Late Night Classics – Prince of Darkness

From the very beginning, director John Carpenter proved he had an unparalleled vision and that he was going to be one for the record books. In 1969, while still a graduate student at the University of Southern California [USC], he wrote, composed, and edited the Oscar-winning short The Resurrection of Broncho Billy. Then, he and classmate Dan O’ Bannon [writer of Alien] made Dark Star, a student short that was filmed in 16mm and was a Master’s thesis that eventually expanded into his first feature in 1974.

After toiling around writing screenplays [Black Moon Rising, The Eyes of Laura Mars], John would make an exploitation classic that was part Howard Hawks and part George A. Romero. Assault on Precinct 13 was a reference-filled suspense tale that won audiences over with its edgy bravado and unrelenting violence.

The ball was just rolling as this lead to one of my favorite films of all-time, Halloween. It was shot in various locations in and around Southern California – most of the streets were the beautiful neighborhoods of Pasadena. What he and producer Debra Hill did with little money, little time, and a true love of the craft is extraordinary. Like Jaws before it, the key to Halloween is the menacing score and faceless killer that lurks just behind a house, or a bush, or by the local school in Midwest suburbia where families take blind comfort in thinking they are immune to the black heart that has come knocking on their door.

John Carpenter reunited with Jamie Lee Curtis on the The Fog, tackled the Western with the science fiction action film Escape from New York, and then made the greatest remake ever with The Thing. After taking a critical blasting for the viciousness of The Thing, Carpenter went into Stephen King territory with Christine, which brilliantly captured man’s fascination with his vehicle and how your wheels can take over your soul and destroy relationships in the process.

Wanting to show his softer side, Starman was made and it was the flip side of his updating of John W. Campbell’s short story, Who Goes There? There are some marvelous make-up effects from the great Dick Smith, but the most glaring oversight of Starman is the performance of Jeff Bridges. His role here is where he should have won his first Oscar for Best Actor.

Big Trouble in Little China is ahead, I mean, way ahead of it’s time mixing martial artists, action, comedy, science fiction, and horror. People have to remember this is long before the chop-socky Asian influence had become commonplace in the U.S psyche. Studio interference on Big Trouble would force John to stray away from the studio system and get back to his roots, as he signed a multi-picture deal with Alive Pictures and out of that merger came Prince of Darkness and They Live.

I cannot tell you how hard it was to choose the one John Carpenter film that I wanted to give the respect it deserves. I toyed with They Live. Thought about In the Mouth of Madness. And was close to giving some love to Village of the Damned. In the end, it was a no-brainer for me to go with John’s darkest film to date, Prince of Darkness.

Jason Bene: After making Big Trouble in Little China, was it imperative your next film have a smaller budget with an independent company where you had more creative control?

John Carpenter: Yes. That’s the whole situation in a nutshell. I wanted to get away from the studios.

Jason Bene: You wrote the movie under the pseudonym ‘Martin Quatermass’. Can you talk about the connection to Nigel Kneale and the fictional scientist he created?

John Carpenter: The ‘Martin Quatermass’ pseudonym was my way of tipping my hat to Nigel Kneale and his groundbreaking serials that he did for the BBC [The Quatermass Experiment]. They were a combination of science fiction that mostly took place in the real world. That was very much on my mind, and also the mixture of science, horror, and fantasy.

Jason Bene: The look of the picture has a slightly distorted look to it. You are known for using an anamorphic lens to get the most coverage out of every shot. What kind of camera did you use and were you trying something new with the off-kilter flow to the framework?

John Carpenter: I used a Panavision camera with Panavision lenses. I don’t know about off-kilter. Maybe that was my state of mind at the time.

Jason Bene: From the lengthy opening credits to the nihilistic finale, your score is unrelenting. How did you come up with notes that were so haunting?

John Carpenter: I just have to be real honest about it. My composing capabilities are minimal. I have a decent feel. All you hear is me improvising along with the movie. Watching it and playing with it with various keyboards and overlapping and double-tracking and triple-tracking and just building up a feel. That’s basically what it was. Very simple.

Jason Bene: You brought in cronies like Donald Pleasance, Dennis Dun, Victor Wong, and future confidant Peter Jason to the ensemble. It must be exciting to work with a group of professionals who are also your friends.

John Carpenter: It was great. It was great fun. I just loved working with Donald again. I hadn’t seen him or worked with him since Escape from New York. He became a very close friend. He’s one of my favorite actors. It was wonderful working with him. I also became friends with Dennis Dun and Victor Wong. I thought I would do a different kind of casting. You have a scientist and I though Victor could pull that off. My wife [Sandy King Carpenter] had known Peter Jason and worked with him. This was her first movie on the production side. She said, “Try casting him.” It was wonderful. I love working with him.

Jason Bene: You took an intellectual approach to science vs. religion and how both of them perceive the devil.  Did you do research on metaphysics and atomic theory?

