Scott on Live at Five talking about Matriarch
On the set of Matriarch
Impossible was the word we kept hearing when we started looking for crew members to shoot Matriarch - a 90 minute horror / thriller film we aimed to shoot in 12 days on a working farm just north of Glasgow. The budget was approximately £35k and allowed no more than a 12 day shooting schedule and a tiny crew. 18 months later Matriarch was picked up by LA sales agent Covert Media and sold to Lionsgate for North American rights.
So lets start at the beginning. I met Matriarch’s producer Steven Little a few years earlier during my time as an actor at BBC Scotland, we both wanted to make feature films, I wanted to write and direct and Steven wanted to produce. So we joined forces and set out to raise money for a film I wrote called Catalyst. At this time I was continually on TV playing the role of DC Will Cooper in the incredibly popular Scottish TV drama River City and it really helped to get our proposal in front of investors. Over a period of about 2 years we had money pledged by a variety of investors and we began to plan the shoot. We were so excited, 2 years of proposals, budgeting and pitching was paying off, or at least we thought so, but, just as we approached pre-production a major investor dropped out and the project was dead in the water.
Steven and I had worked our socks off on Catalyst and we were ready, even set up a base and production office for the shoot at a farm with a big barn that doubled as a studio. The farm was owned by Alan Cuthbert a farmer and entrepreneur who I had met at one of my film and TV courses - a real character, very generous and a huge supporter of independent film. Alan offered us so much support throughout and was just as gutted that Catalyst was not going ahead.
But in amongst the disappointment I saw real possibility, I saw a group of talented, capable people with a massive purpose and motivation to create something regardless of whether that was not just about getting paid. So I went to Steven and Alan and put forward a proposal. I said, what if I write a film to fit the budget (which was about £35k and mostly our own money) and we shoot it all on the farm? I had an idea for a horror / thriller film inspired by the 80’s horror style Hammer House Horror which always scared me to death as a youngster. I pitched the idea and they loved it albeit a bit horrified by my imagination.
The upside of doing a film with mostly our own money was that we didn’t have investors to keep happy, we were free to shoot exactly what we wanted. The downside was that Steven, Alan and I had to do multiple roles. This included Alan being Exec producer, art department, actor (he played the farmer) and location manager. I was also instructed to play a supporting role in the film - the character that has several stunts - we couldn’t afford a stunt double!
Scott Vickers directing actor/producer/farmer Alan Cuthbert
I doubled as casting director and sent out character breakdowns to several agencies all over the UK, most of the large London agencies disregarded us and we certainly didn't have the money to pay for known actors. Luckily due to being known in Scotland the Scottish agencies sent us some incredible actors and we spent several weeks in the audition process. Including putting a casting call out on an indie filmmaking site called Shooting People - one of the actresses who auditioned though Shooting People was Charlie Blackwood, she landed the lead role as Rachel Hopkins.
Shooting a 90 minute movie in 12 days was a huge risk. If we lost a day or something went wrong there was no contingency, we simply didn’t have the money for extra time.
The shoot was one of the best experiences of my life. We hired people who were all committed to the project and it really proved that when you get a group of people with a big purpose that transcends money and they just want to do it for the love of it amazing things happen. Every crew member had several roles. Production staff were extra, actors helped out the art department, I had to build my own coffin… you’ll understand when out watch the movie.
We completed the shoot on time and in full and we were broke! Post production took over a year as we needed to raise some more cash and wait for the right people to come onboard but luckily we found them and we finished the movie.