Premiering at London FrightFest on August 25, The Remaining is an intriguing jaunt. We asked La Scala about his influences and inspirations for the film. “After my father died, I really started to question life, death and my own mortality,” La Scala said.
“Watching my father die was a tough experience, but I learned the most important lesson,” he continued. “I learned that life can end at a blink of an eye so it’s important to live life like it’s your last day on earth. Specifically, taking care of family and friends and making sure you have said everything you need to say. You could miss your chance.”
“While I was grieving over my father’s death, I began writing The Amityville Horror for Dimension. My partner, Jason Blum (Paranormal Activity, Sinister), was shooting one of the Paranormals, and I happened to visit the set. While there, I started thinking about what would happen if there was a global paranormal activity. So with my father’s death, questions of life and death running through my head, and the concept of a demonic global threat, I came up with the idea for The Remaining.”
La Scala continued, “I had a concept, but I needed a strong launching pad for the story. I reflected back on my younger years going to church camp. The counselors would tell us stories at night about the Rapture and the Hell on Earth that would follow. It scared me to death. I went into the Bible, specifically Revelations, and there it was. The entire movie unfolded right in front of me. I was supposed to direct Amityville, but when it stalled in development, I wrote The Remaining, and it was in production just six months after writing Fade In.”
Describing The Remaining, La Scala said, “The Remaining is the story of what happens after the Rapture, which is a moment described in the Bible when all the believers are taken to Heaven, leaving the non-believers to endure seven years of Hell on Earth. I used Revelations as my guide to create obstacles for my characters. I really wanted the story to be Biblically accurate. As the end of the world begins, we meet five best friends who fight to stay alive and struggle with individual redemption. The main protagonists are young 20-somethings just starting out in their lives, but all have secrets that they need to express before the end. Inside all of the relationships is a love triangle that I actually pulled from my real life experience. I like to think of this love triangle as a love story in a war-torn environment.
Talking about his talented young cast in The Remaining, La Scala said, “The most rewarding part of making The Remaining was directing the actors. Frankly, they are some of the most talented individuals I’ve ever had the pleasure to work with. I was so impressed how each one brought specific details to their characters that I had not even thought about. These details helped round out all of the characterization and made my job a lot easier.”
He added, “It was very important that the audience believed that these five actors were best friends. The weekend before shooting I got everyone together, and we shot home movies to establish their friendship. This was not something I had written in the original script. I wanted to use this weekend of home movies as a tool for team building. The actors really got into it and actually bonded more than I had hoped. We literally spent 72 straight hours together doing everything from playing cards, going to the beach, the arcade, bowling, etc. The process was so rewarding and worked so well, we put the home movie footage in the beginning of the film, in the title sequence. To this date the actors are still very much connected and hang out socially.”
In addition to the talent of the cast, their solidarity was as impressive. “I was just very fortunate to have actors that had no egos and that came to support each other,” La Scala said. “This was a hard shoot. Very hard. They had to bring it and looked to each other for support. For example, Alexa Vega wrapped around midnight and was told to go home to get sleep. We would still be pushing on to morning. At around 2 a.m. I looked behind me, and Alexa was standing there. She decided to stay on set and keep the energy up until we wrapped. It was crazy! I was exhausted and she was dancing and singing behind the monitors, boosting everyone up. Even Italia, when she wrapped out of the movie, she came back the next day just to hang out on set. That’s saying something. I’m truly blessed to have worked with these fine actors. Not only are they the nicest people on the planet, but they are all incredibly funny. They made me look good.”
La Scala described some of the special effects used in The Remaining. “Originally the film was going to be shot first-person with all of the effects being practical. But as I wrote the script, I realized this type of style was limiting,” he said. “I really wanted to capture emotional moments, and that is a hard to do when you are trying to justify camera position. By moving into a hybrid style, I was able to not only tell the story in a more organic way, but more cinematic, which allowed me to use more digital effects. Although I think there is something pure and realistic when using practical, sometimes having the ability to go digital is very useful. Case in point: The plane crashing sequence was purely digital effects. Not sure how I would have done that practical without a lawsuit. The hailstorm sequence was both practical and digital effects combined. We actually built huge blocks of ice and dropped them on the actors from condors that were 50 feet above the earth; then we laid in digital hail on top of that.”
When asked about the most difficult parts of the production, La Scala had some definite answers. “One of the biggest challenges I faced directing was obviously the budget,” La Scala said. “We shot The Remaining in 21 days. That is so fast with little room for error, especially when you are doing a global disaster movie. The limited budget forced me to cut a couple amazing sequences that I think would have been mind-blowing. Also, budget concerns slide into every day of shooting as I fought to make my days. We averaged 48 set-ups a day. To put it in perspective, an average feature would generally have about 10 to 15 set-ups a day. I was moving fast. When things go wrong, you have to think fast and come up with solutions. You can’t buy your way out of a corner.”
Another hiccup was the unexpected R rating. “I had a heart attack when the MPAA came back with an R rating,” La Scala said. “I was always working within the context that this would be a PG-13. The MPAA had deemed a few moments too graphic and violent and suggested I cut them to get from an R to a PG-13. This was hard. I shaved off a few frames at the end of the sequences and resubmitted the film, hoping for PG-13. Still an R. Forget about the creative issues, but these moments they were suggesting cutting were digital effects sequences that had already impacted the budget in a huge way. I could have used that money elsewhere if I knew I would have to cut them for the rating. That was brutal. Fortunately, we came to a happy medium, and those sequences are still in the film – just shorter.”
Additionally, La Scala faced a more righteous conundrum. “Another struggle was walking the line between the faith-based audience and the mainstream,” La Scala said. “Since the film is Biblically accurate, I was worried it may be off-putting to some of the mainstream. We made a conscious decision to make sure the themes work for everyone and the message isn’t pushed down anyone’s throat.”