By MICHAEL GINGOLD
The new movie combines a ghost story with body horror.
The trailer has been unveiled (see it below) for DieDieVideo’s HOMEBODY, written, produced and directed by Rachel Kempf and Nick Toti. The duo previously created IT DOESN’T GET ANY BETTER THAN THIS, the found-footage chiller that has received strong notices (including ours) during its theatrical-only release. HOMEBODY stars Julie Linnard, Elizabeth Joanne and Eric Stevenson, with makeup effects by Jeffrey Sisson. The synopsis: “A young widow named Meg meets a woman who claims to communicate with the dead. What follows is a battle of wills, cycling through stages of tenderness and bitter exploitation, as each woman struggles for dominance in their increasingly toxic and unsustainable relationship. Through all of this, the ghost of Meg’s husband watches silently, with plans of his own…”
Toti tells RUE MORGUE that Kempf, his wife and filmmaking partner, came up with HOMEBODY’s story “as a way to process her grief when a close family member died. At that time, a close friend of mine had also recently passed away, and all those complicated feelings got wrapped into this project. We wanted to make something that was the opposite of IT DOESN’T GET ANY BETTER THAN THIS, which is a very manic horror movie about friendship. HOMEBODY goes to the other end of the spectrum, as a slow-burn ghost story about depression and the inability to connect with people.
“It’s a movie that rewards patience,” he continues, “and a willingness to sit in some seriously uncomfortable feelings. Meg is not a likable protagonist in the traditional sense, but for anyone who’s been stuck in feelings of grief or just general depression, she’s relatable. For those people who watched MELANCHOLIA and wanted to slap Kirsten Dunst’s character and tell her to snap out of it, this may not be the movie for you. But for anyone who likes to curl up in a cozy blanket of sadness, they should definitely add HOMEBODY to their watch list—especially if they also like gross body horror and ghost stories!”
The filmmakers also aimed for a different visual/stylistic approach than their previous movies. “We shot HOMEBODY on MiniDV, apart from a few in-world-camera segments shot on iPhone, and then transferred all that footage to VHS for an additional layer of analog warmth and degradation,” Toti explains. “It’s also in black and white, giving the whole movie a classically Gothic feeling despite being an otherwise modern story. If you can imagine something like THE HAUNTING or WHAT EVER HAPPENED TO BABY JANE? but filtered through a sieve of analog horror, you’ll be in the ballpark of how it feels to watch HOMEBODY.”
The new feature does have one thing in common with IT DOESN’T GET ANY BETTER THAN THIS: It was shot in the same duplex. “The location didn’t have any running water or electricity,” Toti recalls, “so making it seem like a house where people lived presented some unique challenges—especially since we were filming on a nonexistent budget and had a crew that was sometimes just two or three people.
“I should also mention that the music for HOMEBODY is by the band Pocket Vinyl, and I’m not exaggerating when I say that I think it’s one of the all-time great horror-film scores. The trailer only hints at what the actual movie delivers, but even if people hate the movie, they’ll walk away praising the music.” Keep your eyes here for news on when you’ll be able to see and hear HOMEBODY! You can watch the filmmakers’ short DEAD GRANDMA, which won a Special Jury Award at this year’s Slamdance Film Festival, below the trailer.
