Of course it is too early, the schedule of filming is not nailed down yet, as we are still working on our feature Female Flesh Eaters, but Kataklysm is going in the studio this fall to record their new CD for Nuclear Blast, so they will compose and record this extra song at the same time, and we also agreed that the gruesome footage shot for the movie will be used for the band's music video. A nice, big-budget looking music-video for the band, and an outstanding add-on for our movie, fellows! By the meantime, you can check the music-video I shot for these guys in  November 2002.
 

August 1st, 2003
Things are taking shape! Script is done, and we are starting to pass it out to the cast members to learn their roles. we were supposed to film Female Flesh Eaters first, but for some cast members availability reasons, it will be easier to postpone it and go for The Night They Returned instead. Olivier Xavier of TEXA-FX is now checking into the monster design, and will soon come up with an outstanding - and terrifying - design, as usual. We aim at filming the first scenes by the end of this month, stay tuned...!!

August 3rd, 2003
Music news! As I am writing the first drafts of the dialogs, music artist Jean-Francois Mayer has already started to compose original music score for the film, finding various moods to sync on the script, and Kataklysm being still touring Europe, they plan to get in the studio to record the main theme sometime in November. Looking good!  :)

August 15th, 2003
OK we are getting close to filming dates now, scheduled for August 30th, 31st and Sept. 1st! By the meantime, I have put together an advance poster for the film. Design will change as soon as we start filming, and we will use actual photos taken straight from the movie...

August 29th, 2003
FILMING HAS BEGUN!! Yes, we started today to shoot footage for The Night They Returned!! For today's sets, we had Melantha Blackthorne, Benoit Goulet and Uncle Costa involved. Scenes shot included Melantha shopping in convenient store, attacking an Army Surplus clerk and kidnapping a folk at gun point. This was the first time we were working with Melantha, and everyone on the set agreed: Melantha is an absolute sweetheart. Very professional, deeply creative, she has this natural-born commanding presence, and, most important, she knows how to express it when acting, which is a rare gift. We are truly privileged to have her starring in this movie.

September 3rd, 2003
I have just put together a cool production poster, from Patrick Aird's photos taken on August 29th shoot! Check that out! Also, a high-resolution version is available. Print it out, and spread it around!

High resolution poster
(zipped 15x23 inches @ 72DPI)

Also available: MOUSEPADS!
This widely popular item is finally available, get yours this very day and help us in the production of this sweet movie! All funds collected are invested in the production of The Night They Returned, and believe me, this is very welcome!
 

September 12th, 2003
Two more scenes shot today! We are truly excited to see the whole thing stitching up together, and seeing the footage being gathered. It is so great working with this cast and crew, this team looks like a match made in heaven!
We shot with Melantha Blackthorne, Ron Voot and Cole Bumroid. A first scene where Brenda Taggart meet with her uncle, and get a very nice military gun from him, and another scene, an intense sex scene, with a bloodbath climax at the end! Excitingly gruesome! I should have pictures to post in the coming days, as soon as Patrick get to digitize the images took on the set. Stick around!!!
 

September 14th, 2003
Oops, first really sad news for this project: Julie Groleau is no longer part of the cast, for availability reasons. We sincerely wish Julie the best of luck with her other projects! BUT, in the other hand, we do have a great news: Elisabeth Faure has joined the cast, to play Jessica Taggart! Lovely Liz has been seen here and there in cult and sexploitation movies / photos, lately she played a latex-clad nun with Melantha Blackthorne in Sinners and Saints (to be released soon). Liz, with her grade and skills in classic theatre will definitely adds deepness in Jessica's personality, not to mention her charming presence on the set. Welcome aboard Liz!!

September 30th, 2003
We made it! Last week end was THE big one, where most of the scenes of the movie were shot. On Saturday we were some 14 people on the set, and on Sunday we were around 18 people! 9 cast members, 3 cameramen and supporting staff were at work on what is the best Indie film making experience I have had so far. Hundreds of pictures have been taken, I should get some images soon from the various photographers, so stay tuned for these images to be posted here.

I got on location on Friday the 26th, to prepare the shack, place furniture and set up the location for the early shooting set for Saturday at 10AM. While being there Friday night, I gathered some night shots of the place, swamp and surrounding woods.

