Director Anthony Cooney on ’80s-Style Slasher ‘Leaf Blower Massacre 2’
Leaf Blower Massacre 2 will be screening at the Horror-On-Sea Festival 2019 on Friday 11th January 2019 at 10:00PM.
Tickets are available here.
Michael Myers had his butcher’s knife, Freddie Kreuger had his knife gloves, even Pinhead had his chain hooks. But each of these ’80s slasher icons lacked the creativity and inventiveness to look at the humble leaf blower and realise its full murderous potential. One man had just such a vision.
We caught up with director Anthony Cooney to talk about his latest outing Leaf Blower Massacre 2, one of the more bizarre offerings on show at 2019’s Horror-on-Sea Festival.
Tom: Can you tell us about the plot of Leaf Blower Massacre 2?
Anthony: Two local police detectives are responding to a noise disturbance in the Chicago Ravenswood neighbourhood when they come upon a mass homicide at the home of the person who been causing the noise disturbance. Meanwhile, the main character from Leaf Blower Massacre 1, Shavar Jennings (Shavar D Clark), is trying to find out who kidnapped his fiancé, Nicole White (Anita Nicole Brown). The detectives and the college professor’s world’s entwine and it becomes a game of cat and mouse to find out who the masked killer really is.
Tom: You’ve described Leaf Blower Massacre 2 as a homage to ’80s slasher movies. Which movies particularly inspired you?
Anthony: Nail gun Massacre which is my all time favourite horror film as you can see in Leaf Blower Massacre 1 & 2.
Tom: There’s been an ongoing ’80s revival in indie and mainstream horror for some time now. Why do you think directors keep going back to that era?
Anthony: I think this was the era of great horror films that shed a new light on the horror scene. The type of horror that was really fun, where you wanted to watch the films over and over and sit with friends and laugh. Films like Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2, Nail Gun Massacre, the Friday the 13th series, Nightmare on Elm Street, Slumber Party Massacre, Sorority Party Massacre etc.
Tom: The film is currently making its way round the festival circuit. What sort of reaction are you hoping you can inspire in your audiences?
Anthony: I’m hoping it has a surprising reaction. One where they look at the film and it holds their curiosity as to how someone can kill someone with a leaf blower in the first place. Also, I have never seen someone kill someone with one in a movie.
Tom: For fans of the original short, how does Leaf Blower Massacre 2 up the ante?
The story line of Leaf Blower Massacre 2 is much more in-depth and explains a lot from part 1. The kills are way more amped-up and are fun to the point that it gives you that “WHOA” factor, and you can chuckle at some as well. I think fans of the first one will really be surprised at what was done with this film.
Tom: What was the biggest obstacle you faced when putting together a film on such a limited budget?
Anthony: I would say the biggest was scheduling the shooting dates and also some of the cast members joining and then dropping out of the blue with really no explanation. However, it all worked itself out for the best. It helped create a better cast and showed who was really serious about the movie. Raising the budget was something I found not too hard, as I did have support from family and friends. I myself also sold a lot of memorabilia at Horror conventions before we started filming.
Tom: For anyone interested in crowdfunding as a means of getting their work made, do you have any tips?
Anthony: Yes. Make sure you have a good team when making the crowd-funding project. I see way too many filmmakers hardly giving anything to people for their donations to the film, or they have the perks super high for a T-shirt, poster etc.
Also, maybe during each week of filming add new exclusive perks to keep fans updated on the project and having them come back for more. The cast and crew really need to promote the crowdfunding as much as they can. The more people know about the film the better the crowdfunding will be and the quicker the project will get funded.
We’d like to thank Anthony Cooney once again for agreeing to talk to us! You can keep up to date with news on the Leaf Blower Massacre films here and on Twitter.
