Summary
An iconic supernatural legend is getting a fresh new twist inConsumed. The movie hails from the creative duo known as The Butcher Brothers, comprised of director Mitchell Altieri and producer Phil Flores, who first broke out on the scene with 2006’sThe Hamiltonsbefore going on to find further success with the remake of the cult classic 1986 horror slasherApril Fool’s Day, the 2013 religious thrillerHoly Ghost Peopleled byShamelessalum Emma Greenwelland the vampire thrillerThe Night Watchmen, which featured an ensemble cast that includedDexter’s James Remar andThe Sopranosvet Matt Servito, among others.
Consumedsees Altieri and Flores teaming with screenwriter Dave Calbert to tell the story of Beth, a woman recovering from a brush with death after being diagnosed with cancer, and sets off with her husband Jay to the woods to get away from the world. Along the way, the two find themselves in an uncomfortable emotional position as Beth struggles with whether to share the return of her cancer with Jay, all while he tries to get them to move on from that chapter entirely. Their conflicting emotions become all the more complicated when they become the target of the Wendigo.
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Unfriendedalum Courtney Halverson leads the ensembleConsumedcast includes Mark Famiglietti as Jay, Beth’s husband, andFinal DestinationandChuckystar Devon Sawaas a mysterious stranger lurking in the woods hunting the creature. Featuring an emotional performance from Halverson, an off-kilter intense turn from Sawa and some intriguing parallels between Beth’s trauma and its big threat, the movie is a nice mix of a character drama and a classic creature feature.
Ahead of the movie’s release,Screen Rantinterviewed director Mitchell Altieri and producer Phil Flores to discussConsumed, how they were drawn to the “intricate” layers of Calbert’s script, pulling from their own personal experiences of people close to them living with cancer, the challenges of on-location shooting and working with Devon Sawa.
Screen Rant:Consumedis such a fun and intricate little creature feature, what was it about the script that drew you both to wanting to make it?
Mitchell Altieri: I think you kind of said it, it’s intricate. When I read the script, written by great screenwriter, David Calbert, just the opportunity to have these different layers where, just as you said, “Oh, great. Look, this is a fun, exciting, thrilling creature feature, but, oh, it’s so much deeper.” When you really peel back the layers, it’s really about this woman who’s dealing with cancer, and it’s really her fight with cancer, which I felt made the story so much more than — we’ve done it where sometimes you just do a horror movie, and you’re like, “We just want to have a good time with it.”
But this, there was so much depth to it, and David wrote it from dealing with a very close family member with cancer. We’ve all dealt with cancer in our immediate families, so it just became this personal, personal thing. And I think once Devon and Courtney and Mark got involved and everything, it just became this thing that was, at the end of the day, we’re like, “Is it real that this creature is hunting them, or is it just in her mind? Is it in Devon’s character’s mind? Maybe it’s two different things, like, are they hunting two different creatures?” It just became this really cool idea that was also explored even further in the editing room.
Phil Flores: I mean, simply put, I think the simplicity of the idea, coming from the producing side, was like, “Hey, this is going to be a very simple shoot, three people in the woods. What could possibly go wrong?” And, of course, you have to deal with everything along the way that comes at you. But we had such a professional cast and crew and just the opportunity again to shoot a film, and David’s wonderful script. Mitch pretty much said it all. [Chuckles]
The Butcher Bros Knew Halverson Was “Just Perfect” To Play Beth
Screen Rant: You both mention that this is very much a character-driven film about this woman who is dealing with cancer, what was it like finding the perfect, eventually landing on Courtney, to really bring Beth to life and capture all of those layers of grief and pain?
Mitchell Altieri: You know, that’s exactly right in the sense that somebody had to play this with an extreme vulnerability, and we’ve been fans of Courtney’s for a long time. We’ve known her for a handful of years, she’s worked on projects with friends or colleagues, and when it came time to cast Beth, she was just perfect. She brought this — obviously, she’s an extremely talented person —vulnerability to this character, but yet, it’s one thing to just be vulnerable, as we all know, in a horror movie. A lot of characters can just end up being reactionary to the horror that’s happening. [Courtney was] vulnerable, yet could stand up as much as she can stand up on her own two feet and attempt to fight back, specifically with this intensity that Devon brings with his character as a person. Coupling those two together with Mark, who plays her husband, it just became this nice little triangle that we just felt was great. It just worked out.
