Interview with Howard J Ford - Director of Never Let Go

 

Ahead of Legend’s UK TV Premiere of horror revenge thriller NEVER LET GO on Saturday June 3, director Howard J Ford reflects on a near family tragic experience, the importance of locations and returning to his horror genre roots.

Your nail-biting revenge thriller NEVER LET GO is having its channel premiere on LEGEND on June 3. Excited or what?

It’s always exciting to know one of your movies is going to be on the telly and watched by thousands at one time rather than one streamer at a time! I fine I feel totally different when I watch a broadcast of my film, it accentuates my cringe at all the things I could have done better! Ha.

Looking back at the making of the movie, what memories stand out for you?

It was a hell of an experience shooting Never Let Go amongst the twisty, turns of the Marrakesh streets. I recall running round with a fully laden Steadicam following our wonderful star Angela Dixon and dripping with so much sweat I almost could not see anything and that I might die of heatstroke at any minute!

You’ve gone on record as saying the film was inspired by a near-tragic experience with your son. Can you tell us more?

Yes – to say I was ‘Frantic’ is an understatement. I thought my 3 year old son had been abducted from a holiday resort I was at. I was running around looking for him shouting like a lunatic and I was convinced he has been taken.  I remember seeing a guy loading something into the back of a small open back car, like a lump in a sack and I was going to leap on him from a huge height, that turned out to be vegetables. My mind was going at 1000 miles an hour. In the end, he was at the bottom of the swimming pool and I only just found him in time. The ‘miss’ was so near, it affected me greatly and I wanted to make a film where a mother had everything against her in a race against time to get her child back. I even cast my son as a kidnapped kid!

The casting of Angela Dixon as Lucy is inspired. How did you discover her?

Angela Dixon is an amazing talent and a lovely lady to boot. We had met at a networking event in Cannes and I checked her showreel and realised she was talented and we were both into fitness and 5 years later I needed someone for this part and BOOM, Angela sprang to mind and off we went to Morocco… I love meeting actors and you just never know when you can cast them.

The locations are pretty spectacular, as in all of your films. Is this an important element of the filmmaking process for you?

Thanks. It really is and the locations are a huge part of the adventure I want to take audiences on. Just like Africa in The Dead, India in the Dead 2, I really like to take my audiences somewhere very different from their living room with a couch in it. I want them to ‘feel’ it and sense it and locations are a huge part of that.

You wrote and produced, as well as directed NEVER LET GO. Do you think having independent creative freedom was crucial to what you wanted to achieve with this film?

I did, I also camera operated and all sorts and that ‘hands on’ element was important to me. It’s an indie film. No one commissioned it or financed it, I just went and did it as I was desperate to turn that awful feeling I had experienced into something real that could be seen and somehow exorcised from me. It was a scramble with a small band of crew but everyone did a super job both on and off screen.

As an independent filmmaker, what do you find are the greatest frustrations?

Normally it’s the fact you don’t have the money to make the film so indie film makers spend 90% of their time chasing money and not actually making films which is the thing they fell in love with. Also you don’t have a ‘money hose’ so to speak to wash away your practical and technical problems so that puts you in the corner all too often. You have to think on your feet, often on your hands and knees!

Fast-forwarding, you’ve returned back to your horror genre roots with your latest films ESCAPE and DARKGAME.  Tell us what you can about both films?

Yes, DarkGame has its first screening this Cannes and has an amazing cast headed by Ed Westwick who was the star of Gossip Girl. A super performance; he plays Ben a detective in a race against time to stop the presenter of a warped online live murder show on the dark web. Producer Tom George did a super job of developing the film so on this one I had his great support and an amazing team.

Escape which is my 10th feature film as director – again we’re back to my indie roots and it’s shot on a desert island. A Beautiful holiday destination where ten young women ( a lovely ensemble headed by ‘Scream Queen’ Sarah Alexandra Marks and Sophie Rankin)  kidnapped for sex trafficking by a heinous gang -  their lead villain played by Sean Cronin who was in Mission Impossible and a Bond movie to name but a few. It’s a revenge thriller and the girls are not going to take it lying down. It should be a real heart pumper and somewhat of a blast!

When can we expect to see them?

