Ghosts continue to fascinate us and remain to be part of popular literature, television and films. There seems to be an insatiable hunger for new "ghost stories" and in the last few years numerous ghost-hunting reality shows have popped up on television. Each episode features paranormal investigators venture into purportedly haunted places in an attempt to provoke spirits to make contact in hopes of capturing it on video.

Lance Preston and the crew of GRAVE ENCOUNTERS, a ghost-hunting reality television show, are shooting an episode inside the abandoned Collingwood Psychiatric Hospital, where unexplained phenomena has been reported for years. They find themselves lost in a labyrinth of endless hallways and corridors that cause them to slipping deeper and deeper into the depths of madness. It is taping what turns out to be their final episode.

GRAVE ENCOUNTERS is the collaboration between 25-year-old writers/directors, and maverick filmmakers, Colin Vicious and Stuart Vicious. The duo applies a technique to lure the viewer into a level of emotional involvement not possible in the traditional narrative format and spellbind them with the "true" events, which unfold in "real-time" immediacy by presenting the film as being genuine "found footage" of a television crew's horrifying paranormal experience The Vicious Brothers have several upcoming film projects in the works and hope to thrill and terrify audiences over the coming years.

FEARS: GRAVE ENCOUNTERS is obviously the work of filmmakers who have a passion for the genre. Where did that passion come from and what was the spark behind the inspiration for the film?

Stuart: I've been a huge horror fan for as long as I can remember. I've always been obsessed with horror movies and things that go bump in the night. As far back as I can remember for that kind of thing for sure.

Colin: I think the inspiration for GRAVE ENCOUNTERS didn't necessarily come from some of the things that we were most inspired by as filmmakers. We were inspired by a lot of the greats like Cronenberg and stuff, but GRAVE ENCOUNTERS is a found footage movie. We really drew a lot of inspiration from the fact that there is a fad of these reality television shows that are these ghost hunting shows. There's actually a program that the BBC put out called “Ghost Watch.” Was it the early 90s, Stu?

Stuart: I think it was earlier than that. I actually don't know, but I think it could be the early 90s.

Colin: That show was kind of the original found footage type of broadcast. We definitely drew a lot of inspiration for our movie out of that show.

FEARS: Given the themes of the film, have you guys ever had a ghostly encounter?

Stuart: I know that Colin certainly has had many a ghostly encounter for sure.

Colin: There's actually a funny story about when we were location scouting the mental institution. Someone took a photograph of me down a hallway. When we were looking at the photos later, on a computer and zooming into them to get a better sense of the vibe of the location, someone actually pointed out that there was this bizarre shadow figure standing over me in this photo.

Stuart: It was super creepy!

Colin: It kind of gave rise to an idea for the movie to have a crazy shadow figure at the end of the hall.

Stuart: There even is an anomaly in the film. There's a scene in the film where we actually captured orbs floating in the corner of the frame that we didn't notice until way later on when we were editing the film. There are these orb-like things that are floating by.

Colin: They’re bizarre looking too. They're actually happening in a room where they used to do lobotomies in the institution.

FEARS: You guys shared the filmmaking duties on this project, how do you go about working together?

Stuart: We totally share everything. We start in the writing process. We co write all our scripts together. That's a completely 50-50 sharing. We pretty much each do everything. Because we write the scripts together we know exactly what we want. This way when we show up on the set we've already discussed everything in detail, every little nuance in the script, so we are both completely on the same page. It makes our job easy. We are very much in sync and communicating on the same level. When it comes to the post process with editing, we basically edited this film in Colin’s condo, hunched over a coffee table right next to each other. We were watching what each other shot, going back-and-forth. We each work on a section making recommendations to each other. We just go back and forth. It's totally collaborative.

FEARS: Given the nature of GRAVE ENCOUNTERS as a found footage film I wanted to talk about the scares in the film. The film has an overall tactile feel of a funhouse experience. In order to achieve that, was that a result of a preplanning in preproduction or did those scares come together more in the post production process?

