Red State - Smith's horror film

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will it ever get made?
VH1 wrote:Kevin Smith Eschews Comedy In Favor Of Horror For 'Red State' -- But Will It Ever Get Made?
'It's like a polemic of sorts,' director says of movie, which is still in need of financing.

Kevin Smith's new horror film, "Red State," is so bleak and despairing, he's beginning to jokingly tell reporters that it makes "The Dark Knight" look like "Strawberry Shortcake." Very much unlike his previous movies, this one has a body count and an unrelenting and terrifying villain.

But the story about four unsuspecting teenagers and the Fred Phelps-esque religious fundamentalist who stalks them, which Smith first detailed to MTV News in an interview last July, is terrifying the 38-year-old director for an entirely different reason these days: He may never get to make it.

"I don't know, dude," Smith casually replied when asked if he's still optimistic that the film will find financing. "Honestly, it's been tough finding financing, and that was before the economic collapse in the last two or three weeks. It's just not a very commercial flick, and I understand why people are like, 'Do you have another comedy? Because I'll do that.' So I don't know.

"[But] for some reason," he continued, his resolve growing, "that just makes me want to do it more. It makes me feel like I'm on the right track, if people are like, 'I don't know if I want to be involved in this.' It makes you feel like it's worth making."

Make no mistake about it, either: Smith is intent on finding financing for the flick and finding it soon, despite recent front-page news about a new space comedy he's written that's in the pipeline — news that wasn't all that, well, new, actually. (Indeed, Smith told us about the movie almost a full year ago, back when it was still going to be about "Ranger Danger.") But that made us wonder if he was shelving "Red State" in favor of the outer-space flick.

"Oh, I'm doing 'Red State' next," Smith insisted. "The space movie isn't quite ready yet and won't be ready for a little while, and then we haven't even thought about casting. If I put Seth [Rogen] in it, I have to wait until Seth's free, and Seth, as we all know, is a very busy actor right now."

Speaking of Rogen, "Red State" is even more imperative these days because of near-universal early acclaim for "Zack and Miri Make a Porno," his newest comedy starring Rogen and Elizabeth Banks. "Zack and Miri" is Smith's seventh film since breaking out with "Clerks" in 1994. Like "Clerks," each film has been both sentimental and scatological — but each, at heart, has been a comedy.

But they've also all been, simply, "movies," Smith said, insisting that he's eager to move outside his comfort zone with an entirely different genre.

"This, to me, is very much a film, 'Red State.' 'Zack and Miri' is a total movie, totally a fun movie, totally enjoyable, but 'Red State' has a lot on its mind," Smith explained. "And I want to get back to my filmmaker roots and make something that's got a lot on its mind.

" 'Red State' has something on its mind. It's like a polemic of sorts," he added. "I didn't get into the business to make comedies, even though I do make comedies and that's what I like. I got in the business to make film, like I'm a filmmaker, and films are full of ideas, and full of outlooks, and full of opinions, and done with artistry or whatnot. I've never been accused of being an artist, but that's chiefly what films are."

Re: Red State - Smith's horror film

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Ditch the name while getting the funding, pitch it as a cheap teen horror movie, shouldn't have too much of a problem getting coverage assuming he doesn't need a budget, which you shouldn't if you just want to shoot four kids running around Kansas getting chopped up.
"I'm like a dog chasing cars, I wouldn't know what to do if I caught one. . . . I'm not a schemer. I just do things."

Re: Red State - Smith's horror film

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Oh, and this=klimov-level genius:
"I didn't get into the business to make comedies, even though I do make comedies and that's what I like. I got in the business to make film, like I'm a filmmaker, and films are full of ideas, and full of outlooks, and full of opinions, and done with artistry or whatnot. I've never been accused of being an artist, but that's chiefly what films are."
"I'm like a dog chasing cars, I wouldn't know what to do if I caught one. . . . I'm not a schemer. I just do things."

Re: Red State - Smith's horror film

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Alexhead wrote:Oh, and this=klimov-level genius:
"I didn't get into the business to make comedies, even though I do make comedies and that's what I like. I got in the business to make film, like I'm a filmmaker, and films are full of ideas, and full of outlooks, and full of opinions, and done with artistry or whatnot. I've never been accused of being an artist, but that's chiefly what films are."
yeah, thought the same thing, lolz.

