Reel Horror

Kevin Smith is in the UK doing Q&A with his fans across the pond. While there he sat down with Rotton Tomatoes and revealed not only the title of his next flix, "Red State", but the subject as well. Smith is fascinated with Fred Phelps, the preacher who founded a conroversial church in Kansas, made of largely his extended family. Phelps' clan is infamous for the protests they stage at funerals for solders killed in Iraq. The have said in the past that the war and subsiquent deaths is a direct consequence for America's "tolerence" of homosexuals. To say they are homophobic is a gross understatement.

From the interview:

"That dude has always fascinated me and he's really informed the horror movie that I'm working on," Smith told us, "The movie's called 'Red State' and it's very much about that subject matter, that point of view and that position taken to the absolute extreme. It's certainly not Phelps himself but it's very much inspired by a Phelps figure."

But while Smith is convinced that "horror" is the right definition for the film, he's not so sure audiences will agree. "To me there's all kinds of horror, and killing someone's not the absolute worst thing you could do to another human being," he said, "The death in a horror movie has always been the money shot in a very exploitative manner. Stabbing somebody and splashing blood all over them is the equivalent to some dude exploding over some broad's face.

"And to me, too, the notion of using a Phelps-like character as a villain, as horrifying and scary as that guy can be, there's even something more insidious than him that lurks out there in as much as a public or a government that allows it and that's the other thing that I'm trying to examine in a big, big way. It's weird because for a few months I've been saying 'horror movie' and technically it is, but it's also not a very traditional horror movie in the sense that people have been asking me, 'Is it a slasher movie? Is it like the Japanese horror flicks?' It'd be much easier to just show it to them when I'm done and be like, 'This is what I meant.' At which point I'm sure there'll be people saying, 'This ain't a horror movie!' But to me, it is."

Before I was hesitant about this project because it was such a departure from his past work, but I find this concept fascinating.