VERAL
Writer, Director
A neo-Gothic comic horror short.
VERAL is a short film based on Gregory Hill’s short story entitled “Now Museum, Now You Don’t.” Both Hill’s short story and Erin Harper’s screenplay adaptation were published in 2018 by Jap Sam Books in an anthology entitled, Future Rural Archive.
Haze, “big-city” newspaperman, searches the High Plains for a “country-flavor” story for the Post. The urban/rural divide is palpable the moment he arrives. Is understanding possible between city slickers and this reclusive community? His search leads him to the Veral "Wax" Museum, presided over by solitary teen Alicia. The basement houses the town’s mummified dead, preserved through her forebears' formula, dating from the Homestead Act. Alone in this stark tomb, Alicia seeks to transfigure the irrevocable law of life and death while Haze's deadline hangs in the balance.
Our Seed&Spark crowd-funded green screen shoot was a huge success on March 7 & 8, 2020 — and just in time before the shutdown. After a hiatus of my 4-month COVID hell spell, vfx was back on track. Production photos showing how I probably got COVID.
Production photos, design inspiration and a test shoot in a garage. Photo credits: Peter Brown, Lacey Niccoli, Angela Juarez, Kristen Lopos, Dennis Connors, Patrick Selvage and David Marek.
Screen shots from the Colorado shoot
Pre-pro LookBook
