“Howl” is a UK-produced short film in which schoolteacher Karen Crawshaw “unravels the mystery behind the odd relationship between her new pupil and a stranger with a dark secret.” It’s being shot in Surrey this February, and it’s the most well-organized “indie” production I think I’ve ever been asked to help publicize. They’ve got their cast, location, gear, storyboards, creature FX and basically everything else figured out, and they’re using Kickstarter to raise the remaining £2,000 they need to pay for the project.
Director Jamie Sims emailed me a few months back to see if I might be able to recommend a UK-based maker of creature prosthetics, and while I wasn’t able to help much in that regard (I live in a Canadian city where they’re making at least one Hollywood werewolf picture a year and I can’t even get a foot in that door), I can share some more details from Howl’s Head of Marketing Ben Cowan:
The film hopes to regenerate interest in the horror/monster genre through combining metaphorical parallels between a common evil within society (child abuser/paedophilia) and a traditional creature of nightmares. Using this, the film explores both adult and child fears.
We are currently releasing production videos and concept art on both our Facebook page and our website, that will allow followers to feel a part of the action, and also feel a part of our production team, embarking on the filmmaking journey as we do too.
At the time of this post, the Kickstarter campaign had less than £800 to go with 19 days left, and there are some really interesting perks available, including two pieces of world-building bonus content:
Ministry of Defence Classified Dossier
In July 2010, Scotland Yard ran an investigation into the mysterious circumstances surrounding the death of Karen Crawshaw. Upon reading and analysing the events described in the late Miss. Crawshaw’s diary, Scotland Yard concluded that the case be passed onto the Ministry of Defence. The investigation is ongoing and strictly classified, but a number of restricted dossiers have surfaced online.
Karen Crawshaw’s Original Diary
Locked away in the vaults of the MOD for a number of years, very few have read Karen Crawshaw’s original diary from 1994. Handwritten, she describes the strange occurrences in the village of Chillum and beyond, including the bizarre behaviour of Eleanor Stagg as she grew up. The diary has seen some wear over the years, but still retains the various ink splodges and sketches by the original owner within.
If you’d like to start 2013 off with some charitable giving in support of a short werewolf film, give Howl a look!