FRIGHTFEST HALLOWEEN: THE LAST VIDEO STORE
An interview with Tim Rutherford and Cody Kennedy
Congratulations on the film. It really captured a certain time, when you could discover these amazing films by wandering the aisles of a video store.
Cody Kennedy: Sweet. Thank you. That was a big goal for us, capturing that kind of shared experience.
Tim Rutherford: Yeah, absolutely. That was one of our main reasons for making it, to try and get that video store feeling. So, if you're vibing, then we did it!
Capturing that sort of bygone era was a catalyst for making the film?
Kennedy: Yeah, we'd been kind of playing in the video store with Kevin [Martin, who plays Kevin in the film]. He basically runs a real-life video store in Edmonton, AB. And Tim and I met each other in high school and we both were really into genre films and wanted to make movies, so that’s how we got involved with Kevin.
We started making short films in his store, and there were these weekly screenings at this theatre in town. Things like Army of Darkness on 35mm, or Poltergeist. Then there was an event for Michael Biehn and his projects and by then we were kind of the local filmmakers so they asked if we could put together a montage reel for Biehn’s best moments.
So, we decided to shoot a little wraparound story for it, because our friend Josh [Lenner), who plays Viper, loves doing his Michael Biehn impression from The Terminator. We couldn’t use the theatre to shoot, but Kevin said we could use the video store.
After that, people wanted to know if we were going to make more, so we were making regular shorts then. You know, paying homage to whatever film they were showing that week. It turned into a series, and then we made a short film called The Last Video Store in 2013, which played at a couple of genre film festivals.
Ten years later, with a bunch of breaks and different things, we were able to turn that into a feature. So, this is kind of a continuation of what we've done before. Like, let's introduce all these elements that we love, the characters that we have created in the past and showcase our love of video stores.
Because of the sort of film it is, there are some quite obvious film references dotted throughout. Were there more obscure homages that you hid in the film?
Rutherford: Well, I don't know how successful we were, but the Preystalker following Nyla through the racks had some serious Jurassic Park kitchen scene vibes. That was one of the main points of reference that we wanted to kind of pay homage and I think that one's a little bit more subtle.
Kennedy: With the Preystalker design, we wanted to embrace that 1990’s CGI so there was a bit of like Reptile from Mortal Kombat. That was definitely an inspiration.
Even like the creature from Alien Resurrection; the weird human hybrid with that kind of chicken body. It always had a weird feel to it. Kind of creepy. Obviously, it's kind of the most hated entry in that series, but I always defend it because I like that it's crazy. Just the tones are all a bit messy and it's pretty out there. Because you look at the designs and the ships and the world, it's just awesome. I feel like it definitely stands out for the well-crafted production design and, I mean, I like the goofy story.
Because you opted to pay homage to that early CGI style, was that easier in the post-production?
Rutherford: Well, it was a lot more affordable. Our VFX artists were very enthusiastic about it, but I don't think we could have really like taken it the next three or four steps given the very limited amount of money that we ended up paying.
They did such a good job of making it kind of campy and floating and unrealistic, but also that it was very present in the room, and I think that's just a testament to the skill because it's very easy to kind of fall too far on the hokey side of an effect like that.
Kennedy: Yeah, I mean we wanted it to feel like it was comped in really well. It’s like where do we find that line of ‘oh, that's pretty crummy’ but also ‘it looks like it's in this room right now’. We questioned whether to give it a rough matte line. Kind of like Alien 3 with the puppet. But we got it to the spot where it needs to.
You’re clearly fans of that era of filmmaking. Are you collectors of VHS tapes?
Rutherford: We used to!
Kennedy: Yeah, Tim and I spent many years living together and there was one point where we had whole shelves full of DVDs and VHS and Blu-rays. I still have a little bit of a collection. I think I have a decent amount, but not as many VHS tapes as I would want.
Rutherford: I'm just rebuilding right now. I fell back in love with movies, and I've been hitting Video Cat here in Vancouver not too far from my place, so there are still video stores around, so I'll use them while I’ve got them.
Our actor for Viper Jackson, Josh, has well over 150 tapes now, and they're definitely expensive. I think he just kind of finds them and collects them that way. He doesn't go out of his way to get prized collectors’ tapes. But he's got some really beautiful pieces, but they're like an entire wall in his bedroom now.
And do you guys have any favourite films from that era that possibly haven’t made the move to Blu-ray or streaming?
