LAFF Report: "A Crime Story with Zombies" -- Interview with LAST RITES Filmmakers Duane Stinnett and

Imagine that you're blown away by a giant outdoor festival presentation of 28 Days Later, followed immediately by a dash across town to catch a late-night screening of Cabin Fever, with director Eli Roth running around with blood on his face, acting like a maniac.

Now imagine, barely a thousand days later, your first feature is debuting in the very same festival that inspired it.

That's the experience of Last Rites director/producer Duane Stinnett and executive producer/featured actress Krissann Shipley. They colloborated on the script for a film that Stinnett describes as "a crime story with zombies."

Set mostly in an isolated Los Angeles warehouse, Last Rites gathers together warring Latin and African-American gangs along with Caucasian cops and one very lost weatherman. While not without a sense of humor, the film spends most of its running time generating serious tension in the explosively claustrophobic setting. The zombies are just one more deadly element added to the mix; indeed, the humans pose as much threat as the zombies.

I sat down with Stinnett and Shipley a few days before the film's World Premiere (midnight tonight at the Majestic Crest). Stinnett is tall and lanky while Shipley is trim and petite, but both share a great passion for horror movies -- and for their film.

(Disclaimer: Upon reviewing my questions, I realized they were quite rambling and ill-formed. So they have been drastically edited or deleted. On the other hand, Mr. Stinnett and Ms. Shipley were quite eloquent.)
Duane Stinnett: "We knew we wanted to do a genre film, for practical reasons as well as artistic reasons. We both really love horror films and always have -- genre films in general, films that have a surreal or fantastical twist to them. Horror films just happen to be, not a sure thing, but if you want to be fiscally responsible, that's one of the venues you want to explore. So we decided a horror film would be a really good thing to do.

"When we started making it, there weren't really any zombie films on the horizon that we knew about, but then over the last couple of years obviously that's changed. We still feel that we're definitely bringing a twist to the genre that we haven't seen before -- it's a crime story with zombies, it's a gangster movie that has zombies in it. We're bringing more to the table."

Krissann Shipley: "Before he and I ever decided to make horror films, I had nightmares for 30 days straight. I would have them every day and wake up screaming. It was two, three years ago. For me, I wanted to release them. I thought making a horror movie would solve the problem. I was an insomniac because I couldn't go back to sleep. When I talked to him, I said I have this problem I want to get rid of."

Duane Stinnett: "Movies as therapy."

ScreenAnarchy: Are you more influenced by recent films or older ones?

Duane Stinnett: "I think everyone in life is influenced by their own personal golden years -- generally from age 8 to 12 -- which define a good chunk of who you are. I happen to be very lucky in that during the late 70s and early 80s I was able to see these great films, starting with Star Wars. Basically from 1977 to 1983 all these great genre films came out, and I just took it for granted that's how movies are supposed to be. I see An American Werewolf in London and I think that's how a horror movie should be. You take it for granted, and then there was a a long drought after that. From '83 to '95 there really wasn't a whole lot going on.

"Right now I feel like we're in a very good place because we've got out of the self-referential phase and we're getting back into movies that take themselves very seriously and play to their own internal logic, and that's what our film is. We never dropped the 'z' word; we never say 'oh, look, there's zombies.' The characters don't know what's going on and they're very scared."

Krissann Shipley: "We didn't want to do a b-movie with girls running around naked and sex scenes. We tried to make it..."

Duane Stinnett: "Classy. A violent, low-budget zombie movie with class."

ScreenAnarchy: I hate zombie movies that explain too much.

Duane Stinnett: "That's one of the reasons we decided to make a zombie movie. It made it easier to make a fast-paced movie. Everyone knows the lore; we're able to pepper short bursts of information throughout the movie, just to let people know that you are following the traditions, rather than having this big long explanation or trying to reinvent the zombie movie. We're more interested in getting to the action."

Krissann Shipley: "One of the decisions we had to make was: Do we want fast-paced zombies or slow zombies? We thought slow zombies were more scary; they're more ominous when they come toward you slowly."

ScreenAnarchy: In my personal opinion, the fast zombies in 28 Days Later just messed around too much with the George Romero lore.

