This is my Inspiration Board, mood board, Pinterest special interest board for my upcoming project which is a horror-comedy titled "The Creep of Crooked Creek". The main antagonist (or is he the protagonist?....hmm....) is a graveyard creature who's come to feast on the living. He's not quite a zombie, not a werewolf I don't think, probably not a vampire, nope, he's a ghoul. He lurks around a section of the forest called Crooked Creek so he's literally the creep of Crooked Creek. He's based on an urban legend about a scary character called the Gray Baby who's supposedly spotted in Archer Woods in the Chicago area. I think that telling a story where his world gets twisted with a gang of petty criminals is good fodder for a pulpy horror film so that's what we're doing. There will be plenty of blood, feisty interactions, and synthpop. On a certain level, this feels strangely possible in Chicago anyway.
Some of these references might seem to contradict each other but not necessarily.
While very big cultural touchstones are, right now, exploring the fantasy-horror niche of the 1980's through the innocent, awkward wonderment of adolescence (I love "Stranger Things" too as we all should), I--in my own small, indie, budget-conscious, limited bubble of media reach--want to explore the tone (the vibe, the feeling) of the 1980's (and the early/mid 90's) through a much different (but also interesting) sociocultural avenue. What I'm referring to is the grown-up, sleazy, druggy, corrupt dark corner of that period which absolutely feels like it's making a frequency comeback during our current moment of questionable cryptocurrencies, street crime, emotionally manipulative internet hullabaloos, OnlyFans, craigslists, and rotten-to-the-marrow political corruption. So we'll start shooting this film in August of 2022.
"The Creep of Crooked Creek" boiled down to 1 sentence is:
A feral ghoul grapples with criminals, brats, and bad relationships.
Precisely. Gore, frustration, money panics, jealousy, life, sex, undeath, and tacky/beautiful aesthetics all intertwining for better and for worse in early 2020's Chicago.
These are some of the things that I've been thinking about while jumbling this project together:
