On Sunday June 13th we finally began principal photography on CHURCH OF THE EYES the long awaited next project from COPPFILMS. After tons of set backs, most of them personal and family related, including the somewhat sudden death of my Mother it was beginning to look like this was never going to happen. But things have pulled together and the first day is in the can.As far as first days go this was a relative breeze, shooting a scene involving nudity, a little bit of make up F/X and lots of weird costumes and lighting. We worked with a model named Odette Despair out of Columbus who was a dream to deal with, absolutely gorgeous, talented and just bursting with enthusiasm for her work and all things genre related.
The first day was a trip for me as I have made the (perhaps unwise) decision to star in this movie as well as direct. I chose to do this for several reasons 1) The insane shit required of the lead actor, I knew that I would never talk myself out of doing it or complain so long we'd loose time on the shoot. 2) I would ALWAYS be available to shoot when scheduled 3) I'd never need to explain what the hell is going on or why to the lead actor. Maybe those are all bad reasons. The movie has also become hauntingly personal to me with people I care about around me passing away or getting terminally ill, which makes the journey the movie takes something I felt I NEED to do. Still it is really hard to separate my focus and I see a lot of work ahead. THANK GOD for my D.P. Henrique Couto who is filling the slack really well there.Amanda DeLotelle who starred and did a shitload of other work on QUIET NIGHTS to the point she earned a co-producing credit, was back on board this time around and I am just as thankful to have her helping again. And thanks to Louu Staal for lending us his place at literally the last second when the first location fell through. It worked out tremendously, and looks fantastic.
This is the first movie I have shot in HD and the first movie I have shot using our new Canon EOS 7D. While it has turned out to be ridiculously expensive in a lot of ways, once I saw the footage (which I STILL have not gotten to see in full 1080 only downrezed on a monitor) I am now convinced it is worth the money. This looks NOTHING like ANYTHING else I have shot. A huge part of that can be racked up to Henrique doing a superlative job on DP too. Visually this movie is a canyon sized leap forward.
We are STILL looking for a lead actress though. Here is the scoop on that. Telsa from THE ATROCITY CIRCLE was cast and ready to do it, or so I thought. She waffled and I looked like I needed to recast, then she was back in, then she totally backed out. I'm not going into publicly why, outside to say she just wasn't committed to the idea of doing the project. Truly sad because she would have been very good in the role. I've looked into some other folks but there is always an issue with the fairly intense nudity/sexuality combined with the heavy religious themes of the rest of the movie. That seems to bother the people who ARE willing to take this kind of movie. So if anyone is interested or knows anyone interested, we are still talking to people for this role.
Thanks
Andy Copp