Both DarkGame and Escape should be out before the end of the year. We don’t have the release dates yet and you generally have to wait for the US to release first but as soon as we have them I’ll shout it loud!

Finally, what else does 2023 hold for you?

I’m working on another film from the team we worked with on The Ledge. Writer Tom Boyle and Producer Fred Hedman of GFM Films. We’re very excited about this one and I hope it’s another nail biter  - about a family on an adventure trip in an RV that turns nasty when an altercation with a gang of hells angles becomes a fight to the death! News on this soon.

NEVER LET GO airs on Legend on Saturday 3rd June, 9pm.

TV: Sky 148 / Virgin 149 / Freeview 41 / Freesat 137

Interview with Howard J Ford - Director of The Lockdown Hauntings

“I am a believer in using what you have as an indie film-maker and I had a global pandemic! There was a sudden influx of fear, isolation and anxiety. I wondered, could I do anything cinematic with that?” 

Ahead of the UK digital release of his latest film THE LOCKDOWN HAUNTINGS on May 3, director & writer Howard J Ford talks about being a one-man crew, casting Tony Todd, his do-it-yourself SFX kit and losing his uncle to the Pandemic.

You shot THE LOCKDOWN HUNTINGS during the UK’s first lockdown. Was the COVID-19 outbreak the inspiration? If so, why a ghost story?

Howard: It absolutely was. I am a believer in using what you have as an indie film-maker and I had a global pandemic! There was a sudden influx of fear, isolation and anxiety. I wondered, could I do anything cinematic with that?  I then heard that the virus is not even alive, yet this not-living thing was out there taking lives and not only that, it was INVISIBLE!   None of us knew how close this deadly thing was to them… I wondered, could I weave that into a plot, then it hit me.. A ghostly killer. That’s something could do!

Although it can be described as a supernatural horror thriller, at heart lie some interesting issues around spiritual belief, our relationship with the dead and the need to forgive. Were these themes always at the heart of the script or did they evolve during filming?

Howard: Thanks. I do love layers in whatever I am making, so I love trying to find out what could be underneath, what is at the heart of it so to speak. And in the beginnings of lockdown there was all this anger and blame as to whose fault it was that we found ourselves where we are and I felt we all needed some healing elements so I wanted to find a way of getting this in there.

You shot the film single-handedly. What was the both the biggest challenge and the most liberating aspect?

Howard: Yes, I quickly realised that if I was going to pull this film off during lockdown, I would not be able to have anyone with me at all. That and staying two metres away from any actors it was really a challenge. Firstly, I needed to find out if actors would let me film in their homes and a social media post gave me my answers and who was up for it. Then I picked what I felt were the absolute best cast from that. The liberating thing was, so long as the actors were ok with it, I was free to take the film in whatever direction I felt it should go at the time without having to consult a single person. I recall one moment sitting in my car outside a Tesco’s garage having shot with one actor in the morning and about to set off to another, I had a sandwich which cost £2.61 and as I finished it I realised, I just fed the whole crew for less than 3 quid!

The casting of Tony Todd is inspirational. How did that come about? And the acting, in general, is great. Good to see a vibrant Angela Dixon on our screens again. Was casting a difficult operation given the restrictions that were in place then?

Howard: I love Tony Todd so much and I was SO thrilled when I realised he might come on board The Lockdown Hauntings. I had met Mr Todd on a flight to LA, by ‘chance’ some years back, we were sat next to each other and we spent many hours talking about all sorts of amazing things. He’s really a lovely guy and very deep and pun’s-aside, time flew by. I had also soon after that worked with John Rhys-Davies on a champagne film of all things and then found out they had the same manager, a super chap called Jeff Goldberg so we re-connected, then when I was about to go forward with ‘The Lockdown Hauntings’ and needed to cast Jordan Myers the main paranormal expert, I kind of meditated over who would be the absolute best person to do this and I thought, ‘go big’, then BOOM. Tony Todd appeared in my head and I thought, it’s a long shot but what the heck, give Jeff a call, and it all fell into place from there.

Angela Dixon is always great to work with and she went through so much on ‘Never Let Go’, which was not an easy shoot I felt she might like to do something totally different and she seemed to love the idea too and also helped fill in some of the many gaps I had on dialogue and things as I was too busy making the film to properly write it. The cast were so fabulous on this film and somehow we all just got on with it, no messing about, we just hit go and did our best within the circumstances.

