Rhode Island International Film Festival’s Best Director Vladislav Kozlov Directs THE KILLERS

Writer/director Vladislav Kozlov‘s mid-length narrative film The Killers, a black comedy which mixes different film genres and elements of cinéma vérité with neorealism, tells the story of a family crisis that erupts from the opposing mindsets of the generations, played by Franco Nero, Sherilyn Fenn, and Jeff DuJardin. The film pays homage to film noir and other film genres, while straddling the line between science-fiction and science-fact in the world of cryogenics. The Killers, executive produced by Dmitriy Pristanskov and produced by Kozlov, Natalia Dar, Yuri Ponomarev, and David Roberson, had its World Premiere at the Flickers Rhode Island International Film Festival (RIIFF). Kozlov won the Festival Award for Best Direction.

Redefining the Cinematic Experience

Said Shawn M. Quirk, Program Director, Flickers’ Rhode Island International Film Festival:

“Vladislav Kozlov has made something exceptional with his film The Killers. Through merging the macabre, science fiction, and neo-realism, he has dared to bring an unbelievable tale about the human condition to light and has redefined the cinematic experience in the process.”

Kozlov spoke exclusively with Film Inquiry about The Killers, and his upcoming feature, Silent Life.

Inspired by a True Story…

Jim Dixon for Film Inquiry: I watched The Killers last night. My wife watched it with me and she insisted that I start out by asking about that last thing we see—that it was inspired by a true story, which gives your ending a very unexpected impact. So, how did this true story come to you, and what was the true story?

Vladislav Kozlov: The true story came that a friend of mine from Eastern Europe. I don’t want to say exactly from where because he wanted to be anonymous. He is an attorney who worked with the scientist, for real, and he thinks that in the future people can be immortalized – I mean if they are frozen – and he found out that very soon people will get specific instructions on how to become young again and how to prolong life. But it might happen tomorrow, it might happen in a hundred years, it might happen in two hundred years or five hundred years, so the question is how to avoid death and preserve your loved one.

He found out that some people had already frozen their relatives, and he decided to do the same thing for his grandpa when he found out that his grandpa was dying of cancer. Of course the family said, “Oh my God no, we’re not going to do this.” But he was convincing and convincing and at finally he convinced them. And, they said, “Okay we’ll do this for you,” but the grandfather was far away, in a very small city and the guy was busy working with a lot of companies and he wasn’t able to be there all the time. His mom went there, but when the actual death happened his mom was so sad – of course it was her father – and she suddenly said, “You know what, we’re not going to do this. My friend was like “What are you talking about, we agreed, we agreed that we were going do it, why did you lie to me, you’re my mom.” So he kept pushing, pushing, and the caregiver was there, and she’s “Like stop mocking your mother, – she hasn’t slept for many nights.”

The last actual line from his mother was like, “Oh, I’m gonna die right there if you keep pushing – I will be the next dead body close to my father, your grandfather.”

Many think that the actual death happen right at the moment, but other scientists think that the brain still is operating for a week or so after – people will find out that maybe in a hundred years that when you die you are not actually dead, your brain is still working and memory is still there so even if you are in the grave you can still think. It sounds really crazy – I’m not saying that I believe in everything I am just telling you – but [laughs] that’s the real thing – it’s not like in a film festival they put us in a category besides drama/fantasy/sci-fi, I called them back and I said, guys it’s not a fantasy. It’s a real thing that will happen in the near future. People will start freezing their relatives because people start losing faith in God but they still want to believe in forever…It’s not a fantasy it’s a real thing.

Genre Bender

The movie surprised me more than once because you’ve got this horror movie-style prologue and I’m thinking, ok, Donovan’s Brain, The Brain that Wouldn’t Die, They Saved Hitler’s Brain and I’m thinking of all these 50’s science fiction horror movies and of course the movie really doesn’t go in that direction at all. It looks like it’s going to be one of those and the fact that most of it is in black and white leads you to wonder if it’s going to go that way and then it really seems to me to be a battle of the two philosophies between Jeff DuJardin’s character and Sherilyn Fenn’s.

