After almost a decade, horror legend Tom Savini has come out of retirement on makeup and effects to work on two new Australian horror films.
The man who was responsible for creating special effects and makeup for such classics as George A. Romero’s Dawn of the Dead and Day of the Dead, oversaw and assisted in creating the effects for Redd Inc and upcoming zombie flick Mary Doe.
Redd Inc, developed by award-winning producer Jonathon Green, is currently in Post Production, while Mary Doe, created by Nick Nicolaou, is in development.
Independent flick Redd Inc is a horror revenge story that follows Annabelle – a burlesque webcam stripper – who gets abducted and ends up chained to a desk with five others in a macabre, horrific make-shift office.
Their self-appointed “boss” is escaped, wrongly-convicted serial killer Thomas Reddmann, aka Redd, demented from experimental, behaviour modification treatment. He requires Annabelle and his other “workers”, who were all participants in his trial, to find the true serial killer… or die horribly.
The innovative filmmakers offered “everyday people” the chance to submit their creative work – such as music, videos, images and artwork – through their website, last year.
In what was a dream come true for the Aussie filmmakers, Savini, aka Sex Machine in classic flick From Dusk Till Dawn, was involved in the project via phone and in-person, and was on-set during the shoot in March. He initially got involved after attending the International Make-Up Artist Trade Show in Sydney last year.
“Tom was a great guy; of course he had great ideas and he let us play with our ideas,” says Nicolaou, whose company he co-founded, Make-Up Effects Group, created the effects.
“Tom made sure that we were discussing the process properly with the producers and making sure that we hadn’t missed any ideas and he was throwing in his two cents and we would throw in our two cents and then we’d bring in an effect together quite nicely and it was a lot of fun.
“It was just fun on set, he brought a lot of energy to the project and it was always fun doing an effect – a bloody effect – in front of him.”
The "Godfather of Gore" even has a cameo in the film, which is set to be released later this year.
The horror icon will also contribute his award-winning effects skills to upcoming zombie fest Mary Doe and has already lent his voice to the film’s online game The Undead Zone.
The creators of the horror/thriller are currently looking for investment funds.
Most recently, Savini appeared in highly-entertaining action film Machete, starring Danny Trejo. His last film that he did makeup effects on was 2002’s Ted Bundy.
He is set to play the lead, alongside Kane Hodder (Jason Voorhees in several Friday the 13th sequels), in upcoming 3D film Robin Hood: Ghosts of Sherwood.