Given you had no crew to assist, how did you manage to achieve the numerous special effects that run all the way through the movie?

Howard: I realised I might have to go back to basics on many aspects and I have to be honest, I’m not a fan of big CGI films as I always find it hard to believe the world no matter how impressive, so I thought, well, what would they have done on ‘The Exorcist’, or ‘The Omen’, two films that scared the heck out of me, sometimes with moments that were not full of SFX.. So I re-looked into the ‘old school’ way of doing things and read stories of people pushing furniture around and things being pulled with fishing wire and air machines etc, so I made myself an SFX kit and tried to do as much as possible practically. In post, I do have some fab CGI chaps and I hope between us we can still shock and jolt you and even surprise you in all sorts of places.

You sadly lost your uncle during this period. Did that having a bearing on the project?

Howard: I did, to the virus too.  It was the weirdest thing as no one could attend and we had to watch his funeral on what looked like a kind of YouTube video, all our family folks in separate homes too. I watched some people I’d never met carry his coffin up the aisle and read some words from the family. Play a couple of his favourite songs, some I remember him playing when I was at his flat in London writing my early scripts, then he was gone. This was the guy that got me into fitness, but he enjoyed his life and I felt he would have said to me, just go do it.

Moving away from THE LOCKDOWN HAUNTINGS…before the pandemic struck you completed filming on THE LEDGE. Can you tell us a bit about the film?

Howard: Yes, ‘The Ledge’ which is a bit of a female cliff-hanger was a totally different production scenario. We had a crew of like 64 people and a far bigger set up. Which is great in one way, but unlike ‘The Lockdown Hauntings,’ you can’t change direction or suddenly decide to do this instead of that, or I’d have had my ass fired straight away! Ha.  I actually shot ‘The Lockdown Hauntings’ just before I flew off to do ‘The Ledge’, so both films were made in Lockdown. ‘The Ledge’ is a nail biting thriller/horror written by Tom Boyle and produced by Evolution/GFM whom I worked with on the distribution/sales of ‘The Lockdown Hauntings’. It’s a very high-concept, exciting  story of one female climber stuck high up on the side of a mountain fighting off four killers on a ledge twenty feet above her. It will be getting some great theatrical releases but not for some months after ‘The Lockdown Hauntings’.

The inevitable question but it needs to be asked. Will ‘The Dead’ be walking again?

Howard: Well, by brother Jon and I do discuss it every now and then and we will consider doing ‘The Dead 3’ if the situation was right. If it happens, it will not be for a few more years. They are painful films to make and very nearly killed us for real.

ADVENTURE BOYZ, your all-action family thriller, starred you and your two sons. A thespian one-off or are there ambitions for the Fords to get in front of the camera again?

Howard: Now that’s a film full of love. I made that the summer before the lockdown as I felt we already had a global disaster on our hands. That disaster being that all our children, and probably us too were relying far too much on our devices and not getting out into the real world where the real joys are, so I made ‘Adventure Boyz’ and cast my own two boys in it as I wanted to see if my story could incentivise them, and any other kids around the world to ‘get off their devices and get out there’! Sadly it came out following a lovely theatrical run as the world was told to get indoors and get on zoom! Maybe it will be re discovered. Was fun to act in too, I was never meant to be in it quite so much but I was just so available! Felix is in The Lockdown Hauntings, his third feature film before he was 10!

Finally, what’s coming up for you?

Howard: Well I’m actually moving forward right now with ‘The Lockdown Hauntings 2: Second Wave’! I’ve already shot some sequences and will be doing the rest over the next couple of months or so. Hope to reveal more in Cannes. That and a couple of other projects including another supernatural film I have written called ‘Indelible’. I also have a TV series, ‘Echo Road’ I have been developing. Other than that, let’s all enjoy some life in case we get locked-down again! With ‘The Lockdown Hauntings’ I hope it’s a very different way of reflecting on lockdown and our journey through it.

THE LOCKDOWN HAUNTINGS IS RELEASED ON 3rd MAY ON DIGITAL PLATFORMS, COURTESY OF ALTITUDE

Pre-Order from iTunes