Saturday morning, first bad news of the week end: actress Suzi Lorraine missed her flight from NY to Montreal due to mechanical problem with the charter bus to the airport. The airport administrators have been able to find a place for her in the next flight a few hours later, but still we had to move all our schedule around to start filming. Things happen, this is part of indie film making.
On Saturday we mostly focus on dialog scenes, establishment shots and so on. Most of the complex setup scenes took place on Saturday, many traveling around for outdoor scenes and so on.

Sunday morning. Everybody is still tired of the long, long Saturday we had, yet some more shots are to do on that day. Most of them: gore scenes and special effects shots. Lots of preparation and no second chance if the shots are missed. we had to nail it down the first time, which added extra pressure on everybody's shoulders. Fortunately, special effects artist Olivier Xavier is a veteran in such field, and everything went pretty much hassle-free and all gory shots got nailed down in a surprisingly short time, considering what it involved and that it was the heart of the movie.

And oh, yes: Sunday was a rainy day, which messed pretty much all of our day schedule... No more outdoor scenes, no lighting from the outside, this all caused us to re-write some crucial scenes for the movie, and move these from outdoor to indoor. We could not afford to postpone these scenes later because of the fall coming up, landscape changes dramatically and can no longer fit with what's been filmed so far. We are creative and managed to find a solution. I guess this is why indie film making is so much entertaining, you have unexpected things to overcome until the very last second and have to find turn-arounds in a snap, while the cast and crew are waiting, looking at you to know what to do next...

Late Sunday night was the final confrontation between a zombie and a monster. This was a real pain, as one of the guy who was playing the swamp creature could simply not fit in the costume, due to his athletic body. Poor Jan who was really digging his role, and was looking forward to do it, we truly should have done a costumed re-hearsal a few days before getting on location, we could have corrected that. We learn from our mistakes. Anyway we had to replace him at the last minute by the caterer guy, no real experience in acting, and absolutely no experience in fighting and stunt scenes, therefore blowing to smithereens all the fight choreography that was being practiced by the two original cast members in the afternoon. Despite that, nobody got hurt and by filming with close-ups framing, the final battle is pretty intense and believable enough.

So bottom line, everybody really had fun during the filming, this week end was a terrific one, full of entertainment, new friends, and so on. All the team was a terrific one, many of them never met before, and every one left the location  with a whole bunch of new friends. The most important thing was obviously to have fun during the week end, as  the film can only benefit of that. It was obvious before the cameras that the cast making it really have fun doing the job, and that is a great news. The cast members transmit a contagious fun to the audience with their performance, even the unedited rushes are extremely funny to watch, so the final edit cannot be lame or boring.

Now we only have some two sets to shoot, easy ones, only a few hours each, with Melantha Blackthorne, Jan Pivon and Liz Faure. After these are done, we can start the final edit.

October 13th, 2003
Another cool step done! I just finished to put up together a very cool 60 seconds trailer, which I forwarded to JF. Mayer for musical score composition. This official trailer should be posted in the coming week or two on the site, stick around for this sweet sneak peek! By the meantime, I posted on the FTP site a short teaser for your hungry eyes. Don't you dare miss it!!! Finally you can have a glimpse of what it's gonna look like. Link is below.

We still have a small bunch of indoor scenes to shoot to complete all the needed shots, and from there we will be able to proceed to the final cut. Things are looking good!!!
 

October 30th, 2003
New stuff to download! Yess! Now you can download the official movie poster, check that out! Featuring actual pictures from the movie, this cool piece truly depict the feel and look of the whole god damm movie! I made it available in high resolution, so you folks can have a fairly large print out of it. Let's take advantage of it fellows, print it out in as many copies as you can, and pass it out to your friends!  :)  You can see a sample of the poster on the top of this page, and the high resolution file can be picked up here as well.

Oh, yes: Happy Hallow's Eve to everyone!!
 

October 31st, 2003
Happy Halloween fellas! To help you all celebrate, I just uploaded the full official movie trailer of The Night They Returned! At last!
Check out this neat piece, download at will and spread the word / share the file with your friends! You won't be sorry!!

