Hey guys! Horrorella here...
Hitting VOD platforms today is THE INHABITANTS, a moody, atmospheric ghost story set in a legitimately spooky historic New England home. The film follows a couple who buy an old bed & breakfast, planning to fix it up and reopen it. The house itself has a secret or two hidden within its walls, and the couple soon relizes that they are not completely alone.
Today, I am happy to bring you an interview with the film's co-writers and directors, Michael and Shawn Rasmussen. They discuss their inspirations, shooting on location in a historic (and haunted) home, low budget story telling and their love for deliberate, thoughtful horror.
Horrorella: How did this story develop? Where did the idea come from and how did you shape it into the final version?
Shawn: We've wanted to write a haunted house story for a while now. Something that would be a throwback to the spooky classic films we saw growing up. A producer on our very first writing project mentioned to us one day that he owned this old historic house and that it also happened to be haunted. It seemed like the perfect fit.
Michael: The owner's a great guy. His name's Glenn Cooper. He told us there was a woman in black who walked the halls. At first we were skeptical. But then we had a chance to visit the place, and haunted or not, it had this fantastic old New England vibe. So we used the history of the house as a jumping off point.
Shawn: Michael and I did some research and found this interesting story about the first woman in New England to be executed as a witch -- Margaret Jones. This was well before the Salem Witch Trials. She was a midwife to the early colonists. We used some elements from her biography in crafting our witch Lydia March.
Horrorella: Can you talk a bit about the filming location? I understand the house has a historic significance.
Michael: The Noyes-Parris house, built in 1669, is one of the oldest houses in New England. It was owned by the Reverend Samuel Parris whose daughter Betty and niece Abigail made the initial accusations that led to the Salem Witch Trials.
Shawn: It was also used as a stop along the Underground Railroad by abolitionists to hide runaway slaves. So it has all these hidden passageways that are cramped and creepy and perfect for a ghost story.
Horrorella: Did anything specific about the house or its history work its way into the story once you decided to use it as a location?
Michael: This is the house that Reverend Parris moved into after the witch trials. And in all of our research we had trouble finding out what happened the children who made the initial accusations. After everything blew over, they kind of vanished from the timeline. So this idea of lost children being trapped somewhere in the house came out of that discovery.
Shawn: Researching the house's background led us to the Witch House museum in Salem, MA. They have a lot of exhibits that focus on the historical day-to-day life of the colonists rather than just the claims of witchcraft. We picked up a lot of great details there. That museum also makes a small cameo in our film.
Horrorella: Did anything strange or foreboding happen during filming? Any supernatural experiences?
Shawn: Yes, and let me preface this by saying that we're not making this up to help promote our film. In general, we are very skeptical when it comes to paranormal events, but one evening after shooting we were screening the dailies with Glenn and our two lead actors. We were all in the living room when we heard a loud noise come from the kitchen. One of the kitchen table chairs had been knocked over, and there was no one else in the house.
Michael: It spooked us out a little, but Glen assured us that the entity in his house is friendly and not to worry. The cynic in us thought there must be some scientific answer for what happened but we couldn't figure it out. The chair just tipped over completely on its own.
Horrorella: Was the entire thing filmed on location?
Michael: Most of interiors were shot inside the Noyes-Parris house except for a few of scenes that were actually filmed at our house in Cambridge. For example, there was no bathroom in the master bedroom so we used our bathroom instead. But all the exteriors were shot there.
Shawn: Shooting in the house was difficult because of its historic nature especially in terms of lighting. The hallways were so cramped there was really no place to attach lights. And the creaky floorboards made recording dialogue rather hard.
Michael: I think using the house was a huge help though in capturing the tone. We're one of the few New England ghost stories that was actually shot here in New England. And there's something very unique about this region.
Shawn: It also helped that we were filming in late fall/early winter. The trees were bare, the days were short, and the actors were cold and miserable.
Horrorella: The film is very effective in the way it slowly progresses through the story and unfolds in a very restrained manner – how did you decide to tell your story this way as opposed to a more fast-paced approach?
Michael: The films we've always loved are slow burns. They escalate at a deliberate pace and are dripping with tension and melodrama. It gives the audience a chance to get to know the characters. That way when the shit goes down, we're all invested in what's happening to them.
Shawn: Yeah, I think this type of story benefits from a controlled pace. It makes the shocking moments that much more shocking. Also from a budgetary standpoint, dread is cheap. Exploding heads? Not so much.
Horrorella: What would you count among your influences with this film?
Michael: As a kid I vividly remember watching THE CHANGELING on television late one night. It scared the hell out of me. There was something about that old creaky wheelchair. We wanted to make something along the lines of that film.
Shawn: THE HAUNTING OF JULIA, BURNT OFFERINGS, AUDREY ROSE and DON'T LOOK NOW were also huge influences. There was a melancholy that all those films captured perfectly. It made them very creepy and spooky.
Horrorella: One thing I noticed and really enjoyed was how off the grid much of the story was. When Jess wanted to learn more about the history of the house and the surrounding area, she got a few really old (and awesome) books from the local library, rather than sitting down and Googling the information. How important was it to you to keep that more traditional, old school approach, and how do you feel it impacted the story?
Shawn: The films we were referencing and that influenced our story were from the 70's and 80's. They had a traditional old school approach that we wanted to try to emulate. Also the house itself is on this remote plot of land. And we really wanted to capture that sense of isolation.
Michael: In some ways I feel technology has ruined horror films. It's really hard to trap people and isolate them now. When we wrote the spec that became THE WARD it took place in a modern day institution with surveillance cameras and all types of technology. John wanted to strip that all away and set it some time in the past. We settled on the 60's and when we did, we noticed that the story had a timeless quality to it. There's no cell phone or other technology that will be outdated in 10 years. We wanted to do something like that with THE INHABITANTS.
Shawn: Sitting down and watching a film is one of the few times these days where people can turn off their phones and disconnect for a while. Unless they’re watching our film on their phones, and that’s okay as well.
Horrorella: Can you talk a bit about your style as co-directors? How did you work together to bring the vision to life?
Michael: We haven’t really had the chance to truly co-direct a film together yet. Both of our films have been super low budget endeavors, so most of the time we’re doing whatever it takes to get things done for the day. Whether it’s grabbing lunch for the crew, hanging lights, or helping with effects. That’s the nature of indie filmmaking, but it would be awesome to some day have a big enough budget where we could focus solely on the shots and working with our actors.
Shawn: Yeah, for THE INHABITANTS we had such a small crew. Michael operated the camera, and I was holding the boom pole and running sound much of the time. We do talk a lot about the visual style and shots we need to get prior to shooting. But then each day comes around, and it’s a lot of crisis management and putting out fires. It’s certainly a fun challenge though.
Horrorella: What’s next for you guys?
MICHAEL: We have several projects in the pipeline at the moment. There's a script we're finishing entitled BLACK AUTUMN which we liken to THE LITTLE MERMAID -- if it had been written by Lovecraft. Then there's a project called SUBCULTURE which is sort of an urban version of THE DESCENT set in the tunnels under New York.
SHAWN: We're also tackling a couple of writing assignments. There's one we're very excited about that's a remake of a Spanish road thriller with a supernatural twist. To be honest, with the nature of this business, what's really next is anyone's guess. THE INHABITANTS wasn’t even on our radar until we got the okay to shoot in that house, and then the whole thing came together in a couple of months. We’re always looking for opportunities to work with other talented filmmakers though.
THE INHABITANTS is now available on VOD. And you can check out a few exclusive images from the film below. Add it to your October movie watching - you'll be glad you did!
