August and September on The Great Escape

Posted by Chrissey Harrison - 9th August 2011

We’ve had a few teething troubles keeping on top of our release schedule. We are still trying to get ahead of ourselves so we have material prepared in advance. So, carrying on regardless, here is what you can look forward to in the next two months.

1st August – FILM – Poo – Some days its just futile to try and wash your car.

8th August – FICTION – Good Girl Guides – a group of your girl guide campers get a little out of their depth in their rush to grow up.

15th August – COMIC – Final Zone #2 – Final Beyond brings us another gem of geek culture.

22nd August – BONUS – Chrissey’s writing tips #1 – some advice for new writers.

29th August – BONUS – Meet the Great Escape – meet the people behind the site in a video blog entry. (delayed from August)

5th September – VIDEO – Yarn – Follow a man on a journey of challenge and discovery (delayed from August)

12th September – FICTION – A short story from a new guest writer

19th September – COMIC – TBC

26th September – BONUS – The Great Escape interviews a special guest.

Gabriel Cushing: The Mid-shoot update

Posted by Rich - 21st July 2011

So, here we are, over halfway through principal filming for Gabriel Cushing vs. The Zombie Vampires, our web-series-come-feature-length-film. The last couple of weeks have felt like a non-stop smear of fangs, foliage, face-paint and most of all, blood. We have an overworked DP plowing through 1,166 takes of footage across 7 days of filming, crewmembers strewn like burnt-out wreckage of some terrible accident, but most of all, cast chomping at the bit to come back again this Saturday.

The first 4 days (Saturday to Tuesday) were hard. David, our returning cast member, found out he couldn’t get many days off over the course of the filming dates so all of the film that featured him had to be packed into early morning starts and late-night finishes. In the end, it meant that we ended up doing 18-hour days, 4 days in a row. It was heavy-going, with one scene being shifted twice and the Wednesday shoot having to be abandoned completely. However, over that time we got a huge amount of filming complete, with only 1 scene missed due to the skipped day.

Over the course of those 4 days, we had every main cast member turn up at some point, with most of them filming every night.

Over that period, we saw: a grizzly death, plenty of people being thrown about, a large number of biscuits consumed, one case of nail painting whilst unconsicous on an unsuspecting cast member, and purple feathers strewn throughout the woodland due to a feather boa that wouldn’t stop shedding.

After a short break in filming, we were back on Thursday, sans David, to film the fight and moments leading up to a vampire takedown and a few surrounding shots. Sadly, time constraints meant we were unable to get all the special effects ready in time to film the death itself, so it’s been moved to a couple of weeks’ time. We also filmed the producer’s cameos (although you don’t see our faces, so you’ll have to guess who is who!).

Monday saw the return of Marley, Keri, Andy and Gemma along with Gina (down for the day). Unfortunately, some last minute pull-outs meant we were down a couple of actors, so step in myself and Amy as ‘featured extras’ to act as vampire feasting material. Also, there was a percentage of stakings and also one count of sending Gina in full zombie costume down to the local chip shop gnawing on a severed leg from the prop store.

Tuesday saw our messiest death yet (no spoilers!) involving a mannequin head that spurted gloop out of it’s eyes and mouth. It was completely gross and kept spraying the crew whenever it got bunged up, but it gave us some excellent gory footage which we hope you’ll enjoy.

Finally, this last Monday saw us filming scene 1 of the film with new face Ollie, plus Marley and Nick. Sadly, shooting had to be abandoned due to bad weather but we got a large amount of it done, so hopefully that can be caught up with towards the end of the shoot.

Overall the filming is going well, but it’s just the tip of the iceberg for this production. Once we wrap, we’ve still got inserts to do, takes to be reviewed, editing to be done, sound to be worked on, dubbing to do, etc. All in all, it’s unlikely to be completed much before its scheduled release sometime in spring of 2012.

I want to thank everyone who’s been working to get us to where we are now. Massive thanks to all the wonderful cast we’ve met so far: David, Marley, Nick, Sam, Conner, Andy, Ollie, Gina, Keri, Gemma, Tom, Josh and Carolina. Big thanks to the crew: to Felek, Chrissey, Anna, Jonathan, Carina, Tig, Amy, Inma, Ben, Jan and anyone else I’ve probably forgotten in my sleep-deprived brain. Special big thanks go to Mark, without whom none of this would be happening. We’re all very excited about the film, the biggest production we’ve ever done bar-none, and really hope you enjoy it when we finally get to show it off early next year.

