Shrooms director Paddy Breathnach talks about drug-addled horror…

Tuesday 20th November.

Bar San Valentino, Soho, London.

Theres tremendous potential in the notion of psychedelic horror and theres been wide admiration for the concept behind Shrooms.

Do you better have taken mushrooms to follow the narrative of it?

Im not the biggest mushroom-head in the world by any means.

I was more interested that the film straddled that kind of mix between American teen-slasher and an Asian horror.

But yeah, we werent exploiting that enough.

We pushed it much more in that psychological vein.

I dont think we avoided the torture thing, but it just wasnt interesting to us.

I havent seen many of the torture films, so I dont know them as well.

Do you think that kind of approach might be the way to go with Western horror?

it’s possible for you to read it that the kids take drugs, and theyre promiscuous, etc.

Theyre popping mushrooms and really unravelling the repression within the character, so thats the source of the darkness.

And that we cant blame them for the things we do ourselves.

A big, broad, sweeping statement!

Were not known for any particular genre.

And really its only 20-25 years since Irish cinema began to emerge in any sense.

I think theres definitely stuff that we have to explore that we havent explored.

They dont kill you physically, its really…the Grim Reaper in some ways.

Id be interested to do that in the modern context in Ireland.

Is horror something youd like to have another go at?

I have quite eclectic tastes and Ive done comedies and I like doing comedies.

Do you admire certain horror directors?

For example, a film that I liked a lot in the horror/thriller category wasWhat Lies Beneath.

I thought that was a fantastically well made film, a very subtle and really beautifully crafted film.

But in a craft sense, some of them are the best-made films; theyre the most beautiful films.

I thoughtThe Otherswas a great film, talking about more mainstream stuff.

There was a shot that we dropped, actually, and I might put it on the DVD.

It was a reference toExorcist III, that shot in the corridor…?

I love that shot I was writing about it only a few weeks ago.

Its a great shot!

The shot is in the film still, but I changed the way that we used it.

I like a lot of Asian stuff thats considered trashy too.

Shrooms is on general UK release from today.