Exclusive Stills and Q&A: Director Chad Archibald Talks Bite – Part 1
Sean Decker
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The recent Fantasia premiere of the body horror-esque feature Bite allegedly induced within a handful of the audience members spontaneous fainting and vomiting (according to festival co-director Mitch Davis), and now that it is heading to the Buffalo Dreams Fantastic Film Festival as the Opening Night presentation, we thought it time to pick the warped brain of the film’s currently buzzed-about director and through and through horror fan, Chad Archibald.
Read on for Part 1 of our two-part Q&A with Chad, which includes a pair of exclusive stills.
Revolving around a young woman who, upon returning from her bachelorette party in the tropics, begins to succumb to an insect bite (in most hideous ways) she acquired while there, Bite (review here) was conceived by Archibald, whose previous feature horror entries include the 2014 features Ejecta and The Drownsman. Jayme Laforest scripted, with the film produced by Archibald, Cody Calahan, and Christopher Giroux.
With Bite currently seeking distribution and continuing its festival circuit run following the Fantasia press explosion, Archibald took out some time to, well, “bite” into Bite with us.
Dread Central: What was the inspiration for the film?
Archibald: “Initially my sister-in-law had come back from a trip to the jungle in Guatemala, and she was covered in all sorts of bug bites. Every year thousands of new bugs are discovered so I thought, ‘Wow, how do you even know what bit you?’ And then I thought, ‘What if one of those just kept getting worse?” From there the idea came pretty easy. I started doing research into how various exotic insects reproduced and how some of their instincts formed. It’s crazy interesting.”
Dread Central: Shot when, where, for how many days, and on what?
Archibald: “We shot for fifteen days in Guelph, Ontario, in December and then another two to three days down in the Dominican Republic, which was a great time. The intro of the film was shot on a 5d, and the rest of the film was shot on two Red Epics by the wonderful Jeff Maher.”
Dread Central: Bite pays obvious homage to Cronenberg’s The Fly, in not only narrative but in its gleeful approach to “body horror.” How much sway did that film have on informing your own?
Archibald: “The idea was never to do a movie like The Fly. It’s an amazing film, but it was never really an inspiration for this film. After the script was done, I did go back and watch it again just to make sure nothing was too similar, and I don’t really think it is, aside from the overall concept of a human turning into a bug. This movie is far less scientific and more organic.”
Dread Central: Bite seems to have a fairly bleak outlook on humanity. The majority of the characters, including the lead, are fairly immoral, self-serving individuals, concerned primarily with self. What informed this approach?
Archibald: “I think the average human is flawed, and I don’t think films should shy away from that. No one is perfect, but good people can make mistakes as well. I wanted Casey (actress Elma Begovic) to have her own internal struggles from insecurities to guilt, but I still wanted the audience to like her and to relate to what she’s going through. As for her friends, a lot of people have shitty friends who really just care about themselves. I feel like people can relate more to flawed characters whether they want to admit it or not.”
Dread Central: What was your approach to casting, and what was your experience in working with the cast?
Archibald: “We did about five days of casting in Toronto, and Elma came in with a selfie shot on her phone as her head shot, which was pretty funny. Regardless, she did a fantastic audition, and it came down to her and two others, but she had grasped the concept of the film so well, even in the audition, that we knew she had to be the one. It was amazing how well the cast gelled and how much fun we had on set covered in goo and little jelly eggs.”
Come back on Friday for Part 2 of our Bite interview with Chad Archibald, in which we dive into the film’s effects. In the interim, you can visit the official Bite website, “like” Bite on Facebook, and follow Bite on Twitter.
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