Colin: I think coming up with the scares was something that Stu and I focused very heavily on during the writing process. It was all about what gag was going to lead to the next, and discussing how to make those work to have the biggest impact. Obviously, when you're on set, on the day you're going to shoot, you just hope that everything is going to go according to plan. In most cases it did.

There was one particular visual effect scare that happens where someone is launched down the hallway. It's actually in the trailer. We were hoping to do as many of the stunts as live action, practical stuff, as we could and augmented them with a minimum amount of visual effects. However, this particular stunt, because we were shooting on location in a real mental institution, just didn't work out. They couldn't get the stuntmen high enough off the ground or with enough force. It really came down to a matter of Stu and me thinking fast on that day and being able to use our visual effects knowledge to the best of our ability. We did the visual effects on this film ourselves as well. We just ended up doing a very simplified version of the stunt and then augmenting it in post. So post can definitely help with the scares but it really needs to be planned and thought out meticulously.

The other interesting thing with found footage that is so important is the sound. Particularly with a found footage movie you don't have any score to back you. That makes achieving that heightened level of scare even more difficult. You can usually rely on the big bang in the sound effect to be punctuated by music, but in this instance it has to sound like it's really being recorded their on camera. That just adds another level of difficulty to this particular genre of film.

Stuart: That was another thing that Colin and I did a lot in the post process with this movie. If you working on a big Hollywood budget film the job of sound design would be left up to somebody else. Colin and I did a lot of the sound design ourselves because there is no score. The sound design was going to be critical to driving the movie. We spent a lot of time laying in ambient tracks to make the building seemed like it was coming alive. Sound is 80% of an effect in a movie.

FEARS: Everything is kind of cyclical, and I'm sure the found footage movies and ghost hunter films will eventually fade in popularity. As fans of the genre looking forward in your careers what type of horror films do you see yourselves making in the future?

Stuart: Anything that is vicious, anything that is scary, and anything that has an edge to the material. We certainly don't want to get labeled as just found footage guys, but that being said Colin and I do have an interesting revisiting to the found footage thing.

I think there's kind of a backlash happening now. I think audiences are starting to get tired of it. Still, I think there's a lot of opportunity to do some exciting and new stuff with it.

Collin: I think it's an interesting way to spin our concept that's been done to death otherwise. You're seeing it from a new perspective which I think is exciting. Stu has it right there, we aren't interested in being the “found footage guys.” Our other screenplays are completely narrative. Were looking to see how it all comes together here.

FEARS: GRAVE ENCOUNTERS is part of the Tribeca Film Festival and it is having its premiere at the festival. How excited are you about that as filmmakers and what do you feel it says in terms of validating your work?

Collin: It is tremendously exciting and is absolutely validating. We must be doing something right.

Stuart: We did the US distribution deal with Tribeca Films as well. When those guys saw the film it apparently scared the crap out of them. That's exciting, and where excited to see it in front of a live audience. Be it a Festival audience, which is a little bit different than your everyday popcorn going audience. It'll be a true test of the film and we're confident we're going to see people covering their eyes and spilling their drinks.

Collin: Hey, maybe somebody will even have a heart attack that might not be so bad. That could be some good press.

FEARS: Well I hope they recover as I wouldn't want them to end up becoming a ghost in the theater.

Colin: For sure.

FEARS: As part of the package of being one of the Tribeca Films releases there is a theatrical component and a video-on-demand component. As filmmakers what is your take on the whole video-on-demand experience and at the end of the day you really care either way as the key thing is to have an audience to your film?

Stuart: Of course the dream is to get that giant theatrical run for your movie, that's the Holy Grail for any filmmaker. Still, it's a trade-off. It certainly seems like things are moving more towards a home-video market. I think the good thing is that with plasma and HD screen televisions it's not the worst way that you could view a movie.

Tribeca Festival Guide link - Grave Encounters

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Official Film Website - GRAVE ENCOUNTERS