Special effects guru Stan Winston has worked on all three "Terminator" movies, "Aliens", the "Jurassic Park" series and "Pearl Harbor". Widely respected, he's one of the few SFX artists to be honoured on Hollywood's Walk of Stars. His latest film is horror movie "Wrong Turn", which he both produced and created the effects for.
Despite being hideous, the monsters in "Wrong Turn" are recognisably human...
We did a lot of research on the families in the Appalachians, looking at inbreeding and the results of inbreeding in terms of physical deformations and psychological and mental deformations. The physical deformations that the hillbillies [in the film] have are all based on scientific, medical research of things that can really happen through inbreeding.
What did the people of the Appalachians think about that?
Believe it or not there was a governor in West Virginia who was very upset with Hollywood depicting his state in less than positive ways. We're not on his favourite list right now! But this is a horror movie and it's there to scare you - not to scare people away from West Virginia. This movie is not about poetry. If you're looking for a movie with a poetic aspect to it, this isn't the movie to go see. It's a very, very simple story about survival in a very terrifying and horrific situation.
It seemed to owe a debt to 70s horror...
Audiences haven't seen a movie that's this hardcore terrifying since "The Hills Have Eyes", "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre" and all those other movies of the 70s. I don't see it so much as a throwback as much as a rebirth. "Jaws" made you afraid to go into the water, "Wrong Turn" will make you afraid to go into the woods again!
From your SFX point of view, were horror movies more realistic in the 70s?
First of all, I don't think of myself coming from a special effects point of view, but rather as creating characters. I don't do special effects, I create characters and I use the tools of special effects necessary to do it. But for some time now, the horror movie has mixed tongue-in-cheek teenage humour with horror. This movie wants to scare you as much as it possibly can. We all feel fear and we need to be able to get it out.
Director Rob Schmidt says you're a joy to work with because you get rid of all your stress on-screen...
I get pleasure out of coming up with ideas of how to kill people in new and exciting ways. There are some very visually satisfying kills in "Wrong Turn" and it allows me to be a very pacifistic person in real life. I'm probably the most pacifistic person you'll ever meet. I've never owned a gun, I couldn't kill a bug. But give me a movie and I'll destroy everything in my wake!