DOWNLOAD THE TRAILER
(1:08 s. clip, 9.2MB mpeg file, zipped)

November 23rd, 2003
Another busy week end, we were shooting additional scenes yesterday, and Friday night as well. Things are looking very good, as the rough cut of the film is already assembled, for over a cool 60 minutes, and a bunch of scenes remain to be filmed in the coming weeks, but we can say that 98% of the needed footage is done at this time.

We truly had a great time on the set with Melantha, Suzi, Elisabeth, Cole, Jan and all the crew members. We re-shot the creatures fight sequence as I was not happy with the previous one we did a few weeks ago. My friend composer Jean-Francois Mayer was there also, and he actually filmed a very cool 'making of', showing Larry getting dressed in the infamous monster suit, and Cole putting on his zombie mask. Now I should be able to complete almost the final cut, we'll just have to pop in the very few scenes left to shoot. These are not crucial scenes, but they do add a great deal in the overall atmosphere of the movie. Stay tuned for more!!

November 27th, 2003
Just updated the trailer, now with better compression, encoded in AVI this time  (Windows Media 9), and also the soundtrack has been enhanced. Visual remains the same, though.
DOWNLOAD THE TRAILER
(1:08 s. clip, 13.9MB AVI file, zipped)

December 13th, 2003
One more step to completion done! Today we had a filming session with Melantha Blackthorne, and a bunch of extras playing guys being kidnapped by our blood-thirsty star in various public location. Yeah... Public location. Filming in public ain't easy task, especially some 10 days before Christmas... Streets were crowded, even at the early time of the day we did it, so we needed to slightly change our plans once on the set. Hehe how do they call this, Guerilla Film Making? Anyway it is now done, thanks to the guys who contributed some of their time: Jean-Pierre Normand, Andre Dubois, Francois Escalmel, Larry Lane Stevens, and the guys from Kataklysm.

Talking about Melantha, many of you may be interested to know that she is principal guest in October 2004 edition of the Festival of the Dead !!

January 17th, 2004
Yeah it's in the can! Tonight we finished filming, the last set needed for the movie has been nailed down, so we can now entirely focus on the editing of the film. We shot the closing scene where Jessica is writing her story, from her hospital bed, under the vigilant eye of the sexy Warden, played by Montreal rising cult star Chastity! Chaz is just about to become a regular character in our films, look out for this stunning lady!

February 9th, 2004
Things are getting more and more exciting!! Now I can start to see the final work to come along! The final cut of the film is  25% done, it is now a matter of days before the whole film is nailed down! Composer Jean-Francois Mayer has already started to assemble the tracks he composed for the film, and sync it on the finalized film segments. The Night they Returned will be a blast, just watching the first 20 minutes, with no music, and the time goes by in a snap, confirming it is very entertaining. It sure is a good news when you watch a movie, and first thing you know, 90 minutes went by and the closing credits appear on screen. That's what we want to achieve... Stay tuned!!!

I also want to thank everyone taking the time to write a word of encouragement, that sure is much appreciated! Also those who pre-ordered the film, boys-n-girls, you rock!!! This is such an adrenaline boost, that is the 'living' proof that people are really looking forward for the film, I just can't thank you enough for all that support and encouragement. Feel free to get in touch anytime, we always love to hear from you!!

February 24th, 2004
We're almost there, hold on tight! I am proud to announce that the final cut of the film is done! That's right! All visual and graphic is nailed down for good, only minor tweaks here and there, but yet the result is extremely funny and entertaining, I can't believe we made all this in a such short period of time. BUT we're not there yet, as this week we are focusing on the sound design and audio dubbing. This is where the whole thing comes to life, it is so exciting! So we can now say that in a matter of weeks, we expect to start shipping the DVDs. This was and ambitious project, lots to do in a short period of time. That February release date sounded like crazy, but we can say we almost made it, as the film should be out early March! Stick around fellows!!

March 10th, 2004
I know, things sometimes just don't go as smooth as we expect them to...! So we<re still in the process of the audio dubbing / foley, but at least things are looking good! I am very pleased with the way it turned out so far. For the next 2 days I will be in the studio with Melantha Blackthorne to record extra tracks of voice, and I believe early next week I should have pretty much everything to complete the audio tracks, and finish the film. Knock some wood everything goes well!!

