Con & Alex chat Killer Clowns with Helloween Director Phil Claydon!!!
If you could direct a remake of any classic Horror – which film would you choose and why? Con
Phil Claydon – I love the classics too much to attempt a remake. However there’s one horror that I’d happily have a crack at a remake, and that’s 1999 slasher CHERRY FALLS. It had a really fun concept, messing with the whole ‘virgin’ slasher trope. In today’s society I’d have loads of fun playing with sex ed, purity culture, hook-up culture, and how a slasher is forcing a small town teen population into an accelerated sexual awakening. I’d ramp in the comedy and scares, tonally think the teen horror vibes of Fear Street. I currently pushing my comedy sci-fi teen horror called LUST, if John Hughes and David Cronenberg morphed like in The Fly, then LUST is what comes out, which I hope to be this generations Weird Science.
What was the oddest object used to create a desired sound effect for a scene? Alex
Phil Claydon – We didn’t have the usual foley that happens with most bigger budget movies, where someone is cracking some celery to make a bone snap sound, or smashing a melon with a hammer. We did not get to have that fun. Instead we had to find sounds that existed in libraries of sounds. So yes I did find a load of squelching oranges, chopped apples, knife sharpening, celery snaps, slime splats for all the gore effects. So for one sound, like stab, I would have about eight to ten sound effects to create the effect of the stab. Gore is all about the right balance of wet squishy sounds, and harsh metal!
My favourite thing while adding sounds was finding ‘door creaks’ as a horror this film needed all doors to creak loudly, however normal door creaks are not that effective, so I found a library of church yard iron gates, or scraping metal forks, so every time you hear a door opening it’ll be a large iron gate, or a fork scraping across metal.
Sound is my favourite thing about movies, it’s so important to create the full immersive experience for the audience, and most of the time the crazier, and more insane the source of the sound, the better effect it has.
What was the first scene written and what was the first scene you filmed and why were they first? Con
Phil Claydon – The first scene written was the opening with Young Carl Cane. I had that visually clear in my head. The actual up scare changed when I shot a rough version on my phone with my wife, and it was her suggestion of where Young Carl Cane should appear. That is the importance of prep, and planning for a film, work out your scares before you get on set.
The first scene we filmed. It was the office scene with Michael Paré and Jeanine Nerissa Sothcott. The reason for this scene being first is actors schedules. We had Michael Paré for three days so needed to shoot all his scenes first. Interesting trivia, when I arrived the office set we shot in was not the office room I had chosen, so my DOP and myself had to adapt very quickly to the space to make it work. This is what happens in low-budget film making, you have to roll with it and move on.
The opening scene was actually the second from last scene we shot in the film. So yep, we shot the beginning of the film at the end of the shoot.
What are your thoughts on clowns? Alex
Phil Claydon – Clowns don’t scare me. I find them fascinating. The fact someone can use the make up as a mask and become someone else entirely. It’s like we have trouble as humans identifying a clown make up face as human, which makes us uneasy and wary. If we are talking what clowns actually gace me the creeps, it owuld be Pennywise in the original TV series of IT played by Tim Curry, and the clown doll in Tobe Hoopers Poltergeist.
What do you think makes Clowns work so well as an antagonist in a horror? Alex
Phil Claydon – It’s the fact someone’s face is hidden behind this mask. Whether it’s Art or The Joker, the make-up brings out our ‘don’t trust them’ radar as humans. They have always been represented as masters of mayhem in fiction. The fact they are human, but not. It creates this uncanny valley, they may be wearing a smile, but all they want to do is inflict pain or carnage. Clowns are supposed to be these children’s entertainers, the fact they get turned into monsters attacks our innocence, like childhood being ripped away with the onslaught of adulthood, which is both confusing and scary… like a clown.
The ending of Helloween makes it feel very open to a sequel. Are there any plans to develop the story further? Con
Phil Claydon – I’d love to stay in the world of Carl Cane and Helloween. All depends how the audience reacts and if there’s a hunger to see more. I’d love to see what the UK would like after the clown uprising in a dystopian future UK, where Carl Cane and the clowns are dominant and Halloween has become the most dangerous time of the year. I’m kind of thinking a sequel would be how Mad Max 2 The road Warrior is to the first Mad Max… it’d be scarier, crazier and most definitely bloodier.
Helloween Available on Digital Download 29/9/25!!!