Duane Stinnett: "I love that movie, so I'm not going to say anything. One of the cool things about us being here is that couple of years ago we saw 28 Days Later and Cabin Fever at this festival, both on the same night, back to back. We went to the Ford Amphitheater, saw 28 Days Later; I was totally blown away. Then we went to the Sunset 5, saw Cabin Fever, and Eli Roth's walking around with blood all over his face and being a maniac like he usually is. And it's very cool that just a couple of years later, we're here with our film. It's very special for us to have our premiere at this festival, because it was one of the inspirations and one of the driving forces because of films we saw here."

Twitch (after making a note to self to avoid sharing personal opinions in interviews): Please talk about the tone of your movie -- you maintain a great balance throughout, even with what was probably a low budget.

Krissann Shipley: "I'm one of the producers, and our budget was low, so we tried to write in one location because of the budget. It worked out well. It's easy to write when you have just one set."

Duane Stinnett: "The biggest challenge as a director isn't the action scenes, it's actually just making a lot of people in one area interesting. How do you get nine, 10, 11 people in a room having a conversation for four minutes and cover that, without spending days shooting every angle? That is the hardest directorial task.

"We got lucky because we got really, really, really good actors and we were able to let them sort it out and work with them to make the tone interesting and intense. When we started the script, it was going to be a horror comedy. That was our first draft. We were going to go over the top, we were going to go Evil Dead. Luckily, the movie takes on a life of its own, and you have to let it be what it's going to be. You can try to corral it, but the movie kept wanting to be serious.

"Throughout the casting process, the auditions, and the rewrites, once we started finding our cast and they jelled, even though we had some funny people in the cast, the overall tone became evident. The tone found itself. Undead came out about a year before we wrapped, and that did the horror comedy so well, we thought it was good, because that way we could differentiate ourselves from the other zombie movies that were coming out."

ScreenAnarchy: (We talked about some spoilers here. Wouldn't be fair to give them away here. But, trust me, you'll want to see this movie. Some good twists.)

Duane Stinnett: "We planned all that out in the script -- how to keep it going and subvert expectations, while raising the stakes."

ScreenAnarchy: How did the film get made?

Duane Stinnett: "There's a house out there with a second mortage on it."

ScreenAnarchy: Oh.

Duane Stinnett: We knew this is what we really wanted to do. When you look at various things you can invest in, like the stock market or real estate, why not invest in yourself? You know you can do something, and nobody's given you the chance to do it, it's like, 'Fuck it, let's just do it ourselves.' It allows you to have complete control. If I have to go to the producer and have an argument, the producer is..."

Krissann Shipley: "Me!"

Duane Stinnett: "Me and her, and..."

Krissann Shipley: "You don't have to answer to anybody."

Duane Stinnett: "It gets a little schizophrenic, trying to save money but you want this really cool shot, but I'd rather have that conflict than have somebody that doesn't get it. We both wrote the script, so we both know what we're trying to accomplish, it's just what's the most efficient way of getting it done."

Krissann Shipley: "The hardest thing for me is that I wanted to have crane shots. That's the reason why I want to have money, because I want to have the crane shots."

Duane Stinnett: "We couldn't afford a lot of things. We actually took a lot of stupid, insane risks. Every penny was milked and twisted and tortured into being the most efficient it could be. Every cent ended up on screen. Our production office was Starbucks."

Krissann Shipley: "We got tons of volunteers during pre-production. Our line producer, who's very experienced, told me the atmosphere on the set one of the best, very mellow. Actors would show up on their day off, bring their family and friends to the set. We shot 12 hour days with no overtime."

Duane Stinnett: "We shot it in 17 days, on time, on budget, no pick-ups, no re-shoots. It is nice being completely self-sufficient, so we don't have to go to a lab. It's awesome being able to shoot the movie and put every single foot of film in the computer."

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Duane and Krissann described their next project, set in a jungle during the Vietnam War, as a much scarier Predator. It sounded terrific.

Thanks to Duane and Krissann for their time, and tireless publicist Winston Emano for setting up the interview.

You can read more about Last Rites at the official web site, where you can also watch the trailer.