Vladislav Kozlov: Of course my main character is the grandfather, a philosopher, who’s played by Franco Nero, and he knew exactly what we were doing. Franco is a poet, and I told him that if he might bring the poetry of his perspective – because he’s talking about life and death all the time. He told me, “I’m getting older and I’m thinking about death all the time and I don’t want to die.” I asked him, “Can you write me a poem?” So the night before we start filming he brought me that poetry which is not in the film. Did you see the longer version?

No, I saw the shorter version.

Vladislav Kozlov: Okay, the longer version has the poetry.

I’ll watch it just for that.

Vladislav Kozlov: The poetry explains everything. The heart of the entire movie. The poetry is like in Rocky when Sylvester Stallone tells Talia Shire “I can’t beat him, but if I go the distance I’ll prove to myself that I wasn’t just another bum from the neighborhood.” The poetry will tell them everything that was created, it’s already there, created by God. Explaining the whole thing that no matter what we are doing, no matter how we try here and there, there is an end because God has already created everything. You need to hear that poetry…That’s the heart of the movie.

The Poetry of Franco Nero

And Franco Nero wrote that himself?

Vladislav Kozlov: Yes, yes, he wrote it himself for like just – it was an inspiration he had and then brought me that poetry. Please watch just that poetry it’s in the middle of the movie when they are sitting at the lake. That’s the heart of the movie.

Then getting Sherilyn Fenn – that was interesting because we didn’t have a big budget, it was a very small movie. But Sherilyn agreed to be in the film and then she came to meet me and she said to me, “Do you know why I actually agreed to do it for that small amount?”

I said, “No, tell me what’s going on.” She told me that happened just with her. Her father just died, and he was far away from Los Angeles in a small city, and she was there talking to this guy with her son, not about cryonics, but there was of a sense of similarity. She also brought the same sweater she was wearing when she was waiting for her father to die. She brought so much into this movie that was real.

I have real people playing in the movie. My cryonic guy, the President of the Cryonic Society, in the beginning of the film is a real person playing himself, Jim Young, who actually freezes people. The priest in the church who disagrees with everything we are talking about, he’s a real priest, and it’s his own perspective he brings to that.

It struck me during the the big kitchen table conversation between Sherilyn Fenn and Jeff DuJardin that he’s relying on faith as much as she is. There’s no guarantee that science is ever going to be able to do this – but he’s so convinced that they will, that we are literally going to cure death, and I just thought it’s interesting that he’s he doesn’t realize it’s faith – just a faith in something else.

Vladislav Kozlov: Yeah, well faith is faith, but what about if a plane is crashing and you have a parachute and they want to give you the parachute, the parachute is broken, do you want to just die in the plane? Because the plane is crashing, 100% you are going to die – or, we have a parachute but it’s a little bit broken but it might work. So what do you choose, you choose to die or you choose the broken parachute. That’s what are you trying to do here.

And also, the Jeff DuJardin character, you know the scene when he’s crying for his grandfather before he makes the decision to dig up the grave? While we were filming, Jeff’s brother had cancer, and he was suffering a lot. He survived, but at that time Jeff didn’t know what was going to happen so when we started shooting he was thinking about his brother, so the tears were real, all of the emotion at the end of the movie with Jeff, that’s real because that’s what was happening with his brother.

DuJardin’s performance is fascinating. I thought of Psycho a couple of times. He’s got those classic movie star good looks like John Gavin but with the underlying madness of Anthony Perkins.

Vladislav Kozlov: Yes, yes! It’s not our first movie together, and we’re finishing Silent Life with Terry Moore and he’s playing a character like [William Holden’s] in the movie Sunset Blvd. with Gloria Swanson. So we’re doing like an old Hollywood movie now, Hollywood Forever Cemetery with [Rudolph] Valentino and the Lady in Black, and Terry Moore plays the Lady in Black and Jeff plays a director who’s shooting a documentary around the cemetery, and they interview her to find out if she really was a true love of Valentino. So, I will tell you this later, but this is more about Jeff, it’s a very interesting combination with them – Terry is 91 – but there is good chemistry with Jeff and Terry Moore.

The Noir Beauty of Black and White

I was very interested in your decision to shoot most of the movie – or at least present most of the movie – in black and white even though your opening credits are vivid red. Did you shoot in black and white or did you convert it in post-production?

