In the late 1980s , horror picture - loving adolescent Rolfe Kanefsky decided to make a new kind of shivery movie . Instead of characters who followed all the older clichés , making all the wrong moves ( going into a dreary basement alone , investigating a unknown noise , running down a dead - goal hall ) , Kanefsky wanted his characters to be self - aware . Using his extensive noesis of repulsion film , Kanefsky wrote a script that drew on , and subverted , classical horror tropes . He raised money by going door to door in his vicinity , then shot the film in 1989 .
The ruined film , entitledThere ’s Nothing Out There , succeed a radical of teenagers who slowly clear they ’re living the plot of a horror film . lead by a repugnance movie expert named Mike , they start to pick up on the figure of speech and clichés they ’re experiencing , and fight back using their noesis of the rules of the genre .
If that outline sounds a bit like the plot of Wes Craven’sScream(1996 ) , that ’s no coincidence . ThoughThere ’s Nothing Out Therewas a hit when itpremiered as part of the Independent Film Project in 1990 , it never found mass dispersion . The bright young Kanefsky showedThere ’s Nothing Out Thereto a smattering of Hollywood producers — include one young producer name Jonathan Craven , boy of Wes Craven — but they all passed .
The new Craven promised to show the film to his father , but Kanefsky never heard back . A few twelvemonth later , Screampremiered , feature its own circle of ego - aware stripling , using their horror knowledge to push back against a secret slayer . Though Craven never mentioned being pep up by Kanefsky ’s film , there are unmortgaged similarities betweenThere ’s Nothing Out ThereandScream .
Charlie Lyne ’s excellent inadequate docudrama , Copycat , detail the making ofThere ’s Nothing Out There , and the parallels between Craven and Kanefsky ’s films . crack it out below , or watchThere ’s Nothing Out Therefor free onYouTube .
CopycatfromCharlie LyneonVimeo .
