Faces of Death Is the Most Unique Horror Movie Remake in Years | Interview
ComingSoon editor-in-chief Tyler Treese spoke with Faces of Death director and co-writer Daniel Goldhaber and co-writer and producer Isa Mazzei about the unique horror movie remake. The duo discussed their relationship to the original film, taking a meta approach, and more. IFC and Shudder will release the film in theaters on April 10.
“In Faces of Death, the exploration of the original film’s infamous ‘is it real or not?’ conceit continues as a woman (Barbie Ferreira) working as a content moderator for a major video platform discovers what appears to be re-enactments of murders from the original film. In an online world where nothing can be trusted, she must determine whether the violence is fiction or unfolding in real time,” says the official synopsis.
Tyler Treese: Daniel, what was your relationship with the original film? It was really one of those horror grails that only the real sickos were checking out, but it definitely has that legendary stature among horror fans.
Daniel Goldhaber: Yeah, I mean, for both Isa and I, the first time we were ever aware of Faces of Death was when we were approached to make this movie and Legendary was like, “Hey, are you interested in making Faces of Death?” And we were both like, well, “what is that?” And we went and checked it out and launched it and realized that we had seen Faces of Death already, but just in like bite-sized chunks on the internet, you know? And it was stuff that like we’d run across on rotten.com or E Baum’s World. So for us was in a weird way, what was so interesting was that like, you know, for us, Faces of Death existed online when I think for a lot of people it existed on VHS tape and that felt like an evolution in the kind of films, you know like life. That felt like a very fruitful starting place for movie.
Isa, I loved how you took a really meta approach to just the idea of a horror remake, and it really plays on the original film being marketed as seeing real deaths. What made you want to really subvert it that way and put a spin on this classic film and have it literally being remade throughout your horror movie?
Isa Mazzei: Yeah, I mean, I think that, you know, the original doesn’t really have a narrative to it. It is just kind of this collection that you’re kind of being introduced to. And I think wanting to find a story within that that was compelling and modern, but also true to kind of some of the themes of the original and also capturing how maybe the original made some people feel was part of the challenge that was really exciting.
So, you know, kind of the first idea we had was that there would be a killer who’s kind of remaking these deaths. And that to us felt very kind of like meta and maybe a little funny in the context of a remake. And so it was really that idea that kind of got us hooked into it. And then from there it was like, for every great killer, there’s someone great hunting them down. And kind of that pairing of two different sides of how people feel about the internet.
You know, someone who is kind of trying to avoid the internet, trying to clean the internet, kind of doesn’t really wanna exist on the internet. And then someone who is deriving all of their sense of power and purpose from the internet and kind of placing them against each other felt like a really compelling and modern way to explore these themes.
Tyler Treese: Daniel, I spoke with Dacre, and he mentioned that you had brought up Elliot Rodger as somebody to look into. I thought that was interesting because obviously, he had so much of his own illness documented online. Can you just speak to finding inspiration from that for his character? Because I thought that was really interesting, and it plays into the themes of being online too much really well.
Daniel Goldhaber: Yeah, I think that what I find really interesting personally […] I almost don’t wanna like quote these people or point to like, specific people in general because I think that one of the things the movie is trying to identify is the fact that we live in an attention economy and that we have made it very clear that the more attention you have, the more value you have. And we’ve also made it very clear that if you commit an act of mass violence, you generate a lot of attention, thus you have value as a person. I think that’s true of the fact that Elliot Rodger is that is a celebrity name. That’s somebody that we know of, not because they did anything other than gunned down a bunch of innocent people and make content about it, right?
So I think for me, what I’m most interested in about these guys is not the fact that they’re too online. I think that is like the classic thing that people do, where they kind of take human beings who are kind of victims of a system that is built to corrupt and dehumanize them, and say, “How dare you become corrupt and dehumanized?” I think what the movie’s really looking at is the fact that, like, we live in a media ecosystem that, you know, that celebrates violence, that places a premium on violence, that turns people who commit violent acts into celebrities, and really wants to kind of confront audiences with that idea.
So, I think when we were looking at some of these people who’ve committed these acts in the past, what I really talked to Dacre a lot about was the kind of very clear sense of alienation that they had. The difficulty that these people have connecting with other people.
I think one of the other ideas that the movie explores, like much more in its images, and I think in what it evokes than in anything concrete, is just how alienated all these people are from each other. The fact of the matter is, most people in this movie are only able to ultimately connect through the internet, right? They’re all constantly trying and striving to perform online for each other because they don’t know how to connect in person. And I think that again, like that alienation is designed, that is built, and there are people that profit off that alienation, they profit off driving us away from one another. And I think that that’s really what I think we were looking to kind of capture when looking at some of these people who committed these acts.
Isa, this film really stands on its own because it literally explains what Faces of Death was. But would you recommend people watch the original if they want to get the full experience, even if it’s not fully needed to enjoy this?
Isa Mazzei: I don’t think it’s necessary to watch the original, but I have a deep respect for the original as a cultural object that has kind of suffused our culture for this long. It’s very enduring, and I think that for anyone who might be thinking about watching the original, I would say, sure, go watch it. You might get some things out of our version that you wouldn’t get otherwise. I always like doing adaptations that are additive to the original and never replace it. And our movie is not a replacement of the original Faces of Death.
Daniel, I was just curious if you saw the video clip of Paul Thomas Anderson and Leonardo DiCaprio talking about Faces of Death? Leo was so certain it was all real. I thought it was great accidental marketing for this.
Goldhaber: It is. It is. Honestly, we should be using that clip more in our marketing campaign. TBH.
Mazzei: Yeah, we should [laughs].
Goldhaber: I’m gonna text our social media person right now.
Thanks to Daniel Goldhaber and Isa Mazzei for taking the time to talk about the Faces of Death remake.
Source: Comingsoon.net