Los Angeles’s Old Zoo serves as the set of feature film shot entirely on iPhone6
After directing over a dozen short films, French filmmaker Tristan Convert announced he has directed his first feature, SCRATCH, an original horror comedy starring Daniele Watts (Django Unchained), for which he has launched an Indiegogo campaign, to reach $10k for finishing funds. Set in Los Angeles’s known-to-be haunted Old Zoo, SCRATCH is one of the first, if not the first, found footage films shot entirely on iPhone6.
SCRATCH tells the story of two would-be filmmakers who decide to shoot a music video for a local nu metal band on an iPhone at an abandoned zoo. A recipe for disaster. Watts plays Samantha Steel, the “goth rock diva” and lead singer of the band.
“SCRATCH is meta-theater. It’s also an update on classic found footage films like The Blair Witch Project. It’s a ‘found phone’ feature. Cinema vérité-style, but not taking itself too seriously,” says Director and Producer Tristan Convert. “The audience will see what the filmmakers’ crew in the movie is shooting from the point-of-view of their iPhones. The handheld, POV-style frame will be intimate, close to the characters, swirling, falling, selfie-ing, complete with texts and IOS updates interrupting the shoot,” he adds.
Convert created SCRATCH as a unique take on an American black horror comedy. Throughout the film, one by one, the members of the cast and crew are scratched by an infected person, which causes them to transform into their primal, savage selves succumbing to their basic instincts. SCRATCH is a classic contagion story, e.g., the werewolf myth, but the infected persons are not zombies. In fact, the savages are not evil at all. They simply crave sex and food. However, they lack the ability to control their impulses, and therein lies the conflict.
“At its core, SCRATCH is about our struggle to contain the beast within,” Convert explains. SCRATCH explores key themes like: What differentiates us from animals? And what does it mean to be truly free?
SCRATCH is currently in post-production, for which Convert has launched a fundraising campaign on Indiegogo to raise $10,000 to be used for color correction, sound mixing, and securing music rights.
SCRATCH’s anticipated completion date is fall 2016.
