It doesn't end well for this guy.

Given David Sander‘s newfound Golden Skull trophy thanks to Screamfest’s Best Special Effects Award for The Tunnel, we thought we’d invite him to give us a little insight into some of his experience working on the film. If you read between the lines, you can see we didn’t quite make it easy for him at times!

- Enzo
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When I was first asked about doing visual effects for “The Tunnel”, I was excited enough, but hadn’t reckoned on a couple of the shots the production threw at me. One of them was what came to be referred to as the “Neck Break Shot”, a rather gruesome sequence witnessed by our heroic crew via their night-vision camera, as Stalker (Goran Kleut) slowly twists the head of an already blinded security guard (Ben Maclaine) far further than nature ever intended.
To achieve the vision in one unedited sequence, both Ben and Goran took a dive into Willoughby Aquatic Centre’s pool at night, surrounded by props that glimpsed in the dark implied the dank, water-filled tunnels under Sydney. Goran performed the sequence with Ben, but rather than actually snapping Ben’s neck, Goran let go of Ben and continued his action, finally dragging Ben below the surface and submerging himself only to emerge a moment later to rush the camera.

The trick was when Ben’s head could turn no further, the camera was stopped, and he was turned around, his clothing reversed, and by himself continued the head-turn move to its grisly conclusion. (continue reading…)

OK, so this thing looks more like something out of ‘2001: A Space Odyssey‘ than something out of ‘The Abyss‘, but nonetheless…

We had a great night’s shoot last night, with our amazing crew pulling an all-nighter to get some crucial water and underwater shots and sequences from the movie. Not much to report other than we are one day closer and one day to go, and then it’s all about the post-production. The edit is coming along really well, and we here at Team Tunnel can’t wait to start showing it to you!

Meanwhile, we’ll just have to keep putting up these cool galleries from our on-set exploits.

These photos courtesy of Steve Davis. Obviously we didn’t keep him nearly busy enough on the night

To The Person In Charge Of New Title Addition Reviews,

We are writing to you regarding our feature film project ‘The Tunnel’.

We here at ‘The Tunnel’ production team, as well as our stakeholders and thousands of fans, have been frustrated over the last few months at IMDb.com’s consistent refusal to list our project. We have repeatedly addressed IMDb’s requests for further qualifying information, as well as puzzling requests for proof of the existence of our production.

Time and time again we are refused a listing on your database, because of what we feel is an unfair judgment based on our online distribution model via torrents. We seek to present our case one more time, putting forward the requirements sought by the IMDb. Also, to seek answers not just for us as producers, but for the thousands of fans and the independent filmmaking community at large, looking to use the Internet to find new ways to connect with an audience.

While we completely understand and respect the need for IMDb.com to screen all submissions in order to maintain an accurate database that is not filled with fake or erroneous listings, we feel that this screening process has failed this time.

Allow us to elaborate: (continue reading…)

We had a very successful day yesterday doing makeup tests with all our cast, and I thought we’d share a little something from the day’s endeavours. Special thanks to Motion Fused for the music track. More after the jump!

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