SCRATCH is a new found footage horror comedy currently in production that is filmed entirely on an iPhone 6. This latest addition of the found footage genre is co-written by Tristan Convert and Akilah Green and directed by Tristan Convert.
Scratch will join the ranks of iPhone-filmed found footage films, which most notably includes James Cullen Bressack’s found footage horror/comedies To Jennifer (2013), filmed with an iPhone 5, and 2 Jennifer (2015), filmed with an iPhone 6. Adding to the crossover, 2 Jennifer and Scratch both star Charles Chudabala.
The trailer for Scratch can be viewed right here on Found Footage Critic.
Synopsis
SCRATCH is a found footage horror movie shot entirely on iPhones. Set in Los Angeles’s haunted Old Zoo, SCRATCH tells the story of two would-be filmmakers who decide to shoot a music video for a local nu metal band on an iPhone in LA’s Old Zoo. It’s meta-theater. And you, as the audience, are inside of the phones that are strapped to the foreheads of the protagonists while they’re shooting. But the Old Zoo has been closed for decades, and the abandoned ruins are said to be cursed by the spirits of the animals who were once trapped there. So who’s filming when, one-by-one, the protagonists revert to their primal, savage selves?
Scratch Official Press Release
Los Angeles, CA – After directing over a dozen short films, French filmmaker Tristan Convert directed his first feature, SCRATCH, an original horror comedy. Shot entirely on iPhone6 by a skeleton crew in Los Angeles in August 2015, SCRATCH tells the story of two would-be filmmakers who decide to shoot a music video for a local nu metal band on an iPhone.
The film is in post-production, for which Tristan is launching a fundraising campaign on Indiegogo.
“SCRATCH is meta-theater. It’s also an update on classic found footage films like The Blair Witch Project. It’s a “found phone” feature. Cinema vérité-style. The audience will see what the filmmakers’ crew in the movie is shooting from the point-of-view of their iPhones. The POV will be intimate, close to the characters like a phone, swirling, falling, selfie-ing,” Convert says.
SCRATCH is co-written by Tristan Convert and Akilah Green and produced by Tristan Convert, Akilah Green, and Sébastien Bizeul. It stars Danièle Watts (Django Unchained) and Katarina Leigh Waters (Wrestling Champion).
Convert created SCRATCH with the idea of a very light crew, very light setup, and very simple plot. Throughout the film, one by one, the members of the cast and crew are scratched by an infected person, which causes them to also become infected and transform into their primal, savage selves succumbing to their basic instincts. SCRATCH is a classic contagion story, e.g., the werewolf myth, but the infected persons are not zombies. In fact, the savages are not evil at all. They simply crave sex and food. However, they lack the ability to control their impulses, and therein lies the conflict.
“At its core, SCRATCH is about our struggle to contain the beast within,” Convert added.
SCRATCH explores key themes like: What differentiates us from animals? And what does it mean to be truly free?
About Tristan Convert
Convert is a French filmmaker. During his studies at The University of Science and Technology in Lille, France, he focused on radical filmmaking. In Paris, he worked on feature films and documentary production. Based on his early projects, Convert received several grants to study cinema at Pictanovo and The European Center for Film Production (CEFPF). His last short film, Le Chat Noir (“The Black Cat”), was premiered at the Hollyshorts Film Festival, won Best Short Film at the The Black Earth Festival, was a distinguished finalist at the Generation Court Film Festival, and was an official selection at the San Francisco Shorts, New York Chashama Film Festival, Nevada City Film Festival, and Arizona Underground. Subsequently, at Eli Roth’s suggestion, Convert moved to the United States and settled in Los Angeles to prepare SCRATCH.
About Akilah Green
After spending almost a decade practicing as a lawyer-lobbyist on Washington, D.C.’s infamous “K Street,” Akilah moved to Los Angeles to pursue a career in screenwriting. Akilah currently works full-time generating and pitching funny stories, segments, and beats for Chelsea Handler’s upcoming Netflix talk show.
As well, she consults for Real Time with Bill Maher on HBO and is a weekly columnist for The Root (a Univision Communications publication). Akilah has a Bachelors from the University of Texas at Austin and a Juris Doctor from the University of Michigan. In addition to co-writing and producing SCRATCH, Akilah has written a number of television pilots for development.
About Sebastien Bizeul
Sébastien Bizeul has been an actor and co-director in the Frozen Zebras troupe in Delhi, India for several years where he has been involved in plays such as “No Exit” from Jean-Paul Sartre and “Art” from Yasmina Réza. He directed comedies at the French Embassy School of Delhi where he also taught theater for many years. Before that, he produced short movies and computer graphic movies. He also wrote a satirical action novel, As Soon As, about an anti-hero discovering a world conspiracy. After traveling the globe, most extensively in Asia and Africa, Bizeul has recently settled in Los Angeles.