An interview with screenwriter Kevin J. Lindenmuth.

To me, vampires stand for Evil. They're creatures who feed on your blood, they seduce you only to kill you and drink your blood. No feelings, no pity. They're just after your life.
    Not so among the kids of today. To them, vampires are sexy, misunderstood creatures and the lore is a metaphore for alienation. Your average bookstore has huge sections devoted to romantic vampire fiction aimed at teenage girls - and the most popular novels are of course the Twilight Saga by mormon Stephenie Meyer.
    When the first book in the series was adapted for the big screen in 2008, the girls went crazy and watched it over and over again. They also manage to make the rather weird and creepy looking Robert Pattinson, who plays Edward the Vampire in TWILIGHT, the most popular male movie star right now.
    The sequel TWILIGHT: NEW MOON opens in November 2009, and the young fans are already lining up, trying to book tickets for the premiere. To me, as an adult man, this TWILIGHT thing is ... well, strange. I haven't read the books, but I thought the movie was unusually lame, tacky and not very sexy. I found it boring and I sure wouldn't call the mysterious, blood drinking, misunderstood beings in the movie "vampires" - because they're not. They're something else, something vaguely reminiscent of vampires.
    Two other guys who aren't Stephenie Meyer's biggest fans, are filmmakers Kevin J. Lindenmuth and Brett Kelly, who dare challenge TWILIGHT with their own vampire tale BLOOD RED MOON.
    BLOOD RED MOON is directed by the prolific Kelly, who the last few years has turned into Canada's reigning king of low-budget horror, with movies such as PREY FOR THE BEAST and the remake of ATTACK OF THE GIANT LEECHES. The new vampire film is written by the almost legendary Lindenmuth - writer, producer, director, author, journalist ... you name it! Back in the 1990s, Kevin Lindenmuth was synonymous with American independent horror, and he directed and/or produced direct-to-video classics like the ADDICTED TO MURDER and THE ALIEN AGENDA series. The past decade, Lindenmuth has mainly made documentaries, so BLOOD RED MOON marks his comeback in the horror genre.

So, Kevin - what inspired you to write BLOOD RED MOON? 

Brett Kelly had mentioned he was interested in doing a youth-oriented vampire movie to appeal to the same audience as TWILIGHT and NEW MOON.  And I’ve been itching to write a new horror script, since I’ve been pretty much doing non-fiction documentaries the past decade. I also knew that if I wrote it, it would get made into a movie. An up side of  this is that Brett is also an actor so he knows how to direct actors and get a performance. I think the only other person I wrote a script for, which was also a vampire movie, was DATE WITH A VAMPIRE for director Jeffrey Arsenault (NIGHT OWL). 
    Of course, it’s also inspired by TWILIGHT. In fact, I more or less treated the script as a spoof of that movie, which you’ll see when you watch it. I made fun of a few scenes.  Brett had sent me a several page outline to work with and I used most of that to establish the time-line. There’s this farmer he introduced in the opening scene and I made him a crazy character who is throughout the script. He thinks it’s aliens mutilating his cattle but it’s a vampire. There’s also the “jock” and “cheerleader” characters as well as the “mean teacher”.  It’s filled with high school angst.  

Why don't you think TWILIGHT works? 

TWILIGHT works very, very well if you’ve never seen a vampire movie before, which is probably true of its core audience--teenagers. What, they’ve probably seen a handful of vampire movies? So, for me, the movie was kind of boring and stereotypical. They had the good vampire/bad vampire, the good vampire who only drinks animal blood, the turning into a vampire via a type of venom... yawn. 

What is BLOOD RED MOON ABOUT?

It’s exactly what TWILIGHT is about, a young girl who is new in town, who falls in love with a guy who happens to be a vampire. And it’s not clear cut who the good and bad guys are. Instead of her living with her estranged father, she’s living with her mother and she’s a bit more “goth” than Kristin Stewart. There’s this lunar event that is going to happen and it has an influence on the oldest vampire in the community... 

What has BLOOD RED MOON to offer that TWILIGHT hasn't? 

Sarcasm. It’s a sarcastic vampire movie, probably most similar to my ADDICTED TO MURDER 2: TAINTED BLOOD in tone. I had fun with this, the dialogue with the characters and what happens to them. I added my own touch to the vampire mythos....such as having all the vampires in the town feeding upon humans. Also, the vampirism can only be transmitted in a very specific way....through sex.  

BLOOD RED MOON must have been made rather quickly. When did you start writing it? When did shooting start?   

It’s the fastest I ever wrote a script, but I’m good with deadlines. I started writing it the beginning of June ’09 and it was finished in several weeks. I think what helped is that I outlined the entire script, based on Brett’s story (and TWILIGHT)--and then it was just a matter of writing all the dialogue and making sure everything fit together.  I really like this script. 
    Then Brett cast it in July, shot it in August and recently finished editing it. So it was all within a four-month period. Quick! 

How did you get to know Brett Kelly? 

I’ve known of Brett Kelly for a while, mostly as an actor, but I think the way I got in touch with him was via Facebook. 

Any chance the leads in BLOOD RED MOON will become as popular as the ones in TWILIGHT? ;-) 

Ha.  

What is the status of BLOOD RED MOON right now? 

It is finished, I recently did a behind-the-scenes interview for the DVD and it will be distributed by Maxim Media/Midnight Releasing in 2010. So by the time NEW MOON is on the video shelves this will also be there!  
You can probably buy a copy directly from Brett and I’m sure he’ll sign it for you.

Well, Kevin, when the hell are you going to direct a new movie yourself?!

That is a good question. I’ve done over a dozen of these really low-budget movies, which I’ve self-funded over the years but the market is a bit different, especially for DVD. For this low-budget type stuff iIt seems like a lot of distributors want you to put together all the extras for the dvd and even the box art, as well as send out screeners to get quotes from press or even submission. If I’m going to do all of that, all their work, I mine as well distribute the movie myself and I don’t want to do that. 
    Also, I’ve done a dozen of these movies,all with similar budgets, and it’s somewhat limiting. Yes, I can make a movie for under $10,000-- but by the tenth one you feel as if you’re doing the same thing over and over again and the fun of it has worn off. Plus, I’ve been doing this for twenty years, since I directed VAMPIRES & OTHER STEREOTYPES, and I don’t quite have that same energy level.  I need a producer with access to a real budget. When I have that I’ll definitely do another movie. 
    I am working on a new documentary that’s sort of horror related. Among the people I interviewed are authors Jack Ketchum, Keith R.A. DeCandido and Bob Fingerman (FROM THE ASHES).....and a few weeks ago interviewed actress Caroline Munro (MANIAC). I don’t want to talk too much about this. 
    And I’m wrapping up a “How to”  documentary filmmaking book I was hired to write, THE DOCUMENTARY FILMMAKING COURSE, that will be widely available next year in the U.S. Of the three film books I’ve written it’s definitely the best one.

The trailer for BLOOD RED MOON is HERE.
Kevin J. Lindenmuth's homepage is HERE.
Brett Kelly Entertainment's homepage is HERE.