March 25th, 2004
Things are looking good! The audio post is getting near to completion, and so far I am very happy with the results! I called for help our fellow audio artist Jay Belton to fix as much as he can some audio clips, and once again, Jay delivers! As some files are being sent, I add them to their respective places on the timeline, and the film is now being nailed down for good. At this time, there's over 40 minutes totally completed, no more things to adjust. Terrific!!

Next week end we'll be shooting the music video for the Kataklysm song The Night They returned. Their music video is composed mostly of shots taken from the movie, and I need some other live shots to complete the music video. Kataklysm are playing Saturday night at Club Soda, in Montreal.

March 27th, 2004
Well, you know we were supposed to be filming with Kataklysm today for their music video, but I waited and have not heard from the band, while I was on location and everything was set up, cameras, projectors, lighting. This was a long and boring day, but oh well, things happen.

April 22nd, 2004
Gee, almost one full month went by since the last update! But don't worry, it hasn't been a month where nothing has evolved regarding the movie! I have been pretty busy with the website for the past three weeks, if you have not noticed anything, well that's because the job has been well done: I moved the entire site to a new server, there were numerous little things to fix, but now it's pretty much over and we're back to normal!

The film is now completed, nailed down for good, and I must say that I am very happy with the way it turned out!! Considering the countless things that went wrong, I believe we ended up with a very entertaining piece, I just can't wait to go public with it!

There has been a few things that went wrong since the last update, the worst one being that I could not get the legal authorization from Katalysm' record label to use the music the band composed for the movie. The band and I tried very hard to push things and have the license delivered, but we simply could not get it, while the label are saying we will get the paperwork done soon. After a few months of effort, I had to trace the line somewhere, and ended up replacing the song by something else. However we agreed that once the license will be delivered, the movie will be released in second print with the song included.

But wait!! One bad thing can sometimes lead to a great one: while I was looking for extra music for the film, I have been lucky enough to meet  Jaimie Vernon, from BullsEye Records of Canada, an independent record label based in Ontario. After SVBI Films and BullsEye Records agreed on licensing/use of the music, Jaimie kindly offered a few tracks from his signed classic rock bands, and this music selection truly enhanced the whole film, I still can't believe how well the music matched the action of The Night They Returned. You will be listening the excellent rock music of The Kings, Cheaper Than Therapy, Goddo, Moxy, Soap Opera and Rubber, as well as Jaimie Vernon's very own songs. And on top of it, BullsEye Records will also be releasing the original soundtrack of the film. There's still a bit of paperwork to fill regarding  the soundtrack release, but it's going to be available very soon. Isn't it great news or what?!!
You can visit Bulls Eye Records' website here: Bullseye Canada.com

July 1st, 2004
OK it's been some time I haven't posted news on this page, but the most important stuff has been announced on the front page of the site. Anyway the film is now almost ready to ship, I should get the copies of the DVD in the next 48 hours, so expect a major announcement pretty soon!!

Also, take not that the film will premiere at hugely popular film festival FantAsia, on Saturday July 24th, 2004, at 11h30 PM. Make sure you drop by to see this special presentation! Most of the cast and crew will be there, so you can meet and shake hands with all the folks responsible for this outstanding B movie.
Some more information can be seen on FantAsia's web site.

Take note that The Night They Returned star Melantha Blackthorne, our beloved Countess Bathoria, is also launching her own film Sinners and Saints during the festival! See FantAsia's S'n'S schedule

See you there!!!

July 3rd, 2004
That's it! This is likely the final update to this making of progress report!
The film is now out, and starts shipping today! Copies are being sent to all contributors, all the people who pre-ordered theirs, movie reviewers and some film studios / distributors. Make sure you order your own copy!

I want to thank everyone who contacted me and mentioned they were following closely the film's production. It's all because of you guys we can make it thru, it is crucial for an independent film maker to know that someone, somewhere, cares, and is looking forward to see the completed product. So much work is involved in independent film production, so many unexpected problems / expenses await you around the corner, we have to have that kind of support to make it thru. Thanks, sincerely!