| STORY
Steven Hido
PHOTOS Erin Galletta & Olena Gudz
When Charles Ginsburg invented the videocassette recorder
in the early 1950s, he created a technology that would put
a camcorder in the hands of the public 30 years later. Since
then every second of every toddler’s birthday party
and every Midwesterner’s trip to the Grand Canyon has
been painstakingly documented by the eye of a video camera.
 |
| Actor Cory maidens (far left) "stabs"
himslef next to the campbells, producer Andy and director
Luke. |
While people have subjected their neighbors to each moment
of their recorded ventures, some folks have been putting Ginsburg’s
brainchild to an arguably greater good — like making
movies with $50 budgets titled “Teenage Zombie House
Massacre.”
Junior Andy Campbell and his brother Luke made the 40-minute
tale of the undead while in high school. Recently they took
on a more serious venture, spending about $500 on their first
feature-length movie, “Midnight Skater.”
“If you’ve got the drive to really make a movie,
all you’ve got to do is get a camera and go out there
and do it,” says Luke, 2002 Kent State graduate and
director of both films.
Introduced in the ’70s, marketed in the ’80s
and practically perfected in the ’90s, video is now
being used by 21st century moviemakers as an affordable substitute
for film.
 |
| Actor and special effects creator Ezra
Haidet (left) and Andy Campbell hang out. |
Michael Young, director of education at the New York Film
Academy, says video is a welcome invention for would-be directors
who want to hone their craft.
“It allows students to experiment without getting into
great debt,” Young says. “It’s also extremely
portable, so you need fewer people on your crew.”
While video has its merits as a cheap medium, Young says
the high cost of film pushes directors to plan out shots.
“Film forces you into a discipline that’s so
important in filmmaking,” he says. “With video
there’s no pressure to choose your shot, plan your shoot
or rehearse the camera movements and decide what the blocking
should be.”
Young says film school teaches discipline, but he admits it’s
not for everyone.
“Pretty much anybody can make movies now,” he
says. “You don’t have to go to film school to
make films. We always say, ‘If you’re comfortable
doing this on your own, go ahead.’”
Luke and producer Andy say they aren’t interested in
film school — they have a more realistic view.
“We’re laid back, and we do it for fun because
we enjoy it,” Luke says.
“Making movies is what I really want to do, but it’s
sort of like being a rock star — it’s really hard
to make it,” Luke says, explaining that’s why
he went into television production.
 |
 |
 |
| Movie stills from the campbells' "Midnight
Skater" and "Teenage Zombie House Massacre"
and Larry Housel's "Dev/Null." |
While many aspiring filmmakers go to school in New York or
Hollywood, Luke says he finds the backdrop of places like
Kent and his hometown Sebring much more conducive to artistic
expression.
“I think I’d be kind of discouraged going to
film school because there’s so much competition there,”
he says. “I feel we’re the only ones here. There’s
no pressure from your fellow students. I think that would
really get to me personally.”
For inspiration, Andy looks to “Sorority Babes in the
Slimeball Bowl-O-Rama,” while Luke is inspired by Sam
Raimi of “The Evil Dead” trilogy and “Spider-Man.”
“I just watched a lot of movies in my time,”
Luke says. “I saw how they did it and just mimicked
it in my own way.”
The last time the university offered film production classes
was in the ’80s. The few classes, which taught students
to shoot and edit on 16mm film, faded away along with the
professors who supported the programs.
Bob West, an emeritus professor in the School of Journalism
and Mass Communication, says he would love to see a full-scale
film program at the university again. But , he says, it doesn’t
look like this will happen any time soon.
“They say it’s too costly,” West says.
“In reality, it’s too much of a hassle for them.
They’d have to create a whole new department, and they’re
not going to do that.”
The School of Journalism and Mass Communication has filled
the void the best it can with video and film programming and
video production classes, West says.
The Campbell brothers used these classes to edit both of
their movies, which were shot on 8mm home video.
“Teenage Zombie House Massacre” is a casual, heavily
improvised take on the living dead genre, while “Midnight
Skater” is a more structured work laced with comical
one-liners and severed body parts.
 |
| Fake blood left over from one of campbells'
slasher movies drips off of Luke Campbell's palm. |
With lines like, “That’s the best sex I ever
had with a dead body whose arm was cut off that I was using
to slap my ass,” “Midnight Skater” may not
be for everyone.
West’s cult films class has screened “Teenage
Zombie House Massacre,” and he says the students get
a kick out of seeing a movie executed by their peers.
“It’s their language, their era, their setup,”
he says. “If they’re laughing, it must be good.
It’s a little sophomoric for my taste, but what the
hell.”
Andy knows their efforts aren’t meant for much more
than amusement.
“We don’t have the whole artistic thing toward
our writing,” Andy says. “It’s not really
meaningful stuff.
“When you send your movie to Sundance, people get impressed
by that kind of stuff. That’s not really our style at
all.”
And Luke says he doesn’t plan on being discovered anytime
soon.
 |
| The Campbells make their blood with
bulk tomato sauce, red food coloring and milk. |
“It would be great if somebody saw our film and said,
‘Hey, this is genius! Let’s give these kids some
money.’ I don’t think that’s ever going
to happen,” he says.
But for 1997 graduate Larry Housel, it did happen.
Housel recently completed production on his first feature-length
film, the digitally shot “Dev/Null."
The bulk of his $10,000 budget came from local stand-up comedian
Parker Matthews. Housel met Matthews in local clubs while
performing skits. The pals have a minor-league production
company called The Phat 5.
Housel says financial constraints are no reason to forgo
a dream of making movies.
“The first thing that everybody asks is, ‘How’d
you get the money?’” says Housel, a computer technician
during the day.
“Just start asking people, and you’d be surprised.”
Housel dived headfirst into directing his first feature despite
his lack of film education.
“It’s a unique situation because we don’t
really know anything about making movies,” he says of
himself and his crew.
 |
| Larry Housel recently completed production
on the digitally shot "Dev/Null." |
“The whole thing is a learning process. I didn’t
go to film school. All I know is what I watch when I watch
movies and what I’d like to see when I watch.”
Housel says he doesn’t see attending film school as
a reasonable decision.
“If I had 10 grand, that would pay for, what, a semester
at NYU?” he says. “I just think through the experience
of making movies, I’d learn a lot more.”
With “Dev/Null” finished, Housel hopes to take
advantage of the money he could make as a working-class filmmaker.
“Being that you can make movies now for thousands of
dollars, as opposed to tens of thousands of dollars, I think
it’s possible to make a movie, sell it, make money off
of that movie enough to make another movie and maybe even
make a business of it.
“But that’s the dream. The reality is I’ve
got to get up and fix computers every day,” Housel says.
The Campbell brothers are also looking ahead.
The partially filmed “Poison Sweethearts” is
taking a backseat to “Shit-Eating Vampires,” which
they say will put a new, if not fully welcomed, spin on the
oldest of horror staples.
While some filmmakers are selling movies for millions of
dollars at film festivals around the world, the Campbells
say that they’re not missing out.
“We never really take it that seriously,” Luke
says. “If making movies was your job, you’d take
it more seriously.
“I think that would probably take some of the fun out
of it.” |