Sawa Is “Simply Wonderful To Work With”
Screen Rant: I’m a hugeDevon Sawa fan, he’s obviously a horror genre staple, and like you say, he brings such a great intensity to this role. Was he the first person you had in mind for this role when you saw the script and character?
Mitchell Altieri: Yeah, Devon, we’ve been fans of his, as well. Not only through the genre, but also films like SLC Punk and Idle Hands, and things like that. Once you kind of really start seeing that character, and you see him, you’re like, “Okay, he really is this character.” And thankfully, Phil and I and Devon, we’re all represented by the same agency, so it became this really kind of easy pathway to us talking and meeting, and then it became Consumed.
Phil Flores: Yeah, and he’s simply wonderful to work with. If you’ve ever watched an interview, that’s how he is. He’s very candid, very straightforward, and he’s personable. He brought a lot to the set the first day on the shoot. You could tell there was a different presence. It was a little more quiet, a little more subdued, a little more stoic, and that’s for the character, as well. So, having Devon on set, in the room, really helped us get through the production easier.
Consumed’s Forest Setting Was “Literally A Horror Film Within Itself”
Screen Rant: Talk to me about shooting in this forest setting, because it sounds easy in theory, but there obviously must be a lot of hurdles, like lugging the equipment out there, especially when dealing with a creature feature’s effects.
Phil Flores: Yeah, you’re exactly right, every film is a challenge, right? Every film, you have to put out fires. Specifically, [for this], we said, “Oh, yeah, this will be a very simple thing. We’ll shoot in the forest, in the woods, it’ll be really easy, we can’t possibly go wrong. There’s no people trying to mow their lawns, and trying to interrupt the set, there’s no airplanes going overhead.” You forget about the waves of mosquitoes, the brown bears, the isolation, the cell phone service. It was literally a horror film within itself, in some ways.
We were living this meta experience of people being lost in the wilderness, and were kind of lost in the wilderness. But we had, fortunately, Jeff Allard, Joel Pincosy, the other two producers on the project. We all came together, Mitch included, and we’ve worked each other for so long that we were able to create a really nice shorthand and get through most of these obstacles. And again, we lean on the actors, because they did a lot of the heavy lifting, and they were so professional and easy. And it’s only three of them, so it’s not that hard.
Mitchell Altieri: Phil really covered it. The Butcher Brothers, we’re really getting our careers going with independent films and independent horror. There’s this kind of idea that when you start with independent horror, with these small movies, go out to the woods, shoot out of the woods, and we never really did. But, in the back of your mind, you’re thinking, “Oh, shooting in the woods shouldn’t be that hard.” Ooof. One thing to add to what Phil was saying, as soon as the sun goes down, there’s no light. It’s pitch black, and you’re like, “Oh, wait a second, we have to light this entire area. Wait, who talked about shooting in the woods being easy?” [Laughs]
The Wendigo Is Meant To Be “A Metaphor” For Beth’s Sickness (& May Not Even Be Real)
Screen Rant: Sounds like a whole other experience in and of itself! I’d love to talkabout the Wendigo, because that’s an entity that doesn’t get a lot of play in horror movies, and I think the effects, both practical and the CGI, are stunning. How did you go about finding the design for the creature in the film, as we see it through its different forms?
Mitchell Altieri: Yeah, going back to what we were talking about earlier, where, with the script, we really want to kind of unravel and slowly take you through this creature being always just on the sides, or you only get little pieces of it, but in relation to it really being about Beth and her dealing with her cancer, and, at the end of the day, it’s like, what’s real, what isn’t? The Wendigo folklore really is just a metaphor for her disease, so to create that, we really wanted to use it to inspire from not just what you see, because the Wendigo is a very complex creature.
Not a lot of films have tackled it, but it’s a bad spirit that possesses you, but it’s also a creature that can eat you, and it can take over you, and you’re able to morph into, so there’s a lot to it. We just kind of utilized that, as much as we could, into what we would felt like [fit the movie]. We’ve all, specifically David and ourselves, dealt with very close family members who’ve had cancer, so I think that’s really what it was. It was just kind of blending the Wendigo myth with the pain and suffering that comes with cancer. So, yeah, that’s how we kind of came upon this idea, our creature, and our representation of the Wendigo.
