Martin Gooch, BAFTA winning filmmaker talks about The Gatehouse

An ancient curse is unlocked in The Gatehouse, on VOD 12/5 from Uncork’d Entertainment.

Jack is a struggling writer recovering from the death of his wife. His daughter, 10-Year-Old Eternity, loves digging for treasure in the forest behind her house. In a coincidental turn of fate, Jack agrees to undertake a writing project about the ‘legend of the black flowers’ at the same time that Eternity discovers a mysterious object in the woods, and the forest wants it back. They’ve unlocked an ancient curse and must now fight for survival.

The film hails from award-winning director Martin Gooch, whose credits include many comedy shorts as well as films and series such as Death (2012), The Search For Simon (2015) and TV’s Hollyoaks.

indieactivity: When did your film career kickoff, Martin?
Martin: I’ve always wanted to be a film Director since I was 5 years old and an Aunt took my brother and I to see Disney’s The Rescuers at the cinema. I remember it distinctly and can even tell you what ice cream we had and what the carpet looked like. I was hooked. But I didn’t get to make a decent short film until 1999 when I made the Orgasm Raygun short which was bought by the BBc and put on TV. After that I made a whole load of shorts (I think I made more than 20) and I was a winner with BBC Best new Directors in 2001 and 2002 and eventually they gave me a job directing Doctors for BBC1.

indieactivity: And since then, who have you enjoyed working with the most? Anyone that has impressed you?
Martin: I have been fortunate to work with many brilliant cast and crew, some really fantastic people and it is very hard to think of anyone as more impressive than anyone else. In 1999 I was a Clapper Loader (2nd AC) on a film in Tunisia called The Three Kings (not the one with George Clooney!) and the actor Paul Freeman from Raiders of the lost Ark, (which is one of my all-time favourite films of all time) was in it. He played King Melchior and he was just incredible, a real force on set and just invincible acting power. I said to him ‘will you be in my movie when I make it?’ and he said yes.

Cut to ten years later when I was making my first feature film and I gave Paul a call and he said ‘yes’ again and was in my first feature film Death (Known as After Death in the USA).

His onset presence is phenomenal and his performances just wonderful. So much fun to work with, but all the actors in my films have been amazing, and hugely committed to the projects. Linal Haft is a regular having done 3 of my films and is always brilliant to work with. Sarine Sofair I have wanted to work with for a while and it totally awesome I felt bad that we killed her off in the movie…

indieactivity: When did the journey on “Gatehouse” begin?
Martin: The actual building we filmed the Gatehouse at is a small late 17th century lodge just up the road from the village my parents live in, in Somerset, England. It used to be quite overgrown and I had passed it a hundred times, and one day I drove past and the hedge had been trimmed and a young lady was putting up washing in the garden. I stopped my car and went over and said how much I loved the house and said I was a film maker.

She said she loved movies and did I want to see inside, I said I’d love to and after having a look round and feeling totally inspired I said – if I write a film that fits your house can we come and film it here? And she said yes. Cut to 4 months later and I turned up with a film crew and made a movie.

indieactivity: How would you describe the tone?
Martin: It’s a gothic fantasy, rather than a horror. My original pitch was Pan’s Labyrinth without the labyrinth or Pan…

indieactivity: Tell us about working with Uncork’d? They’ve been lots of classy genre films in recently.
Martin: This is my first outing with Uncork’d so we are only at the beginning of this particular journey!

indieactivity: What was it that appealed to you about working with them?
Martin: Let’s wait and see!

indieactivity: Being a film about spooky stuff, we’d be remiss not to ask “do you believe?”
Martin: I think if you grow up in a town that is 2000 plus years old, like I did, it would be remiss to think that the echoes of the past do not resonate in some form in this current and future worlds.

indieactivity: Ever had a spooky occurrence or encounter?
Martin: Yes. Several. If you are an empath and open to the other worlds then they will come and find you.

indieactivity: How tough is it shooting an indie horror film? What do people not know…?
Martin: Making movies is tough. Long hours, little sleep, little money! And it can be fraught with pitfalls and disappointment, actors cancelling at the last minute, locations being unavailable, kit not working, running out of money… But it is fun, it has to be or we wouldn’t do it. We have a lot of laughs on my set and I sincerely hope that my cast and crew go away having had a great on-set experience.

indieactivity: What’s next for you?
Name: I have literally just wrapped on my 4th feature film a sci-fi post-apocalyptic movie called Black Flowers which is all about a family’s fight for survive in post-apocalyptic America. I’m on the plane from LA to London as I write this. We shot it in North California and Montana USA,and filmed in an actual nuclear bunker and should be complete in the spring. I was also invited to Beijing, China in the summer where one of my projects was picked up so hopefully that might graduate to production.

I’m also currently in the process of financing Alice on Mars, which follows the further adventures of Alice of Wonderland fame, she’s been to wonderland, she’s been through the looking glass and now she’s going to Mars. It’s a wonderful film full of excitement, adventure and sci-fi action!

I just want to go to work, to keep on making films, making art and entertainment and making engaging films that people want to watch, it’d be wonderful to have bigger budgets and more time to shoot to create stronger and more satisfying work with less compromise and more time to explore creatively and make art. That is what I am working towards.