The Mill at Calder’s End is the next film in a planned series of “ghost story puppet films” by L.A. based special effects artist and puppet filmmaker Kevin McTurk. He describes it as a “gothic ghost story in the spirit of Edgar Allan Poe and H.P. Lovecraft.” It will feature the voices of horror legend Barbara Steele (Black Sunday, The Pit and the Pendulum) and Jason Flemyng (The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, X-Men:First Class) and he plans to make it using a mix of Bunraku puppetry and old school in-camera special effects.
Kevin previously made the ghost story puppet film The Narrative of Victor Karloch, which has won several awards at international film festivals and is one of the best puppet shorts I’ve seen in the past few years. Kevin’s a very talented and extremely passionate artist whose previous credits include work on big-budget blockbusters like King Kong, Batman Returns and the Jurassic Park films (read more about that over at The Stand Winston School Blog). I got the chance to get to know him a little bit last fall when I moderated a panel on puppet filmmaking at Dragon*Con (also featured on the panel was Sam Hale, who recently funded his own puppet film, Monster of the Sky, via Kickstarter) and saw some of the early concept art and sculpture that was being done for this film. It looked amazing I’ve been really eager to see The Mill at Calder’s End ever since.
Kevin has already reached his initial fundraising goal of $32,000 and is now aiming for a “stretch” goal of $50K. He plans to use this larger budget to create more intricate in-camera effects, build more detailed puppets, and film using higher end cameras and lenses, as well as an enhanced sound mix.
You can learn more about The Mill at Calder’s End and the rewards that are available to supporters on Kickstarter. Help Kevin make this film happen!