Vladislav Kozlov: I knew it was going to be very noir-looking, black and white, but we filmed in color just in case we needed some color, and I knew that we needed something, I wasn’t actually sure what exactly, but then I found it worked for the memory of the grandfather when we see Franco at the very end. I’m glad I filmed in color but I knew it was going to be mainly black and white.

The black and white is absolutely gorgeous. It’s got some of the very rich, dark blacks you see in 30’s black and white cinematography. I thought it was an exceptionally handsome-looking movie.

Vladislav Kozlov: Thank you.

And when you use color in that key flashback it has more impact because we don’t see it coming.

Vladislav Kozlov: Yes, yes.

And of course, you do throw a little bit of red blood in a black and white sequence when it’s critical. It reminded me a little bit of Sin City. I thought it was a cool effect. It was just that you wanted the noir look?

The Glory of Old Hollywood and Shooting on Film

Vladislav Kozlov: Yes, because I knew it was going to be very noir-ish, although people will be thinking it’s sci-fi or fantasy. I wanted it to feel like it’s from 1956, because I am a fan of old Hollywood.

I love black and white and I am a big fan of shooting on film, but unfortunately it’s too expensive. When you shoot on film that’s different, you might do the color, you might make it a little dark in post, but then when you shoot on HD, red scarlet, whatever you are using, it still doesn’t have that effect you want to show to the audience. My idea was already black and white, but as soon as we tested the camera I said that’s not going to work, let’s shoot in color, but we turned it into black and white because it does look like a movie. I love to shoot on film. Film is film. You cannot compare it.

I agree, but on the other hand the digital technology has made the low budget independent film world just explode because all of a sudden the hardware is much more affordable. Tell me a little bit about the importance of music in the movie because you’ve got some rather interesting choices.

Vladislav Kozlov: I love Richard Wagner, one of my favorites. I love classical music – I was trained in classical music. I just love music, you know and that music was exactly what I wanted to use for the film, and at the end Freddie Mercury of course, “Who Wants to Live Forever,” that was in my head from the beginning.

And ironically that song was written for another movie.

Vladislav Kozlov: Yes, yes.

Putting Franco Nero in a Ditch

I’m a big fan of Highlander. Franco Nero has had such a remarkable career, you’ve got to tell me a little bit about what it’s like working with him – you’ve already eluded to him writing the poetry, which I thought was an extraordinary contribution for an actor to make. What is he like to work with?

Vladislav Kozlov: He is very creative. Always improvising – that’s why I told you that – I knew he loved to write poetry but he is a little shy to tell that he can really write – because he can sing, you can see it in the movie Camelot, he loves to sing, he loves to write poetry, but he is a little shy to share it with people. “What if they don’t like it,” you know, but he wrote this one overnight, he didn’t sleep at all, so that made a big impression.

Then he showed me the script on the set, and he had a lot of notes like how about we try this, how about we try that, then what really struck me, that was really impressive, when we got to the set because I don’t like shot lists, I don’t like to be ready, ready for everything, because when I come on the set it always depresses me. So, when we came on set, I saw this little ditch up there, and it looked like a grave and I thought, “Oh my God, this is it, this is the movie.” And, my UPM, he was looking at me like, what are you talking about?” I say, “We’ll put Franco Nero up there.”

And he’s like, no, no, no, he will not agree because it was cold, it was February, it was freezing, it was dark, [we’re shooting] overnight, and I said, “Don’t worry about it, Franco is a professional actor he will do it.” So, I came to Franco and I said, “Franco, I want you to be in the ditch and I will put some blanket for you so I will see you there in two minutes.” I didn’t even ask him whether he wanted to do it or not, I just told him that we needed it. So, when he understood we needed it, he was in that grave, he was in that ditch from like – in five minutes he was there.

So, explain how I work with Franco Nero, this is my fourth movie with him. I put him together with the Hollywood Boulevard Superman and made the movie The Kid, with Franco Nero playing himself with Superman guy from the Boulevard. The second was The Killers, and he also did the apparition of Valentino’s ghost in Death of the Sheik, and he played the voice of God with Paul Rodriguez, the comedian, in the short that I just finished.

