Ripsaw: Revenge of the Dead

Outtakes | DVD Cover

Filmed: Summer 2007

Cast

RIPSAW - Faraz Zamyadi
NAILS - Harry Kounogakis
MORGUE - Sam Bury
ARABIAN HITMAN - Azz Al-Mufachi
OFFICER McNAB - Oliver Cooper
FOREST VICTIM - Florica Soemantri

Back Story

Promo poster for the film

First year of my film course at uni and me and a few mates just watched the Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino Grindhouse trailer. I say I would die a happy man if I made one, just one, cult classic. The sort of movie that critics pan and your parents don’t tell to their friends about, but has a small, loyal following. I start to imagine my future as a one hit-wonder - I’ll be stacking shelves in ASDA, or selling an 18 rated DVD to a minor in Blockbuster, then some guy would come up to me and say, “Hey dude, did you direct that movie?” and I’d say, “Yeah,” then he’d say “Awesome,” and then he’d leave without even asking for my autograph but that cute girl I work with overhears and she shoots me a smile that suggests I might get to take make out with her if she gets drunk enough at the xmas shindig.

So my mate challenged us all to make our own grindhouse films over the summer and when we come back for Year Two we'll have a screening where the audience chooses the best one. That got me excited and I ran out of the room to get a head start. “Paul!” my mate shouted after me, “Where you going, there’s another three weeks of uni left!” but I had already packed and got my train ticket booked.

Pre-Production

Harry as Nails moments before ad-libbing a sprint to his car and speeding off

I knocked up the script in an afternoon, which you can tell by the nonsense of the final cut, but I had the basic OTT plot that I thought was perfect for the B-Movie vibe. Now all I had to do was to cast my deranged lead whose victims come back from the dead to hunt human flesh.

There was only one man I knew who could play a serial killer that also liked to get freaky with corpses: Faraz Zamyadi. He’s a thrash metaler and a few years before I shot a music video for his band Damnas (who were not best pleased with the Lego themed result). It made sense to cast him because he had long hair, tattoos and his own leather jacket.

I got the rest of the cast that were in my college film 'The Job', some other mates and my ex-girlfriend. I filmed it over the summer of 2007.

The Shoot

Sam as Morgue moments before he's eaten 

First day of shooting and I got Harry Kounogakis playing hard-ass detective Nails and Sam Bury playing Morgue - the partner with a history. I enjoyed writing the stereotypical cops with tacky dialogue, and is something I later tried, and never followed through with, in Boooom!

First day of shooting and I’m eager, stressed and a little scared. Haz and Sam are sitting in the car and I’m about to shout ‘action’ until Harry looks up from the script and asks, “What one am I?” I wasn’t even mad, I’d dragged these guys straight from their jobs, flung a hat on them, shoved a camera in their face then told them to act. Watching the film you can tell that I’d have to cut after every line, run round for the reverse shot then feed the guys their next line.

Somehow I persuaded my ex to get kidnapped, stabbed multiple times then corpse raped. Think I bought her dinner after. There was even a scene where Faz drags were body through the woods. It took about 5 or 6 takes and she had cuts running up her back and legs. I couldn’t even use the shot in the end because it was too dark for the shitty lens I was using.

It took about 4 weeks to shoot in total and around 2 months to edit, including slicing all the music in. If you’re interested, I paid for all the music rights, which were very reasonable, and got everything off Audio Network.

Reception

Faraz as Ripsaw moments before ripping his trousers

I returned to start my second year of uni feeling confident that I made a masterpiece. We got a bunch of people into our living room and played the movies for our competition. A few people were appalled by Ripsaw and one girl even said I ripped off Tarantino, but they agreed I had put the most effort in (“you didn’t bother getting a summer job then, Paul?” - “No”), so I won whatever that competition was meant to be.

I burnt off a load of DVDs and started to hand them out around campus. Somehow, the student president got a hold of a copy and said he loved it. His receptionist was not best pleased however and called me a ‘disturbed young man’. After that she would make a point of walking out the room whenever I entered.

Couple weeks later I was in a bar, waiting to be served by a bartender who kept tossing bottles of Becks in air like he was Tom Cruise in Cocktail. A bloke I had never seen before came up to me and asked if I'd made Rispsaw. Yes, I told him, and he gave me a firm handshake.

“What can I get ya?” the barman asked - “Becks”. I looked round to check if anyone saw a fan get to shake his hero's hand. Nobody. With great pride I opened my beer and it shot all over me.