Rutherford: From that era, I love a lot of Canadian horror films, and one I don't think we'll ever see come to light is a film called Blue Monkey [William Fruet, 1987] which is this weird rip of Aliens and some of the Corman like movies that were coming out. Even some of the Troma movies were bug-orientated. That movie I've never seen released outside of the VHS that I watched it on. I'd love to see that again, but who really knows about it? It's quite an experience, a very Canadian experience.
Kennedy: You can watch it on YouTube now, but there is this movie called Twin Dragon Encounter [Paul Dunlop, 1986]. There are these twins and they, own a Kung Fu studio in Toronto or something and they decided to make a very ego-oriented movie of them just kicking ass. Like using karate to beat up a militia.
They're at their cottage house and bring two very uncomfortable actresses to play their girlfriends, and then they're just beating up this militia in the forest. But in super slow-motion fight scenes. They seem to think ‘we're so quick and so awesome that everything needs to be super slow’, but it just feels like a weird David Lynch thing. It's not really impressive, it’s just weird. I do have a VHS tape of that one. It’s at Kevin's video store, actually.
We’re also big fans of 80’s and 90’s Hong Kong films. There is one specific film I absolutely love but that I haven't seen released called Possessed 2 [David Lai, 1984] and it's just a crazy, haunted apartment that throws everything in there. The last ten minutes are totally insane.
You worked with Kevin and Josh, who you had known previously, but how did you go about casting the rest of the roles?
Rutherford: Yaayaa Adams, the great actress who played Nyla, went through a full casting process. And for Leland Tilden, the very large individual who played Castor in the principal filming, we went through a casting director who lined us up with people who had great resumes and a lot of potential.
There was a little bit of a process of trying to unravel our long-standing relationships with Kevin and Josh enough to let some other players in. And then we got some help for the cutaway stuff and like the second unit stuff from our friends like RKSS [François Simard, Anouk Whissell, and Yoann-Karl Whissell], who just had a great run with Turbo Kid [2015], Summer of 84 [2018], We Are Zombies [2023] and Wake Up [2023].
The Astron-6 team came and helped us out with a lot of the separate movie aspects and filled out the world of almost entirely fabricated titles.
I think we kind of set out to make a fun movie in a video store and it just kind of progressively became more and more Canadian as we went on. And then Cody and I remember we're sitting in the editing suite, and we said ‘wait a second, we’ve got the Canadiana, the Canucksploitation’ because so many of these actors and bit players are other Canadian directors. Lowell Dean, who directed the Wolf Cop movies, plays an announcer.
It was just a lot of fun to take a moment and see that we kind of did the thing that we were joking about in the movie.
Without spoiling too much, the ending leaves it open for the possibility that Kevin could continue having adventures with some of these videotape villains. Are there any plans to continue the series?
Rutherford: Yeah, I mean, absolutely Cody kind of made a reference to the web series that we did. That concept of Kevin’s adventures continuing… It’s very important for a B movie like this to have a cliffhanger hinting at a sequel. Shout out to Deep Rising [Stephen Sommers, 1998]. You know we're still waiting!
Having access to the interior of the videos was always something we had played with as a part of this film. As it goes in your first feature, you’ve really got to control the scope and make sure that you’re putting as much as you can into the environments you’re engaging with. But we'd love to see, you know, in the streaming day and age a TV series pickup with Kevin’s ongoing adventures within the videos, and the wider videos themselves.
Kennedy: In the film’s third act, we wanted to do that, like have them step through a bunch of films, but we couldn't. We’ve always had this idea of wanting to do TV. You know, 20-minute condensed versions of those movies, so that he's able to break and play with the tropes.
Have you guys got any other projects that you're currently working on?
Rutherford: Yeah, we're definitely working on a few projects. Just trying to put the feelers out now that the festival season is kind of wrapping up. We're looking to sell the movie very soon and all those factors will play into the scale of the next project.
You know, I couldn't necessarily announce anything official but there's a pile of movies that we referenced and other inspirational movies that have led to new and exciting ideas and because the video store has just been going on for so long, you know, I've been sitting on a few ideas that have been kind of like growing underneath. Now I feel like I've paid my late fees. You know, I'm all settled up and I'm good to rent some new movies and explore some new territory.
Kennedy: Yeah. So, step outside the video store, but I imagine it will still have a similar tone, yeah.
Directors: Cody Kennedy, Tim Rutherford
Writers: Joshua Roach, Tim Rutherford
Starring: Vanessa Adams, Kevin Martin, Leland Tilden, Josh Lenner
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