off.
Im not into it, but if its fake I could watch and create the goriest things imaginable.
Thats what its all about, living vicariously.
I worked with a special effects guy who was obsessed with seeing an autopsy.
Id been given the opportunity to work at one point as a mortician.
Im just not into that whatsoever.
Its just not my thing.
When you were writingFrankenstein Vs.
The Mummy, did you readThe Egyptian Book of the Dead?
The only thing I did was, I bought a book on Egyptian history.
The character Amenmesse is actually a real person.
Theres only one sentence in the entire book.
He was this usurper who lived from here to here and they really dont know anything about him.
So I thought that was a cool starting point.
I could actually incorporate a real character and make my own backstory.
But I dont know much about theBook of the Dead.
Why was Ashton Leigh wearing panties in the sex scene?
[Laughs] I tried.
That was her first sex scene.
That was mine too, actually, the first one I ever had to shoot.
Everybody was a little anxious about that.
She was nervous about that.
She was drinking some tequila.
I wanted it to be classy and kind of romantic.
Thats what I was going for.
I told her, I would love for it to look like youre having sex.
Eventually she was cool with that.
I thought it came out really nice.
What was the hardest effect to pull off?
It went kind of smooth.
The hardest thing was probably creating the Mummy because there are some interesting things going on with his face.
He can actually open and close his mouth and you see the teeth and you dont see any lips.
It creates a really cool illusion.
That process, before we even started shooting, was really difficult.
So he couldnt just pop them out.
He couldnt eat for eighteen hours.
He could go to the bathroom.
But that is torture.
Nobody would do that.
He acted like a really close friend, you dont want him to suffer.
So Im really grateful for that.
What scares you more, reanimated corpses or killer clowns?
I would say, honestly, reanimated corpses.
As a kid, I always found zombies to be terrifying.
EspeciallyDawn of the DeadandDay of the Dead.Dawn of the Deadis one of my favorite horror movies of all time.
You just keep looking out the window and theres more and more coming.
Its just a matter of time before you hear them at the door.
Something about that is very terrifying to me.
Stephen King kind of ruined the Mummy for me with his the Mummys coming, walk faster.
Any other classic monsters you want to take on?
Not necessarily the Wolfman, but I have a script in the works for a werewolf movie.
Just have him do another full-blown werewolf transformation.
That would be my dream.
Those are two of my favorite directors.
Everything I write I wind up putting something twisted or violent into it because of the special effects.
Or sci fi movies with some kind of creature.
Its not so much the blood, its the special effects in general are just a wonder.
Its the fascinating part of movies that gets me going.
I feel that whatever I make is going to have elements of that in there.
I dont think Ill ever be making a straight drama or romantic movies, things like that.
Its always going to be something with some kind of fantasy element to it.
Some kind of illusions, some kind of trickery.
That what it does for me.
The Mummycomes out on VOD and DVD on Feb 10, 2015.
