French director Matt Beurois, who has received numerous awards throughout his career, has rolled out his new thriller/horror flick ‘The Barn’ and is hoping that the movie’s story, which features a serial killer and zombies, resonates with viewers.
“The genre film are the movies I grew up with and the films I learned most from” Beurois told me.
“And we made ‘The Barn’ appealing because we wrote the script tailor-made for the sets we already had at our disposal. We had a list of sets, and we had a very limited list of characters (at first), to keep it under control as an independent production. My idea was to make an reverse ‘in camera’ concept. Imagine you watch ‘Cube’ but from the outside of the cube… There is a voyeur thing going on with everyone focusing on ‘what’s inside the barn ?’… So I made the movie that way. The farmer never goes out, and all the characters come to him and come to the barn. It’s like a magnetic attraction, but truly, they are all trapped or limited… Outside.
Beurois believes in the zombies featured in his film, “because the walking dead maybe are the most human monsters. And it’s very easy to show the real monsters are not the ones you expect. You can make it twisted and ‘The Barn’ has some twisted stuff in it.”
Credits RG, YP
“Fans loving zombie movies have to know this is not a bloody one” Beurois continued.
“Come and watch ‘The Barn’ if you want an 80’s atmosphere, horror elements pulling the actors performances up, a real script with a “who did it” investigation, and a great score echoing my John Carpenter’s appreciation.
People say the movie stands out because it offers a different take on the zombies. The movie is set after a virus outbreak, when only remain some quarantine camps. There is a law forcing people to declare when a relative turns out affected. But not everyone wants to give up on their kids… And here we are in Sugar Grove, Virginia, and there’s that barn. ‘The Barn’ is not the first movie making zombies more human. I believe we stand out because in fact, if you pay close attention, you understand that the kids do pull the strings, especially the leader of the pack April. Until the very last shot of the film.”
Beurois took a unique approach when filming the movie, as the film’s effects were all done on camera, meaning no digital VFX were used in post production.
“Everything you see on screen in ‘The Barn’ happened on set” Beurois said.
“Nothing has been digitally touched, or enhanced, there are no VFX at all. That’s a choice. I grew up with movies like ‘Robocop’, ‘The Fly’, ‘Alien’, ‘The Thing’… When it’s real, you can feel it. It’s like your eyes tell your brain ‘you could touch it’. Sometimes it makes films goofy, and we like them for that too (see the ‘Little Shop of Horror’), sometimes it’s just filmmaking that sticks in your memory.
For ‘The Barn’, I tried to make it real. Make-up and zombie design is subtle because I didn’t want the monsters to pull you out of the film. It’ also a route I wanted to take with my actors. It becomes more genuine when you really have a sick kid screaming on your face.
It came with some basic challenges : some actors were in the make-up room when we were shooting other scenes. Some designs took an hour, some little less, depending on when they happen in the film, because the disease progresses. At some point, we were so late on the shooting schedule that Auregan who plays April kept on her make up all day long, so David scherer just had to do touch-up. One night she slept in her zombie makeup and outfit ! And you have to know she was also the main producer of the film. Imagine the breakfast that morning, with all cast and crew, and you have your producer coming in after just a couple hours of sleep, and she’s a zombie, with the sticky hair, the blood and the wounds… That was funny… We also have a couple set pictures of her running production meetings on location, on the grass in her full zombie face. You do listen to your producer, even more when she’s a zombie!”
Beurois’ unique approach is refreshing, and his take on ‘The Barn’ should stand out because of it. As far as future horror films in the works, Bearois would like to do something completely different.
“I would love my next film to be something completely different. Honestly it could be a romantic comedy and I’d love the idea ! What excites me is the story to tell, and being on set working with actors, and the crew. I made a lots of short films and documentaries, from comedy to action, dramas, dialogue pieces… And I will always go back to the genre films because fantasy, horror and sci-fi are the best genres to talk about who we are, and what’s happening to us, our fears, our hopes… Look at ‘The Shape of Water’, or ‘Inception’. Great stories, love, family… Inside extraordinary journeys and feelings. And you can just have a great deal of fun making it !
‘The Barn’ is my first feature. I have 3 scripts ready for the next one. Stay tuned.”
‘The Barn’ is now available for full digital VOD, DVD & BluRay, via Gravitas Ventures, and is available for pre-order on Itunes and Amazon now.
