Jason mid-shoot
Dark Vale, Jason’s latest feature film, is the 32-year-old’s pride and joy, a calling card for a keen director who wants nothing but to make movies for a living. It’s his dream and it looks like it’s finally coming true. A very eager and excited Jason proclaims. “It got into LA Cinefest for official selections, so I have two Laurels above the title on the DVD, and it got a great review from Brothers Grim; they gave it a solid 8/10.”
Dark Vale is about a young couple called Tom (Darren Randall) and Leigh (Cara Middleton) who go away for a short cottage break. They leave the cottage and drive through a place called the Vale where things take a turn for the worse and the couple are haunted by an evil spirit. They begin to question their own sanity and they have to try to work out how to escape this mysterious place. “I was in an up and down relationship when I started writing Dark Vale and a lot of that poured out into the script, so there’s a lot of me in there,” Jason explained. “The Tom and Leigh storyline revolves around me and one of my exes and then I added the ghost stories. The real life feelings makes the characters complete.”
What makes the film even darker is the fact that one of the main locations (called, oddly enough, The Vale) is supposedly haunted. “Apparently scouts were doing an activity there and one of them ran off because he saw a ghost. I read about it in a book called Nottinghamshire Ghosts,” he says. “I like to use my surroundings as an influence on me. I lived only fifteen minutes away from the location we filmed at and the stories allowed me to develop a script. Knowing the place was supposed to be haunted made the atmosphere that much better.”
Cara Middleton in Dark Vale
It’s not just his surroundings that inspiration has come from. His past line of work in a DVD store and a passion for drama has also helped pave the way for a future in the film industry. There’s even a nod to the original Resident Evil video game in the way that some of his camera shots are structured. “The original Resident Evil in the mansion is amazing. Dark Vale is a slow burner and it takes some inspiration from it. You’ll see quite a lot of the locked camera shots, like in the first Resident Evil, because Newstead Abbey was perfect for that kind of filming.”
Horror though was not a first love of Jason’s and although he’s got his teeth stuck in the genre he openly admits that he spent a lot of the time looking for cover when the monsters came out to play. “I didn’t really watch horror until I was 15 or 16. I used to be terrified of it because when I was a kid my sister put them on all the time and I would be behind the couch crying,” he says while laughing, no regret in his voice. “I didn’t watch them till a fairly old age, then something just triggered in my mind.”
Making a movie is not all plain sailing though and with the highs come the inevitable lows. For professionals, acting and directing is the main source of income and leaves them in a position to concentrate fully on the film. For Jason and his crew there were no such luxuries. While shooting the film, Jason worked in Morrisons, while the two leads Cara and Darren worked in a hospital and Asda respectively. “It was all very demanding on the cast and crew. Cara was working all the way till 6am and then we had filming 11 till 5 so it was a very quick turnaround for her. I was working in Morrisons and I was filming all through the night, then working from 5am till 12 and then back out filming.”
When you’re prepared to put in the long, gruelling hours it doesn’t take long before you start getting noticed. Jason’s first feature, A Date with Ghosts, had a measly £1,000 budget which came out of his own pocket. The film was, by his own admission, “a little hit and miss at times.” It did, however, allow him to get his foot in the door. Brad Rushing, a director of photography in Hollywood, saw the film and decided to take Jason under his wing.
Word spread and now the lad from Mansfield was getting some private investment. Dark Vale got the go ahead and a cash injection of £5,000. The increase in funds meant that for the first time Jason could afford outdoor lights and hire actors with a wider range of acting experience. He didn’t cast his net particularly wide however in the search for actors, relying heavily on talent in and around the county and people familiar with his surroundings. Cara was a member of Bassetlaw Youth Centre and went on to study at West Notts College. Darren, also alumni of WNC, went down the road of theatre acting and ended up touring the country before returning to Nottingham for Dark Vale.
“It was brilliant working with local talent.” Jason’s a proud Nottinghamshire resident and his enthusiasm shines through in the movie. “My producers said that Cara’s acting was incredible and he was very impressed with Darren Randell who was the leading man in Dark Vale. He had seen a lot of American films where the acting has been terrible and he said it was a breath of fresh air to see them. Katie Richmond-Ward’s been involved as well - she’s over at Nottingham Workshop - so she plays a small part in Vale.”
Jason’s blossoming partnership with Brad has potentially landed Jason a meeting with Mike Upton, known for the BAFTA Award winning film The Road and also John Wick. “It’s huge for someone like me! If the festivals go well then my next budget could be anywhere between £100,000 and £200,000. I don’t need all the money; he can give me a sum and I can go and do it all myself and deliver a film to him. A bit of decent money and I can give him a very good movie, I believe. It’s still early days. The dream is to hopefully do a studio film for a company like Universal. That’s the big goal, to make it in the big leagues.”
Darren Randall in Dark Vale
Jason says that he could come back to Nottinghamshire and do all his future films here. If it is good enough for Shane Meadows, Christopher Nolan's Dark Knight, and even the slightly odd cameo for Old Market Square in last year's Krampus trailer, then why not. “Nottingham is a fantastic place to shoot any movie. You’ve got so much material to film with; lots of churches and old monasteries, modern architecture, numerous parks and deep forests.”
Directors, actors and producers aren’t born overnight and it takes a lot of dedication and commitment before you can see any progress. “The only way to do is to just get out there, utilise the locations. There are a lot of gangster films in the British independent film scene, because there’s a few quid to be made there. If you try to come up with something different then you should stand out more,” Jason advises. “Starting off on short films is great but at some point I think you should bite the bullet and get into doing feature films because short films aren’t really in demand. You’ll learn a lot more if you get out there and do a feature.”
Jason hasn’t confirmed what his next project will be, but is swayed by the prospect of another horror. “There are some tricks up my sleeve.”
A Date With Ghosts is available to buy on DVD via Amazon.co.uk. Dark Vale is currently unreleased but keep your eye out for updates.
Jason M.J Brown YouTube
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