Franco loves to add ideas about music. He wrote the poetry. He never says no because he respects the director’s vision…

I have been a big fan of his for a long time. He’s a remarkable actor and a remarkable screen presence and it’s lovely to hear that he’s such a great pro. I should also mention in case you want to mention it to him, my mother-in-law is madly in love with him.

Vladislav Kozlov: [laughs]

The Original Django

I loved him in the original Django, which is probably my favorite spaghetti western.

Vladislav Kozlov: Oh, Sergio Corbucci. Oh, by the way, he told me an interesting story about when he did the Django, a funny thing that at the first opening credit when he is dragging his coffin. The director, Sergio Corbucci, told him, “Okay, just walk and we will film you.” And Franco walked with his coffin all the way down and they are rolling the camera and then they finish rolling, they called cut but he was far away. So Corbucci took the camera equipment and everything and just left. So Franco was waiting for the cut and when he came back, there was nobody there. [laughs] So he’s like, “This is the first shot of the movie and nobody can walk over to me and say that they cut, or they finished, they just left?” So there he was with his coffin and only the set decorator was waiting for him but no director.

That’s a great story. So, what was the biggest challenge making The Killers? It sounds, actually, like you had a great shoot.

Vladislav Kozlov: I think the most important challenge was to arrange a Skype conference between Sherilyn and Jeff, because it had to be in the right moment. They had to get in different rooms and we needed to film with two cameras and I had to direct both of them at the same time. That was a little bit chaotic and a little crazy, because I needed to give the direction to both of them. We tried to film it separately but it wasn’t good because there was no sense of “in the moment”—you can see that it’s not true.

So we start filming them at the same moment, and Sherilyn Fenn says “When I was with my father when my was dying, and everything in that room was a lot of candles and it was dark.” So I went to my DP and said, “Hey man, we need to change the atmosphere, put a lot of candles in here.” So we removed everything from the set, like furniture and everything, and created the atmosphere that she could be comfortable with. I put the candles there. So besides just giving the direction to the actors, I need to decorate the room to make sure she will feel that.

So that was probably the most challenging, the Skype conference. That dress she was wearing in that Skype conference is the dress she was wearing when her father actually passed away. That’s why she was doing that, of course. And Jeff was feeling that because of his brother was having cancer and fighting for his life, so those things during that Skype conference were kind of real for both of them.

Directing Terry Moore

That must have been very intense. So what’s next up for you?

Vladislav Kozlov: I would like to extend The Killers, I would like to add a little bit reason to Jeff’s character, so that people will understand he’s not just a crazy guy. I want people thinking of the movie, “Who knows? Maybe he is right and that in the future maybe we laugh at him, maybe we’ll think he is crazy but you know what, who knows?” And as far as Silent Life, we will be filming more pick-up scenes at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery during the Valentino event in August on the day when Valentino actually passed away and Terry [Moore] will be there to do her pick-up scene.

And, again, I am very impressed with Terry Moore, she’s 90 years old, filming three weeks straight, and last summer was a brutal summer here in Los Angeles. She’s really a trooper, I mean I was impressed. I mean a woman at her age and memorizing 60 pages of the script, tension, crying, dying in the movie. So when I’m finished that, I hopefully will be done by January 1^st so we can bring it to the Cannes Film Festival, at least for her, while she is still alive. I want that to happen for her. She was an Academy Award nominee in 1950’s for the movie Come Back, Little Sheba and I think she has that chance.

I hope so. Vlad, thank you for time and we look forward to seeing Terry Moore’s performance in Silent Life.

Vladislav Kozlov: Thank you for your kind words and I appreciate your time, and your wife’s, watching some guy’s movie – that means a lot to me – we love movies and that’s why you and I do this. Because we love films.

Conclusion

Ranked as one of the top 10 Festivals in the United States, the Rhode Island International Film Festival is a qualifying festival for both the Short Narrative and Documentary Short Film Academy Awards as well as the British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA). There are only 10 film festivals worldwide that share this distinction and RIIFF is the only festival in New England. Since RIIFF gained the Oscar accreditation, 66 films that have been screened at the Festival have received nominations, and ten films have won. Vladislav Kozlov better start getting his acceptance speeches ready.