ConsumedChanged “Quite A Bit” From The Original Script To The Editing Room
Screen Rant: So, you’ve mentioned the editing room a couple of times. I’d love to ask how much changed from the original script and from what you shot to what it is we now see in the film?
Mitchell Altieri: Quite a bit, quite a bit. I will say, at least for me, when you’re doing an indie film, editing is such a big part of it. You discover so much in the editing room. I’m sure that’s true for all sorts of different sizes of feature films, but for us, you have the script, and then director comes on, producers come on, actors come on, and it becomes its own life. And then you shoot it, and then that becomes its own life, right? And the film will tell you like, “This is what I want to be.”
And the DP, we had a wonderful DP, Miguel. His style is very unique. He shot The Vast of Night. He’s done all these amazing projects, this was his first American horror movie. He’s this DP from Chile that has done these amazing, award-winning projects that you would go, “Oh, now he’s doing a horror.” So, he brought this very unique vision to the photography. But then, you do end up with all these different ideas and takes in the editing room, and our editor, Brett Solem, we’re like, “Here you go, make something.” [Chuckles]
Phil Flores: And just, on top of that, I think what I noticed, because I was able to see it from an outside perspective, that this fantastic script that David wrote was a personal story for him, had all the working pieces, and that was a draw first. It was like, “This is a very simple, straightforward story about two people going to the woods, getting chased down by a beast.” But, as you said, there’s so many layers that are going on, like her cancer metaphor.
But I think what came out through the editing process, I noticed, was that the connectivity with her to the creature, to the Wendigo, and how there is a bond between them, and it’s her bond to her disease, as well as bond to the creature. Even Devon’s character is bonded to this creature, and out of that, in the editing process, arose a kind of cosmic horror thread line that came through the story that even informed the origin of the story itself, slightly. That was fun to discover.
The Movie Also Reteamed Altieri & Flores With Frequent Producer Collaborators
Screen Rant: Phil, I’d like to turn to you next. We’ve talked about how this is very much a two-hander story between the cancer drama and creature horror. From a producer’s standpoint, what is it like finding the right people to not only sell this to, but also to get really passionate about joining and helping the team?
Phil Flores: Yeah, Jeff Allard is the main producer on the film. I came on as a Butcher Brother, so I came on almost as a creative producer. Not that I don’t have the chops to, but the whole team; Joel Pincosy is another producer that came on. He worked with us on The Violent Kind, a couple other films, I believe, too.
Mitchell Altieri: The Night Watchmen, Holy Ghost People.
Phil Flores: So, he’s on the roster. It’s all one big jamboree in my head. It’s always about team building. You have to work with people you trust consistently, and you don’t always know when you come on to set who the problem child is going to be. Because there’s always a problem child. It could be me. [Chuckles] But we’ve been very fortunate to make enough films with enough people that we’ve been able to garner trust and gain a nice momentum with. And specifically, I’d say this film, the casting had so much to do with it, from Mark to Courtney to Devon.
All coming from different places and really showing up, being in the woods, getting down and dirty for weeks on end, and being professional for the entirety of it. We were truly living in the woods, that’s how it was, and it wasn’t always fun. People got hurt, you’d trip over a rock, or like Mitch was saying, it’s pitch black out, so you have to really take everything to consideration, and hopefully come out with something wonderful. Which I think we know we did a pretty good job.
Mitchell Altieri: And just to add to that real quick, XYZ was a big proponent of this movie, from the scripting phase all the way through right now. They were involved from casting to production notes and everything, so they really helped out quite a bit. And, obviously, XYZ does everything from Mandy to all these amazing, very unique horror movies that we’re all fans of, of course. But yeah, they were very, very instrumental in helping us get this movie off the ground.
AboutConsumed
Trapped between a madman (Devon Sawa) seeking revenge and a skin-stealing monster, a married couple must find the strength to fight and make it out of the woods alive.
Stay tuned for our otherConsumedinterview with director Mitchell Altieri and producer Phil Flores!
Consumed
Cast
A woman struggling with a secret illness must find the strength to survive when a camping trip turns deadly, trapping her and her husband between a crazed killer and a skin-stealing monster.
