A NORTH Belfast man has launched a crowdfunding appeal for a new horror film, set to commence production later this year.
Twenty-nine year old Olcan McSparron has already had a number of notable successes in his fledgling film career to date.
A former St Malachy's College and Queen's University student, his company, Coin and Serpent Productions, has produced several feature films, short films and music videos, primarily on tight budgets. One of his films, 'Petyr,' premiered at the prestigious Raindance Film Festival in London earlier this year, having been produced on a budget of £600.
With his latest feature, 'Hemlock,' Olcan is hoping to go a few steps further.
"We've put £12,000 as a target in the Crowdfunding page. We're aiming for a final budget for the film in the £50-60,000 range. People have been very generous so far, and we're planning to look at other grants, high-profile investors and government bodies."
The idea for the film sprung from other shorter-form projects the North Belfast man is currently working on. Having realised that they would take some time to get investors on board, he switched focus to crafting a longer feature.
"I had two other completed scripts for films, which are low-budget. I'm in ongoing negotiations with several investors and production partners, one based in the United States, one based in Canada and one based in Italy, about getting funds together for them. I realised that could be a long-process, taking up to a year or so for us to have those funds secured.
"So I came up with the idea of Hemlock, which had been in the back-burner for a while."
There's no doubt that the film seems like it will have the capacity to draw a shriek from an audience, but McSparron says that there's going to be a deeper meaning behind the initial scare-factor.
"It's about a writer who is dying, and writing his 'magnum opus'. He realises he has focused his entire life on his career and hasn't really been close with his family. He goes to a castle in the countryside to write this final book, and he encounters the ghosts of the characters he has written and realises that a lot of his work is actually about his family.
"It's a story about a man who has fallen into the trap of his own ambition and lost sight of the more important things. It's a morality tale, but it is going to be quite a suspenseful hour. I do intend to have moments when the audience are really scared!
"The title comes from the series of books the author has written in the film. Hemlock is a herb with cult and folklore connotations for summoning the devil, demons or the dead. It's most famously used by one of the Witches in Shakespeare's Macbeth."
With pre-production, casting, and crewing up due to begin in September, busy times are ahead for the North Belfast filmmaker. As someone born and raised in the area, he puts huge importance on the use of local talent in his productions.
"Movies are a unique beast. You bring together people for a short period of time, maybe hire them in for a few months and then they'll go their separate ways after the project has ended.
"We're going to be doing an open audition process with local actors. We want to show what Belfast and Irish independent cinema can do. You see big productions come over here and be shot here, and that's fantastic.
"But I want to show what the actual talent here can do themselves. Movies that were written, shot and edited by filmmakers here who can really show what the Irish independent cinema sector can do."
