May 27, 2010

The First Look At Alexander Seyum’s DARKMOON

Written By: Ken Hulsey
Sources: Alexander G. Seyum / Avery Guerra

What do you do if you are a Ironworker who has found it hard to find work during these rough economic times?

Why, you go to film school and make a werewolf movie of course.

It may sound like a joke, but that is exactly what Alexander Seyum did after he got laid off from his job as a boilermaker, he bit the bullet and decided to follow his dreams.

Seyum explains, “..I’m a student film maker currently at The Los Angeles Film School in Hollywood. But I wasn’t always a film maker. I was a Union Boilermaker local#92 and an Ironworker for 5 years. During that part of my life I was writing short stories, poetry and recording music as my side projects. The recession hit and my Union lost a whole lot of work. So I had to make a hard decision at that time in my life. Wait for the work to come back or take a leap of faith and follow my dreams and become a film maker. So I decided…become a film maker! I grew up watching horror films, being inspired by Stanley Kubrick, Martin Scorsesse, Oliver Stone, Quintain Tarantino and Stephen King.”

For his first film project, Seyum decided on a making a short werewolf movie entitled, “Darkmoon”, which is part “American Werewolf in London” with a good portion of the 1941 Universal classic, “The Wolfman”, added into the mix.

On “Darkmoon” the inspiring film maker teamed up with FX artist Zoie Roman, and his fellow Los Angeles Film School classmates, to create a modern film with the look and feel of the classics.

Roman was obviously inspired by the makeup created by Jack Pierce for Lon Chaney Jr when she designed the look for the werewolf in “Darkmoon”. (See Below)

It is so refreshing to see young film makers reverting back to the way movies used to be made before CGI came on the scene.

The film, which is about 15 minutes long, and cost about $1800 to make, was originally a short-story penned by Seyum called, “The Beast of Forest Greens”, which the film maker turned into a screen play.

Here is the synopsis:

For the past fifteen years there has been a myth about a creature lurking near the city of Los Angeles…today these sightings have reached an all time high.”

As someone who has lived in Southern California most of my life, I can tell you that there are all kinds of ‘creatures’ lurking around LA ………. some human, some trying to pass for human. You really have to see it to believe it sometimes.

Presently “Darkmoon” is in post production and Seyum is pondering over a list of potential film festivals to submit it to.

Here are some behind-the-scenes photos and the trailer for “Darkmoon”:

Filed under Cinema News, Monster Island News, Movie Monsters, Pop Culture