We were lucky to catch up with Gabriel Scott recently and have shared our conversation below.
Gabriel, thank you so much for taking the time to share your lessons learned with us and we’re sure your wisdom will help many. So, one question that comes up often and that we’re hoping you can shed some light on is keeping creativity alive over long stretches – how do you keep your creativity alive?
You have to find the things that speak to you and resonate with you. There is always going to be a lot of pressure for your creativity to look a certain way or to match the creative thinking of others. As a queer filmmaker with a preference for horror, I definitely had to learn to stick to my creative guns. Ever since I can remember, I have always been filled with morbid curiosity, dark humor, and a love for all things horror. Things that were scary, taboo, and macabre all captured my imagination. I found beauty, catharsis, and fun in creatively exploring what most people avoided even thinking about. There have been those who demand that I conform to more “normal” tastes. Even in film school, a message, while never stated outright, was made abundantly clear. Horror is seen as a lesser genre. I remember a professor and I having a discussion about my thesis film. It was a horror short film titled Hard-Bitten, about a man who gets bitten by a werewolf as a metaphor for queer trauma. The film was very personal and I remember the professor saying with the utmost sincerity, “You will probably feel like a weight has been lifted after you make this. Afterward, you hopefully won’t even want to make horror movies anymore.” I was very taken aback by this. I felt disrespected. I love horror films, not because they are a dark place for wallowing, but because I believe they help us make sense of the human condition. I have not stopped wanting to make horror films in the over-ten-years that I’ve been doing this and I don’t foresee it happening in the future lest I suffer a blow to the head.
There are some more pragmatic steps that I take to keep the creative juices flowing. I believe, as an artist, it is important to engage with different mediums. As a filmmaker, it is easy to get into the habit of only looking for inspiration in watching movies. Eventually, I end up hitting a wall and cannot think outside of the box. Then, I remember to pick up a book, look at paintings, or listen to music. I am often surprised at the unexpected places that those eureka moments come from. Suddenly, I feel refreshed to reapproach my own work. Engaging with one kind of art can become stifling so diversifying your sources of inspiration can be very useful.
Finally, on a more personal note, I never make the same thing twice. By the time I finish a project, I am usually ready to make something completely different. I, of course, have a unique creative voice and personal style that I return to but I also need to try new things to stay satisfied creatively. I like to explore and challenge myself so doing the same thing over and over gets pretty boring pretty fast. Plus, when you’ve been working on a project for weeks or months or even years, the project has most likely made you want to rip your hair out at least once so it is nice to move on to something that doesn’t remind you of it.
Let’s take a small detour – maybe you can share a bit about yourself before we dive back into some of the other questions we had for you?
I never feel more at home than when I am directing a film. I draw from high brow genre films as well as B-movies, cult classics, 80s slashers, body horror, and exploitation films. Some of the most inspirational directors for me are David Cronenberg, Brian De Palma, Paul Verhoeven, Lucio Fulci, John Carpenter, and Stanley Kubrick. Something all of these directors have in common is their ability to combine exploitative elements like sleaze, sex, gore and violence, with genuinely beautiful craft like atmospheric cinematography, flowery scores, and riveting performances. I consider my style to be in a similar vein. I make classy exploitation films, if you’ll accept the oxymoron. Who says splatter movies can’t be high art? I’ll gladly prove them wrong.
When I’m not directing, I am doing practical special effects. My specialty is, unsurprisingly, blood and gore effects. It’s creative, messy, and actually a lot sillier than you’d probably imagine. It is difficult to see me walking around with a barbecue sauce bottle full of blood in one hand and a fake severed head swinging from the other while I’m humming “Heads Will Roll” and not crack a smile. It’s like finger painting but instead of acrylics, I use fake blood and guts. It also involves a lot of creative problem solving, which I love. How do I make this look as realistic as possible? Where can I run tubing so blood will squirt at the camera? How do I build a fake head that will split open? When I manage to elicit screams of disgust on set, I know I’ve done my job well.
I am always looking toward bigger and better goals. I will be taking my college thesis film, Hard-Bitten, to film festivals soon and cannot wait to see where that takes me. I am also developing ideas for what will be my feature length directorial debut. I have directed a plethora of short films, videos, music videos, and more over the years but I am fiending to direct a feature length film – my dream since I was a child. It will be an independent horror film made by myself and some extremely talented friends of mine and I cannot wait to terrify the world with it.
If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?
As a serial procrastinator, I am constantly working on disciplining myself. It’s very easy to get distracted from creating. It’s easy to say you’ll “do it tomorrow.” It’s easy to get bogged down by life and slip out of the habit of doing what you love. You need to discipline yourself and keep your feet wet. Set aside time to sit down and work on your art. Set deadlines for yourself. Make something small when you have the time. Find out what other artists you know are working on. Obligate yourself to keep at it even when it feels like your wheels are just spinning. As long as you’re working, you’re only getting closer to where you want to be. Say it with me: practice makes perfect.
With that said, burnout is a very real and very debilitating syndrome that you should be careful to avoid. When you feel it creeping in, when you’re at your wit’s end, when you no longer believe there is a finish line, what you might need is some space. Taking time away from work is intrinsic to a stable and successful career. You need a life outside of work to keep the rest of your being fulfilled. Time away also allows you to come back with a refreshed perspective and new ideas. Taking space from work may sound counterintuitive to what I just said before about discipline but it is all about balancing the two. All work and no play makes Jack Torrance chase his wife and son with an axe. And he didn’t even finish the book he was writing!
Finally, remember when I said practice makes perfect? Well, there’s no such thing as perfect. I have often prolonged releasing projects because they weren’t yet “perfect.” They just needed a little more work. And then a little more work… And then a little more work… And they float into post-production limbo, not seeing the light of day. One of my editing professors said something that has stuck with me in regard to this exact phenomenon. “You’ll never ‘finish’ working on a project. But at some point, you just have to stop.” He was right.
Okay, so before we go we always love to ask if you are looking for folks to partner or collaborate with?
Absolutely! I am always happy to meet fellow creators who share my passion for cinema, horror, B-movies, cult movies, and SFX! I am also an avid physical media collector and love talking to other collectors. Filmmaking is a team sport and the industry is all about who you know. I love surrounding myself with artists whose work inspires me and I love collaborating with other artists so we can elevate each others’ work. If you work in film and video or just like discussing our shared creepy, niche interests, you can reach out to me via my socials listed below. I am always on the lookout for fellow freaks who are anxious to create something cool!
Contact Info:
- Website: https://linktr.ee/mrgabrielscott
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mrgabrielscott/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/MrGabrielScott
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/PhantasmalFilms
- Other: https://www.tiktok.com/@mrgabrielscott
Image Credits
Saul Bromberger