John Carpenter: A lot. It isn’t exactly a devil. It’s an Anti-God, which is very different. The devil by biblical terms is just a fallen angel. He started a rebellion in Heaven and was cast out. He’s not on the evil par with the deity. This is an anti-deity basically. I guess I didn’t explain that very well in the movie.

Jason Bene: You seemed to be going for the less is more approach with Frank Carrisosa’s make-up effects. Were you happy with the final results?

John Carpenter: I was very happy with it. I was especially happy with what Catherine turned into. I thought that was pretty good. I was very happy.

Jason Bene: The dream sequence involving the tachyon sent from the future is a foreboding piece of celluloid that fans still talk about to this day. Every time I discuss this flick, that’s the scene everyone says freaked them out.

John Carpenter: That’s weird. I never thought of that. That’s great. That’s interesting. I have to keep that in mind.

Jason Bene: I was so curious about the church that you filmed the exteriors for that I drove to L.A. to check it out and it pretty much looks the same.

John Carpenter: Is it still there?

Jason Bene: It is and I think it’s a theater/playhouse now.

John Carpenter: What street is that on down there?

Jason Bene: I don’t remember. I plugged the address into my GPS and headed out to see it. I told my wife that I think the inside of the movie was shot in Long Beach.

John Carpenter: Parts of it were. We shot in all sorts of places on that. We shot the interior of the church in Long Beach and we actually had a set built. There were various places.

Jason Bene: You shot it in my backyard because I was born and raised in Long Beach, California. I’ve always had a connection to this movie.

John Carpenter: Good man. There was an old hotel down there. It was used in a lot of sets for movies. It’s crumbling.

Jason Bene: I bet it was one of the hotels on Ocean Boulevard.

John Carpenter: I believe it was. It was falling apart and it was dangerous. We went right in because of the look.

Jason Bene: Rocker Alice Cooper cameos as a ‘street schizo’ who impales Etchinson with a bisected bicycle. Where did that gag originate from?

John Carpenter: That was Alice Cooper’s gag that he did on stage. He said, “Can I bring this along?” I said, “That would be great, we should use that.” It worked.

Jason Bene: I don’t think you had to do much directing to make him creepy. Just put some white make-up on his face.

John Carpenter: He’s a very nice man. He just had a good time. He knew exactly what to do.

Jason Bene: When Etchinson goes down the stairs and sees the pigeon on the crucifix you can hear Cooper’s song ‘Prince of Darkness’ playing.

John Carpenter: I don’t remember now, man. It was too many years ago.

Jason Bene: You have fans like me with too much time on our hands.

John Carpenter: God bless you all. God bless you.

Jason Bene: The tone and ambiance you create has an Italian flavor to it. The movie sits comfortably next to The Gates of Hell and Suspiria. Would you say this is your ‘Spaghetti Horror Film’?

John Carpenter: [Laughs] I don’t know. I hadn’t thought of that. That’s really interesting.

Jason Bene: Maybe I read into it too much. I think it was all the bugs and insects that made me think of those films.

John Carpenter: That’s right out of [Luis] Buñuel. He had a lot of surrealism and insects running around in his work.

Jason Bene: Prince of Darkness falls in the middle of your ‘Apocalypse Trilogy’ [The Thing, In the Mouth Of Madness]. It wasn’t welcomed with open arms upon its initial release, but since then it has found its audience. What does the movie mean to you looking back on it?

John Carpenter: I have real fond memories of that because it was a return to low budget and it was really fun to make. We managed to put together something kind of creepy for very little money. It had a real neat atmosphere to it. It had a real deep feel to it. I am very proud of the film.

Jason Bene: With its 25th Anniversary right around the corner maybe we will see a Blu-ray release.

John Carpenter: [Laughs] You never know.

Jason Bene: I think there is a Region 2 DVD that you do an audio commentary [with Peter Jason] for.

John Carpenter: Oh God, I don’t remember. Probably.

Jason Bene: Do you think there really is a ‘Brotherhood of Sleep’ somewhere in this world watching over a canister of swirling green Anti-God?

John Carpeneter: [Laughs] I don’t know man. I hope so. I hope they maintain. I thought that was a neat concept. I kind of enjoyed myself on that. It was ripped off of a movie called The Sentinel. It was a book.

Jason Bene: The one from the 70′s with Chris Sarandon?

John Carpenter: Yes.

Jason Bene: That’s a scary movie!

John Carpenter: It’s a weird film, isn’t it? Its about priests who hold back the doorway to hell or something like that.

Jason Bene: John Carradine had those white eyes and he just stood in the window.

To interview director John Carpenter about one of my favorite movies from him is a dream come true. Thank you so much John, and I can speak for all of your fans and say we cannot wait to see your first feature film in almost a decade, The Ward, sometime in the near future.