Re: Red State - Smith's horror film

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Just saw this. Hard to say now which is Smith's worst film, this or Cop Out. I'm going to go with this, only because it's extremely boring and fails at being almost every kind of film it's trying to be. Not to mention you can tell he just ran out of ideas at the end. Smith likes to say people talking is what he does best. There's a lot of that in this film, but he's apparently forgotten his forte. Most of the dialog falls flat when it's not being overly preachy. None of the characters are deveoped enough to where we care about them. In fact new major characters kind of randomly show up as old ones are forgotten. The Westboro folks are such an easy target to make fun of, but it almost feels like Smith is afraid to really take any digs at them. Either that, or the real life nuts are so out there that it's impossible to parody people who already are a living parody.

For a while this is a horror film, but one without much suspense or gore. Then it's a hostage/standoff movie, but one without any real tension. Characters we don't care about shoot each other a lot and then it just sort of ends. This film isn't funny, horrific or even remotly interesting. Maybe Smith is smart to claim he's quitting directing. His Q&A videos I find amusing, but his last three films have been horrible.
Just cut them up like regular chickens

Re: Red State - Smith's horror film

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Most of the non-fanboy reviews I read mirrored what you said. Boring, talky, not actually a horror movie, badly assembled story, etc. I'm telling you, this guy has been a sham as a filmmaker from day 1 but hit (a very, very small amount of) lightning in a bottle with Clerks and has done a pretty incredible job of turning that into funding for, what, 10 more films? I guess I can credit him for that, but I really don't see much difference between him and a Uwe Boll in terms of broad cinematic incompetence except that Smith gets better actors.
"I'm like a dog chasing cars, I wouldn't know what to do if I caught one. . . . I'm not a schemer. I just do things."

Re: Red State - Smith's horror film

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I like the original Clerks, Chasing Amy and Dogma. Clerks II is mostly a waste except the ending. Actually, I thought Jersey Girl was one of Smith's better and more mature films. It's too bad Bennifer sunk it and spooked him away from that kind of filmmaking, because I think he might have been able to keep growing if he'd gone that way. Instead he went back to the well again and overstayed the welcome. With Red State I don't even know what the hell he was going for. The film feels like a dude who read a newspaper he found on the subway with an article about the Westboro folk and stuck to it was an old paper with an article about Waco and he got confused and thought they were the same article.
Just cut them up like regular chickens

Re: Red State - Smith's horror film

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You are much more of a completist on the Kevin Smith front than I, but I've seen about 3 of his and watched segments of others (Cop Out has been on an HBO loop recently so I've given it about 10 minutes...the only worse thing he could've done than casting Tracy Morgan would have been Chris Tucker. I'm sure he was on the short list). Seriously, we watched Boll's House of the Dead last weekend and they both share a child-like ability to imitate real filmmakers. Which is to say, don't give film budgets to 7 year olds like Kevin and Uwe.
"I'm like a dog chasing cars, I wouldn't know what to do if I caught one. . . . I'm not a schemer. I just do things."

Re: Red State - Smith's horror film

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To be fair, Smith didn't cast Morgan. He and Wills were both already attached to the CopOut before Smith was brought in as a hired whore to direct. From the stories it doesn't sound like he had much control on the picture and didn't do much but sit around and collect a paycheck. That doesn't excuse the other shitty films he's made lately though. Smith has always been a better writer than director. But between lazy old age and too much pot, he seems to have lost that talent.
Just cut them up like regular chickens

Re: Red State - Smith's horror film

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i finally saw this last night. i had completely forgotten everything i'd read about it, including this thread, so i really didn't expect anything one way or the other. what i anticipated was a LOT of dialog, a really talky film. i didn't get that from this at all. i didn't get any long, single stationary cam shots with paragraphs of dialog with a lot of tongue-in-cheek, "look how clever i am" lines. none of that. in fact, i'd say if i didn't know it was smith, he would have been the last director i would have guessed made this. it was very nice to see lots of familiar faces in this - couple breaking bad alums, creepy mulholland drive dream guy, goodman, milton from office space and now boardwalk empire, and was really surprised to see pollack (as well as what happened to him, didn't see that happening). while i agree on the westboro/waco articles stuck together - very obvious references here to both - there was enough to make it different. i certainly wouldn't have classified this as "horror". parts of it were pretty damn interesting, i wanted to see where it was going to go. but in the end, the answer was kind of "nowhere".

