Online Exclusive: Horror Film Directors Dish About 'Grindhouse' Trailers

Eli Roth

Eli Roth (director of Hostel) describes himself as the bastard Frankenstein offspring of Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez. "In the '90s, everybody said, 'What effect are these violent movies going to have on society?'" he remembers. "And the answer is 'Eli Roth.'" He directed a trailer for the holiday-themed slasher flick Thanksgiving.

What was the inspiration for Thanksgiving?
My friend Jeff, who plays the killer pilgrim -- we grew up in Massachusetts, we were huge slasher movie fans and every November we were waiting for the Thanksgiving slasher movie. We had the whole movie worked out: A kid who's in love with a turkey and then his father killed it and then he killed his family and went away to a mental institution and came back and took revenge on the town. I called Jeff and said, "Dude, guess what, we don't have to make the movie, we can just shoot the best parts."

How long did it take to shoot?
Two days. If I actually thought about what I had to do, I never would have done it. But how can you say no? When Quentin calls, you gotta accept the charges. I scheduled it in Prague right after my Hostel: Part II shoot. I told everybody, "Get me the oldest, crappiest cameras we can find and let's just chop people's heads off for two days and get as many naked girls as we can and just trust me." No matter how many movies I make my whole life, that two-and-a-half minute trailer is what I'll be remembered for: "Eli Roth -- he had a guy fucking a turkey with a decapitated head on it."

Did you have a good time making it?
It was the most fun I've ever had shooting anything. All I want to shoot now are fake trailers, because there's no rules. You grab your friends, point a camera at someone, have them say a line, and it looks like a huge punch line from a scene. But the best part about trailers is it's all money shots. Everyone tells me that I'm extra happy whenever I'm shooting a kill scene. They say, "You're different when you're shooting a torture scene or a decapitation. You have this sparkle in your eye. You're bouncing around, you're glowing -- any time you're killing people or you're shooting nudity."

So are you going to make more?
I'm talking about doing a whole movie of fake trailers with Robert and Quentin called Trailer Trash. Robert hit the nail on the head when he said that you feel as if you've shot a real movie in two days. I can shoot my blaxploitation movie, I can shoot my Vietnam flashback movie, I can shoot my 80s sex comedy: Eager Beavers. I can do every holiday slasher movie: Passover Massacre, Hannukill.

Arbor Day!
Well, Mad magazine did that in 1981, so I'd have to license it. I still have that issue -- in fact, the design for the titles in Thanksgiving are taken from Arbor Day.

How'd you get all those Czechs to play pilgrims in the parade scene?
We made announcements on the radio saying, "Come be in a Quentin Tarantino/Robert Rodriguez movie." And so everybody in the town showed up, including seven-year-old majorettes. And we explained that someone's going to get their head chopped off, but nobody spoke any English. As soon as that head came off, blood squirting everywhere, the girls just ran screaming. It was actual panic: kids were crying, they've got blood on their white shoes. After a few hours the girls got the joke and they all started playing soccer with the head.