TWISTED SISTER's DEE SNIDER Talks 'Strangeland: Disciple'

Marco Chacon of FlickDirect recently conducted an interview with TWISTED SISTER frontman Dee Snider about Dee's upcoming feature film "Strangeland: Disciple", the much-anticipated follow-up to "Strangeland" (1998),which he wrote and starred in as antagonist Captain Howdy. A couple of excerpts from the chat follow below.

FlickDirect: "Strangeland: Disciple" is coming out — what's the release date? And, we have already seen other movies like the "Saw" and "Hostel" movies — what is "Strangeland: Disciple" going to show us that we haven't seen?

Dee: There is no release date yet. The target date for starting production is September or October. "Hostel" and "Saw" are children of "Strangeland". Before that, there was no torture genre; everyone was still beating the dead horse being chased and dying of "Halloween". The idea of being torn into had not been developed yet. I did a Fangoria radio show, dedicated to the world of horror; and the makers of "Hostel" and "Saw" would talk about how they loved "Strangeland". With "Strangeland: Disciple", I'm going to take my crown back. That calls for a really intense effort on the part of the script. It is the graphic nature of "Strangeland: Disciple". It will be NC-17. We can allow ourselves to focus more on things happening to the subjects. We don't have to cut away so rapidly — so rabidly. "R" leaves a lot to the imagination. I tend to leave a lot less to the imagination.

FlickDirect: "Strangeland: Disciple" is going to be NC-17. You must be taking some heat for that? Tell me about that.

Dee: I wanted to make the first one NC-17, but the company making the picture said "No, you can't. You won't get any screens. When did you last see an NC-17 movie at the multiplex?" There is a conservative undercurrent in this country that won't allow [this type of movie] to be seen. Their view is that the rating is to protect the public, not educate them. I am not making a movie for children. I know, from experience, that kids are buying tickets to "Snow White" or whatever and sneaking in to see R-rated films. So we toned down "Strangeland". With "Strangeland: Disciple", we are doing the reverse of what is going on today — which is to release the R-rated movie in the theaters and then do the unrated director's cut on DVD. I want to make an adult movie: dark, disturbing, and intense. The original release will have limited screenings. When "The Exorcist" came out, it only showed in New York and L.A. The word spread about this insane movie. The first cut was a lot more intense with more subliminal cuts and things like the spider-walk that got taken out of the release version. People were passing out in the theater. We're going to do the initial screenings with NC-17, and then a wider release at "R." People will be going, "You have to see the original." I'm not making an intense picture for the purpose of making an intense picture. It's reality-based. The first one was also; when I wrote it, Internet crime didn't exist. In the last movie, Captain Howdy appears to burn to death — he is on fire. When you see how he survives, people will go, "Oh crap, I get that!" It is realitybased. The opening scene is an autopsy of a severely burned body; it is a gruesome, brutal experience. The credit roll is over the surgeries on Captain Howdy — the burn surgery. Burn victims are the most horrific; the real monsters of our society. The surgeries they go through to be reconstructed have people run from the room screaming. What's the first thing that happens when a criminal is brought into the morgue? It is an autopsy. If a guy survives burns — then it is surgery. This is following the natural course of action, and it is incredibly intense!

Read the entire interview from FlickDirect.