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…)