while it was a risk for smith on all levels - a WIDE departure from anything he'd ever done before, a large A-/B+ list cast, self-distributed in a "tour" format - i don't think it was as successful a film as he had hoped it would be, from a viewing standpoint. from a financial standpoint, i hope all his "fuck hollywood" posturing and all the time he invested in getting this out there worked, as i'd like to see what he does next. i'd like to see him go farther and take as many chances with a "serious" film like this as he did with clerks back in the day. i think he still has something to say, just not really sure what it is anymore.

also, it is ALWAYS a bad idea to list what is next and attach a date to it at the end of the credits. you will always miss it. in this case, his long-promised hockey film "hit something" again promises that much of this cast will return in 2012 in that film. really? forgetting the date slippage, this cast in a hockey film? having a hard time seeing how that would work....

so in the end, i'd like to see it a couple more times to see if maybe i missed something, but now while i disagree with some points above, i agree that i think he had the first half of this planned and then kind of winged it the rest of the way and ended up not really saying much. was still interesting as a vehicle to watch some pretty talented actors work.

Re: Red State - Smith's horror film

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I watched the first 40 minutes or so with my wife and can definitely say it's easily his most technically competent film. And it does have a good cast. No idea how good the second act does or doesn't get and if he sticks the landing. But like you said, nothing about it says "Kevin Smith movie" in the early going and I say that as a complement.
"I'm like a dog chasing cars, I wouldn't know what to do if I caught one. . . . I'm not a schemer. I just do things."

Re: Red State - Smith's horror film

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MovieWeb wrote:Red State 2 Being Planned by Director Kevin Smith

Kevin Smith has plans for a sequel to his 2011 horror outing, Red State.

Director Kevin Smith has plans for further sequels to some of his movies following the release of Clerks 3, with the filmmaker revealing that he is going to make a follow-up to his 2011 horror outing, Red State. While appearing at a screening of Clerks 3 in Austin, Texas (via Slash Film), Smith explained why he has been unable to make Red State 2...until now.

"The good folks at Lionsgate who financed this f------ motion picture ['Clerks III'], they put out 'Red State' on DVD like years ago. And the deal lapsed, and the people that own 'Red State,' the two financiers, weren't from the world of film. One was from the world of fashion, one was a Canadian financier not even in the world of film. So, when Lionsgate reached out about renewing, they got no response back from the copyright holders. I could tell them as much as I wanted till I was blue in the face. Like, 'No, renew it!' But I didn't own it. They did. So it just fell into a spam folder and f------ fell out of circulation.”

But now, following a conversation with Lionsgate, who have worked with Smith on the third Clerks movie, Smith can finally bring Red State 2 to life.

"Because we did this movie ['Clerks III'], we were talking to go home video. [Lionsgate's] like, 'Hey man, how come you guys wouldn't re-up "Red State" with us?' And I was like, 'They still didn't get back to you?' [Lionsgate] goes no, we been trying for f------ years. So we put it all back together and s---."

And it sounds like it did not take long for Smith to jump on board the idea of a sequel to Red State, which finds three teenagers caught in a honey trap. The boys soon find themselves in the hands of Abin Cooper (the late Michael Parks), a lunatic preacher who spews so much hatred that even neo-Nazis stay away and plans to kill the trio for their sins.

"They were like, if we do this, would you do it again? And I was like, yeah, in a heartbeat. [...] I mean, obviously, Michael Parks is gone. But it's just a story of crazy people with guns and s*** like that. As long as I could use John Goodman again. I could make a hundred f****** Red States. And I'm like, let's do it. So we're gonna make one."

Details of what Red State 2 would involve are currently known only to Smith himself, but no doubt fans are excited to return to the Rapture.

Red State 2 is not the only sequel currently being planned by Kevin Smith, with the filmmaker hoping to helm a follow-up to 2014’s Tusk. Titled Tusks, Smith has even revealed what the sequel would entail saying, "Early on I was always like, Well, eventually, they'll take them out of that walrus skin and try to rehabilitate them. And just like Harvey Dent in The Dark Knight Returns, he'll only ever see himself one way. Then he becomes the Howard Howe, Justin Long becomes the crazy guy who's trying to turn people into something else, Chimera things, half-human and half-whatever. Last time it was walrus, this time...you'll see."

Clerks 3 is set to be released on 4K Ultra HD, Blu-ray and DVD on December 6, 2022.
thankfully they removed all the potty talk :roll:

but yeah... again, smith is out of fresh ideas i guess. but this is one sequel i'd like to see.