Exclusive: A Visit to the Set of Supermarket!
Steve Barton
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Somewhere tucked away in the sprawling Los Angeles metropolis there lurks Hastings Market; a supermarket that never really was. Shelves are stocked but the lines are always empty. A casual inspection of the butchery reveals that the majority of the meaty product has the distinct feel of rigid plastic. Something truly horrible looks to have happened in the frozen foods section, where old blood stains the floor and a thick slather of gore blurs the selection of TV dinners. From somewhere in the back, there comes a cry of distress and terror…
“Finger!!!”
Rarely before has the simple name of a secondary bodily appendage been shouted with such alarm. Such it is on the set of upcoming Raw Feed film Supermarket, directed by Ben Rock, a tense thriller with action, blood, and some really slimy bad guys.
Actor Tom Kiesche took some time between shoots to talk with Dread Central to explain what he could of the story for us. “The idea of the movie is there’s a group of, well, you’re not sure what we are. We take over this supermarket and we seem to be killing people randomly”, Initially, these guys seem like your run-of-the-mill terrorists. Very soon, however, it’s revealed that there is something larger and more sinister going on. These so-called terrorists bring along drugged up junkies they refer to as “spotters”; individuals who seem able to pick out appropriately desirable targets from among the general crowd of the store. These gun toting mad-men take out these specific individuals with extreme malice. Suspicion, distrust, and paranoia reign as it is slowly revealed what the men’s mission really is.
There’s enough killing (and getting killed) to their mission that the actors are forced to get pretty messy. Asked if he was involved in any of the gore Kiesche explained he’d been put through a bloody ordeal already and was scheduled for more. “I will again this afternoon, and I did on Friday night. This stuff when they shred it up and put blood on it, it’s like taking off a giant band-aid. There’s no shower on the set so it makes for an interesting cleanup.”
Tom went on to explain how he had looked at the script, “I always look at the script as the pieces of ensemble. I saw it as, you have the hostage takers as one group, and there’s a lead with them. That’s the character Ritter, played by Carlos (Bernard). Then there are the hostages, and there are two leads with them – two teenage kids. Then there are the cops outside, and there’s a leader character with them, played by Matthew (St. Patrick). To me it is like these three ensembles working together”
The special effects Supermarket are being provided by Wolf Pack productions, represented by industry veteran Myke Michaels and his team. Michaels has a long outstanding career in make-up which includes hundreds of films and is currently working on many exciting titles including the upcoming Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. His effects work is focused on creating imaginative and startling designs that are theoretically possible in the real world and are governed by real world physics. He showed Dread Central one of the works created for Supermarket and held it proudly up for photos. “Can this really happen? Yeah, it could happen, because these are his own muscles that are popping out. This is his own face that is popping out. It wasn’t like all of a sudden, where’s this skull coming from,” We can’t show you exactly what Michaels is talking about here, as that is a big reveal; however, we will say that it is a beautiful thing.
To help keep things in the real world as much as possible, the bulk of all the effects in the film are practical and use old-fashioned latex, animatronics, and buckets of fake blood. “95% practical effects”, says Michaels, while explaining that some minimal CGI is still used to accent certain situations. Exactly as it should be!
Supermarket is expected a 2008 release and it is planned that there be a rated-R as well as an unrated version. Expect a lot of blood, tension, and some nasty surprises. Looking forward to it!
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