the list of 9 for december 7, 2004:
NINE SIMILARITIES BETWEEN "CLAUSTROPHOBIA" AND "NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD"
With the American release of my film Claustrophobia (retitled Serial Slayer bydistributor Lions Gate), and in anticipation of the growing number of site visits fromhorror fans as a result, I thought it would be fun to add a few fright-related Lists of 9 to theusual batch. So, while I'm not comparing my modest thriller to George Romero's 1968 horrorclassic, and while they're clearly very different types of movies, I did find some unplannedsimilarities between the two. (If you haven't seen my movie yet, then see it!)
- EXTREMELY LOW-BUDGET INDEPENDENT HORROR. This is a given,but I wanted to point it out since both films were self-financed without industry contacts,festival exposure or pre-sales. Romero's budget was reportedly $114,000. Mine, thanks to the lowcost of digital video, was even lower.
- MOST OF THE ACTION TAKES PLACE IN ONE HOUSE. In bothcases, this was for budgetary purposes: it's pretty cheap to have everything happen in onelocation, so you don't spend time moving around, renting other locations, or dealing with permits.As a sidenote, both stories take extremely similar approaches to this one-location issue:characters debate whether to stay put or go out and get help, and there are numerous failedattempts to leave the house without getting attacked by the killer(s) outside.
- OPENING CREDITS APPEAR OVER A CAR DRIVING AROUND. Thiscame as a surprise to me, when I recently saw Night of the Living Dead again. I'd forgottenit. But in Claustrophobia, Mary Lynn Rajskub drives around for a few minutes while creditsroll. Same thing happens in Romero's film. Okay, and maybe a hundred other movies too.
- THE GLASSES. Another oddity is that the thick-framedglasses Rajskub wears in my film bear a striking resemblance to the glasses worn by Johnny(Russell Streiner, who utters the immortal line "They're coming to get you, Barbra!"), the guydriving the aforementioned car, in Romero's film.
- THE USE OF TV AND RADIO. Here I may have beensemi-consciously influenced by Night of the Living Dead: I admired Romero's use of TV andradio news reports to provide story exposition as well as adding scope and realism. I utilizedthem to the same end in Claustrophobia.
- NO PHONES! Nearly every horror movie out there needs todispense with the ability to use a telephone for help, or else you have no movie. Romero was in onthe gimmick early on: while the house in Night of the Living Dead still has electricity,the phones are inexplicably out. Phone contact has become a harder thing to neutralize in recenttimes, thanks to the abundance of cell phones. For Claustrophobia, I have the traditional"The line's been cut!" moment for the land line, while giving one character's cell phone a deadbattery and the other two characters no cell phones at all.
- KITCHEN KNIVES. When you're trapped in an ordinary houseand there's a murderous presence outside, what tools do you have at your disposal? Right: sharpkitchen knives. Judy O'Dea grabs one almost immediately upon taking refuge from flesh-eatingzombies in Night of the Living Dead; so too do Claustrophobia's plucky, if confused,heroines.
- UNWILLINGNESS TO HELP STRANGERS IN NEED. This is the mainthematic link between the two films: the debate over whether strangers deserve to be helped duringtimes of crisis. It's more explicitly embodied by Night of the Living Dead's narrow-mindedMr. Cooper, but the question of helping others vs. self-preservation underscores nearly everyscene of my film.
- JUDY O'DEA! I thought, either start the list with Judy, orend it with her, since obviously the actress, who starred as the demented Barbra in Night ofthe Living Dead and is featured in Claustrophobia's opening scene, is the one entitythat inarguably connects the two films.
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