Kitchener’s master of horror
Horror is so often served to the audience on a visceral blood-andguts platter it’s refreshing to find a filmmaker who believes less is more.
In “3 Dead Trick or Treaters” and “Offerings,” local horrormaster Torin Langen has created cinema that relies on the viewer’s imagination, making these films all the more disturbing.
“3 Dead Trick or Treaters” is a chilling anthology about a smalltown paper boy, the graves of three murdered trick or treaters, and handwritten horror stories tacked to the children’s headstones written by a deranged pulp author.
It’s ambient silent horror that stays in the mind long after the credits have faded.
“This was more about the
sound and the implications about what is happening rather than showing everything,” says Langen. “There are not a lot of effects throughout the whole movie but I like to think when they are used sparingly they are more effective and powerful,” he adds.
Langen also created and directed music videos for Victoria B.C’s dark metal band Crosss (“Golden Hearth”), Kitchener’s progdoomsters Sierra (“Prologue 1972”), and psychedelic/pop-rock Halifax band Walrus (“Feels”) with likely more music videos to come.
Inspired by the underground music scene, Langen screened “3 Dead” in 40 different venues and indie film festivals across North America, Europe and Asia.
Langen has always wanted to make movies. And he comes by it naturally.
“I did not stand a chance,” he admits with a laugh.
“My parents are both photographers,” he says.
“It was great when I was growing up and learning how to do this stuff. I would get hand-medown equipment as a resource and that made a huge difference. I also had a family that gets it.”
Langen got into horror through B movies.
“I liked the campy so-bad-it’sgood schlock movie experience,” he notes.
“When I was in my early teens I got more into horror — not just horror but underground filmmaking and fiercely independent stuff. Through there you find a lot of people who are not working with studio money which means they can do whatever they want and they can get more into fringe experimental territory,” he explains.
“I just went further and further down the rabbit hole,” he
laughs. “When I was really young I was doing stop-motion animation. Once I started playing with the family camcorder, that evolved into live action and doing skit comedy with friends but it was always around wanting to do longer-form narrative projects. I did a zombie movie with some friends and it was not anything serious,” he notes.
“We had been looking at all of these really low budget films — DIY movies that were actually getting DVD releases — and we thought, oh wow — if we make something maybe we can find a company that wants to put it out. That was the ultimate goal. We thought it would be fun to do our own project for the shelves at video stores like Far Out Flicks and Generation X — which was still around back then.”
The zombie movie took three years to finish with Langen doing everything from directing and producing to makeup and special effects.
“It was a terrible movie but it taught me a lot about everything. Through my teens I kept on doing more and more short films,” he adds.
“I like horror because it elicits a strong reaction from an audience no matter what budget level you are working with. You can do something that can get a reaction out of people. So ‘3 Dead Trick or Treaters’ was an amalgamation of wanting to play with horror elements and do it in a way that was more of a mood piece.”
Langen has always been a big fan of Czech filmmaker Jan Svankmajer (“Alice,” “Faust”) — a surrealist animator who influenced Monty Python’s Terry Gilliam (“Brazil” “Time Bandits”).
“I like experimental filmmakers that often work without dialogue,” he says.
Langen always had a huge interest in the horror film underground.
“There is a Japanese filmmaker called Shozin Fukui. He did “964 Pinocchio” and “Rubber’s Lover,” says Langen. “They were more like Japanese cyberpunk. Those movies inspired me, not because you could tell they were low-budget but because of the way they were shot.”
The locations in “Three Dead” and “Offerings” were mostly on the outskirts of town.
Langen did not cast anyone outside his usual group of film actor friends. There was no money, so the filming process involved “calling in a lot of favours” and shooting on the weekends. Some people in the movie were actors, some were not.
“I refer to them as enthusiastic non-professionals,” notes Langen. “My feeling is with a film that had no dialogue is that you can push and prod the pantomime a little bit more. It did not have to be about line delivery so looks were really important.
“I would consider ‘3 Dead Trick or Treaters’ my official debut,” he proclaims, adding the film was six years in the making beginning with “Fondue” in 2012.
“’3 Dead’ was done very methodically one piece at a time, every autumn,” he says. “In the off months, we were working on the wraparounds and the soundtrack for each segment.”
Langen used Safe as Houses musicians Bensen Carter and Andrew Laughton for “Fondue’s” score in addition to musician Stephen Schooley who did the remainder of the film.
Langen is thrilled that VOC Silent Film Harmonic wants to reinterpret “3 Dead Trick or Treaters.” The film will be screened featuring Langen’s sound design, including sound effects and screaming. The original music will be replaced by VOC’s live improvised music.
Edmonton underground horror film distributors Videonomicon recently picked up “3 Dead” for DVD/ Blue-Ray release.
“It’s funny because having a physical disc of my film is what inspired me to make movies in the first place,” notes Langen.
“Ten years ago I made that goofy little zombie movie. It has been this whole journey but now I finally have a physical release of something that I did.”
He says if he had known how much work we was going to face he would have been a lot more intimidated rather than just going, “Jump in blind and dig your way out.”