"That spelling is totally wrong in Italy!"
-Yeah, we know.
"It doesn't even mean anything highly intelligent!"
-Yeah, we know.
"You are just cheap copycats of the MASTERO's of the Giallo-genre!"
-Yeah, we know and do it by honoring their work!
World's first “Fiallo” movie!
Tre Caldo Gatto Bottiglia Assassino a Portata Di Mano • Cat in the Bottle • Kissanpäivät (also known by the working title TENÚ), is a new, experimental proto Giallo that's an unseen movie experience made in Finland. Our so-called "Fiallo-genre" means simply Finnish Giallo.
Giallo is a 20th-century Italian thriller or horror genre of literature and film. Especially outside Italy, giallo refers specifically to a particular Italian thriller-horror genre that has mystery elements and often contains slasher, crime fiction, psychological thriller,psychological horror, sexploitation, and, less frequently, supernatural horror elements. In Italy, the term generally denotes thrillers, typically of the crime fiction,mystery, and horror sub genres, regardless of the country of origin. – Wikipedia
We want to bring this forgotten genre back to better knowledge and develop a new sub-genre called Fiallo. Our movie is a huge salute to the genre in all departments. The overall style, music, acting, and look of the film are strongly influenced by the classic genre elements. Without forgetting our addition of Scandinavian style and strong black humor to mix up the genre a bit.
Where it all began?
I have had for a long time this idea in my head to make a fake trailer of a Giallo film that didn't exist at all. I talked first time about it to Ville on our vacation trip (we had tickets to John Carpenter's live show at Oberhausen, Germany) and he said "Why not make it for real?". I thought about it and said, "Yeah... you are right. Why NOT!".
First, it was one murder scene with just a couple of actors and mainly one location. Now the script is more like 30 pages long and there are several locations and several characters in the story involved. But that's not a bad thing at all.
Following the footsteps of the masters...
Our short movie is a mix of Giallo, Poliziotteschi(=Euro-crime), and horror elements. It’s a classic murder mystery and story about two detectives that try to solve and catch this crazy killer. Filled with black humor which is a huge element in this genre. Intended or unintended but those moments are something that people always remember from these movies! My biggest inspirations in the genre are directors like Dario Argento, Sergio Martino, Lucio Fulci, Mario Bava, Aldo Lado, Umberto Lenzi, and so on... many of those well-known names these days.
Musica
(Music)
Music has a really important role in the genre. Our work on this movie started with the music. We had music roughly planned and even the first demos made before we had any version of the script done. From the beginning, we knew that if we don't have the right music for this movie we have nothing. Same as if we are missing one of the lead actors from the film.
Our biggest source of inspiration for music are artists/bands well known behind this genre. Goblin, Claudio Simonetti, Fabio Frizzi, Bruno Nicolai, Stelvio Cipriani, Ennio Morricone and so on. We have some really interesting contacts building up on the music side and we are happy to say that some really talented guys are already part of the Azh Boyzz family.
Linguaggio
(Language)
The language in the film will be Finnish, but we are still playing with the idea that the final piece will be dubbed in English. In the '60s and '70s, most of the Giallo movies were made in Italian language and later dubbed into English for international release. Or some cases they even didn't record sound on location (because of tight budgets) and knew they will add speech later on in the movie. This technique was actually called MOS ('mit out sound') shooting.
When the genre was in its most popular state there were globally known actors hired for these Italian films. Even though they didn't speak the language it didn't matter. Director might just ask an actor to say "One, two, three, four." knowing that they will dub it anyway later. But even voice-over actors were often just a few persons playing multiple roles and voice sync was a bit off.
In our movie, this classic “mistake” will be part of it. All our teaser texts (even the name of our film) are just translated roughly through Google translate. Without any spelling checks. So our movie language is quite a bit “out-of-sync” like the dubbing is in the movies. But even though our original title is kind of "nonsense" it is opened up in the movie why it is like that... it is part of the script.
Stile visivo
(Visual style)
Visual style plays also a huge role. Wide shots presenting great-looking settings, murderer POV-shots (POV=Point of view), extreme close-ups, and surprising camera angles are a few of these elements that we are going to be using in our movie. Colorful lighting and set design, theatrical mood, and certain looks in the wardrobe are just a few key elements. All these things are our cornerstones of achieving the authentic look of the film and our final style. Spiced up with a bit of Finnish look and mood, of course.
As we so much would love it to totally a look like 70's movie from wardrobe to locations to actual lenses used on the camera. We know that some compromises are inevitable after all, we are making a low-budget indie film. So that is why we are thinking of the world being in some "hybrid" universe where there are a lot of props from the old era (old phones, wardrobe, lamps, tables, our main character's car, etc.) combined with locations that look old enough but still might be quite modern.
Le sfide
(The challenges)
We have quite many challenges on this project. As this genre demands, we must have great-looking locations, acting must be at the right"wrong" level, the soundtrack must be kick-ass, visuals must shout GIALLO, there are quite a few practical effects, lots and lots of needed props that support our story and world... and so on. Lots and lots of J&B Whis... No sorry. I mean A&B Whiskey!
What this all means? We can't make this movie with zero budget. We have expenses that must be fulfilled partially from our own pockets but also we need help on this from some financial organizations or individual supporters. That's also the reason this project is stretched before we can actually start to shoot. Or we just need to plan it accordingly and cut it into small pieces that are doable production-wise. Need for money isn't a reason not to shoot a film, NEVER. Because the need for money is always present and all of us want it. It just means that we have to figure out how to start doing it and what is possible for us.
Il nostro prossimo obiettivo
(Our next goal)
We have been planning to shoot a short "prelude" for our movie which is based in the same world as our Cat in the Bottle. There are some of our main characters written in it and the overall visual style will be shown in it. So in a nutshell it is our proof of concept. We have been close to doing it but always pulled the emergency brake at some point noticing and feeling that we aren't there yet. It has also evolved into another concept, like music video production. Or maybe the best way to do it is just to start the actual project and do it?
There is interest in our movie...
and that is the most rewarding thing. People have made it clear that they are interested in our project. We have already collaborated with great artists and are discussing with others to be part of the project.
One of these is this amazing artist called Chad Keith who made this awesome painting for our movie even before we made even a single second of our actual film. That is REALLY supportive and clear trust toward our vision. Please check Chad's amazing work and support him by following and sharing.
I wanted to praise Chad's great work and animated his work with a touch of Giallo-mood. In this video, you can also hear an amazing song made for our movie by Visa Lahtinen, ReCyclop Studio.
Pssst. You can find this awesome poster design also on our Azh Boyzz shop.
Blog text by Teemu Saarinen / Azh Boyzz.