INTERVIEW: Bryon Erwin, Director Lynch Mob

CinemATL: How were you brought onto Lynch Mob?

BE: I was working as an editor and the film company, First Cinema, was shooting a short film with an inexperienced AD who didn’t slate the shoots, so when I went back to edit I had to revamp and log all of the footage. And as I was editing it, I was working with the producers and talking to them about what they did right and what they did wrong, what I would have done and so forth. I built a trust with them with what kind of artist I am. They saw what I did to turn the footage into a nice piece of work, so when they got their next project, they wanted me to direct it.

CinemATL: What is your past experience as a director?

BE: I directed a couple of no-budget horror films in high school and one in film school. Since these were shot on VHS the format quality was too low to get distribution. After film school I spent several years directing commercials for Comcast.

CinemATL: How did the decision to shoot on HD come about?

BE: I was really lucky with that. We had 3 Panasonic 24 P cameras, so we knew we could get fight scenes with lots of coverage, car chases and what not. At one point the producer came up to me and said that the new thing was HD and for now on everything that was not shot in HD was going to get left behind as far as distribution and airing on cable channels. So he pushed really hard to make sure the movie was going to be shot in HD.
That meant the crew; especially the DP had to be familiar with the HD. The DP was totally good with the 24 p, but had little experience with HD, so he actually backed out of the project. But after talking to him and working with him a little bit he became really excited about the possibility of what HD can do and he has really shined and become our saving grace for this movie. He has turned o ur production from a regular Atlanta - filmed movie into one of Hollywood caliber.

CinemATL: From the dailies, what difference have you noticed between the HD quality and that of 24 P?

BE: What I have noticed the most is that you have a lot of clarity with your image, to the point that you can see the cells on people’s skin. It’s so clear and sharp of an image that it gives you the freedom to manipulate the image with filters, coloring, and color correction. Like a negative when you shoot film, you have a lot more play when you transfer it to digital with how much contrast you can add or take away and colors you can enhance and so forth. When you’re shooting with video you lose those options, but when you’re shooting HD you get them all that back. I worked with an editor on cutting together a trailer and he showed me how it is possible to crop or zoom in on an image and retain the quality.

CinemATL: Tell me about casting?

BE: The hardest role to cast was the lead role, the character Weasel. We had two of what I consider the best actors in Atlanta try out for the role they both did it in different ways, but they both did it excellent, they gave 200% and it was fascinating just watching them do their screen tests. One of them did it in a way that was outside of the box, but after a long debate, we decided to go with the original way and that gave us that actor, Michael Cole.

CinemATL: How has your experience on set been?

BE: We’ve had the best luck of any film I’ve ever worked on. Whatever technical problems have challenged us in a day, we have creatively worked around them to turn the scenes into something better than we originally imaged. For example, suddenly we have cloud coverage and we have to shoot it differently but that turns out to be better for the script and better for the story. Locations fall through but we get backup locations on the spur of the moment. And the backup locations have ended up better than the locations we lost. We’ve just had the best luck the way things turn out every time we have shot.

CinemATL: How do you feel about the cast?

BE: I’m the luckiest guy in the world, as far as being a director. Even though we held rigorous auditions for each of these roles, I knew that each person we hired didn’t need a lot of direction to play his or her part well. Thus, my job has been minimal as far as how I’ve had to direct the actors. I just have to tell them to speed up or slow down. I don’t have to go in there and say now you have to be sadder or angrier; these guys are just nailing it. They’re perfect at their parts.
CinemATL: What do you think about the script?

BE: I’ve done a lot of movies where the crew and I have put in 14-hour-plus days, giving everything we’ve got and then go home exhausted and just pass out. I’ve done this over and over again and I’m 40 years old now. I’m not a big Hollywood director. All of the past movies have had the same problem and that is the story is not there. If you start off with a good story, it doesn’t matter how it’s executed, you can’t fail if the people like the story. We’re just lucky that we had a good story to begin with and that motivates everyone who’s working on the movie. We know in the end all of this hard work is going to pay off because we have a good story.

CinemATL: What are you working on next?

BE: I can’t tell you that. But I can tell you it’s going to be a horror movie.


Dave R. Watkins is a actor, writer & filmmaker living in North Georgia.

INTERVIEW: SCOTT STAMPER, Writer/Producer Lynch Mob

CinemATL: What inspired you to write this script?

SS: We were looking to do a film in the horror film genre and we were trying to think of something that hasn’t been done. Since we had access to a lot of Mob-type characters, like some actors from the Sopranos, we tried to write a Mob-based horror film. But since we were filming in Georgia, it had to be based in the south.

CinemATL: Which Soprano’s cast members were you able to secure?

SS: Paul Borghese and Tony Darrow. Tony is best known from his role on Goodfellas as the restaurant owner, but also plays Larry Boy Barese on the Sopranos. Tony’s character on the Sopranos gets arrested next season and becomes a series regular so we happened to get him at just the right time.
We were also able to get Dexter Tucker, Chris Tucker’s brother, to do a cameo for one of the film’s final scenes.

CinemATL: How did you target these two actors?

SS: One of the producers, John Cornetta, has been friends with Paul Borghese since childhood. Paul has done some work on the Sopranos and is a series regular on several NBC shows including Third Watch and Law & Order. From there, Paul contacted Tony.

CinemATL: Did you shoot under a SAG contract?

SS: Yes, we are on the Ultra Low Budget SAG agreement. We have to pay SAG actors a minimum of $100 dollars a day. We were going to go non-SAG until we secured the name talent actors.

CinemATL: How did you go about getting financing?

SS: Part of it is self-financing, but we also have some investors. We had an investor’s reading of the script, but everyone who invested was someone we already knew.

CinemATL: What are you shooting on?

SS: We are using the HVX200 HD camera and running it to the P2 card, which captures true HD.

CinemATL: How long have you been shooting?

SS: We started in late July. We did most of it in two months. We did about 80% during the first month and now, because of the more complex shoots with special effects and working with everyone’s schedule, we have to do one day here and one day there.
We were planning on doing an 18-day shoot, but about halfway through we realized we would either have to lower the quality of what we were shooting or extend the days. So we decided to go for a longer shoot. It went from an 18-day shoot to about a 28-day shoot.
Extending the days brought about new complications when the crew, planning on only shooting for 18 days, signed onto another production. We then had to work around the schedule of the other movie, which became very difficult when the film’s schedule would constantly change at the last minute.

CinemATL: Where have you shot in Georgia?

SS: Rome, Marietta, Lawrenceville, Alpharetta, all over Atlanta and now Douglasville.

Welcome to Lynchburg

On Set: "Lynch Mob"
Written by Dave R. Watkins
Thursday, 19 October 2006


The sign created for 'Lynch Mob.' (photo: Dave R. Watkins)On September 17, 2006 I traveled out to Dacula Georgia to observe one of Lynch Mob’s final shooting days. The film deals with a mob informant, Weasel, who is put in the witness protection program after turning over evidence to the FBI. He relocates to the town of Lynchburg where it is soon revealed that the townspeople suffer from a curse placed on them during the civil war that forces them to eat human flesh to survive, but makes them immortal. Soon the mob sends their people after Weasel and carnage ensues.

While on set, I observed the minimal crew on hand and was impressed as they functioned in an efficient and synergistic manner. While most of the crew focused on shooting several car scenes that involved adhering an HD camera and light to the hood of the car, others worked on creating an impressive “Welcome to Lynchburg” sign to be used for a few of the films’ key scenes scheduled later that day.

The main crewmembers were extremely busy most of the day, but I was eventually able to get on-set interviews with both writer/producer Scott Stamper and director Byron Erwin.