If you’re the impatient sort, why not come down THIS WEEKEND and join in by becoming part of our Zombie Vampire horde? Details are available on our Facebook event page or email us at [email protected], but you might want to check out this video first…

See you later!

Upcoming Projects at The Great Escape

Posted by Rich - 29th June 2011

As you may have read in our previous blog post, the last Monday of the month is devoted to giving you a peek into what happens behind-the-scenes and the divulging of tidbits of information here at The Great Escape.

This month, we’ll be flicking the blackout curtain on our upcoming projects & events.

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‘Terror of the Killer Carnivorous Coat‘ is a half-hour short film featuring missing persons, unspeakable horror and possessed fabrics. Written & directed by Mark R. Adams, it stars David Curtis, Nathan Head, Kristian Griffiths, Dan Westley, David Workman and Amy Cummins.

Filmed a couple of years ago, but still pending some post-production work and some minor reshoots, we are hoping to release it for Halloween this year.

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‘Gabriel Cushing versus the Zombie Vampires‘ is an upcoming 8-part web-series featuring the titular hero battling the bemused undead that are causing havoc around a sleepy village in the South-West. Written and directed by Mark R. Adams and starring David Curtis (who played Charlie in our short film ‘Threefold’), Conner McKenzy, Marley Hamilton, Sam Herbert and Nick Orchard, it is planned for release in spring of 2012 over the course of 4 months.

Cast and crew have been sorted, pre-production is just wrapping up, and we are preparing to begin shooting at the start of July over the course of 3 weeks.

This is actually our biggest project to date since we first started making films, so to help out we have ‘conscripted’ help through the excellent Bristol Event Volunteers along with every favour we have.

Expect more news over the upcoming months.

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‘Yarn‘ is an upcoming short about a man finding a string leading away from his house and ending up on an adventure. It’s written and directed by Chrissey Harrison and stars Matt Adams, Dan Westley and Verity Huntley.

Currently, the film is in the post-production stage awaiting licenses for music but expect to see it here in August/September this year.

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Hope this gives you all an idea of what we’re currently up to and hope you’ll join us next week as we present our next film ‘The Man Who Married The Sea‘… which stars ME! 😀

June and July on The Great Escape

Posted by Chrissey Harrison - 6th June 2011

We hope you have all been enjoying our launch content over the past week. As of next week we’ll be bringing you new content every Monday. The first Monday of the calendar month will be video week, followed by fiction week, comic week and bonus week where we’ll bring you a little something extra.

This Monday we’ve got a sneak preview of our up coming releases for the next two months and some new content in the Wiki.

So, here is what you can look forward to in June and July on The Great Escape:

13th June – Fiction – check in for another short story from Great Escape fiction editor, Chrissey.

20th June – Comic – The Great Escape welcomes a new comic writer and artist.

27th June – Bonus – Find out some more about our current film projects with an extended blog post.

4th July – Film – The Man Who Married the Sea – When a man leaves his wife-to-be at the alter and throws his wedding ring into the sea he finds himself in an altogether different relationship.

11th July – Fiction – Enjoy some poetry this week with a small collection of short poems from in house writers Chrissey and Amy.

18th July – Comic – A new comic, beautifully illustrated by artists from Hellbound Media.

25th July – Bonus – Meet The Great Escape film crew in a special video blog post.

1st August – Film – Yarn – A modern take on the silent movie, follow a man on a charming journey of challenge, humour and discovery.

Welcome to The Great Escape!

Posted by Rich - 30th May 2011

Hi and welcome to The Great Esc!

Every week we’ll be bringing you something new; films, fiction, comics and more. Tune in next week to find out what will be coming up over the next few months.

Right now we’ve got something for you to check out in every section:

 

FILM – Threefold
Filmed in 2007, Threefold was one of our earliest completed projects; pulled from the Great Esc vaults to celebrate the launch of the site. Charlie discovers the consequences of his actions when he is haunted by ghosts from his past. Written and directed by Mark Adams.

 

FICTION – The Diary of Joseph Mortimer
Originally written for a competition, The Diary of Joseph Mortimer is presented here for the first time in it’s full length form. Land owner and farmer Joseph learns a hard lesson about the price of charity on the night of Samhain. Gruesome horror from aspiring author Chrissey Harrison.

 

COMIC – The Monster Under the Bed
Read the exclusive full colour version of Hellbound Media’s comic The Monster Under the Bed. Things that go bump in the night may not always be your imagination. Written Matt Warner and illustrated by Anna Pennlund.

 

So take a look around, visit the forum and the wiki, and hopefully we’ll see you again soon.

The Great Esc Crew

The Great Escape