When the Cairnes brothers were growing up in suburban Brisbane – “you could ride your bike for five minutes and be in the bush. We were always running over cane toads, there were frilled-neck lizards in the backyard,” says Cameron, “it felt closer to a country upbringing in a lot of ways,” – they were forever haunting their local video store.
“We grew up us kids of the VHS generation, dining out on anything genre that we could get our hands on,” says Colin. “That was hugely influential on us, especially the spirit of those horror-comedies like Reanimator, Howling, Return Of The Living Dead. The most interesting films of that ilk are ones that have an unexpected or satirical take, like ones by Landis or Dante, or Poltergeist.”
Their debut feature film, 100 Bloody Acres, is steeped in that heritage. Though they initially set themselves the goal of writing “a brutal, no-holds-barred, '70s-influenced, Texas Chainsaw Massacre-styled horror-movie,” says Colin, their desire to “take it to unexpected places” means that their finished film is anything but. Instead, it plays as a farce; with its comic elements far outweighing its periodical sprays of blood.
“We both have backgrounds in comedy, and we'd made a bunch of short films, all of which were comedies. So we were always going to go in that direction,” says Colin. “There's a lightness of touch in the film. It's not a nihilistic, brutal torture-porn, but there are some fun, splattery moments that fans will love; I love that stuff!” enthuses Cameron.
Don't miss a beat with our FREE daily newsletter
The story is a simple-enough horror premise – three city kids break down on the way to a country music festival, and come across country yokels Damon Herriman and Angus Sampson, whose 'organic fertiliser' business is fuelled by fresh roadkill – that's, moreso, an affectionate portrait of the Australian countryside; filled with dinky 'tourist' attractions and forever tuned to the local radio station, whose DJ is voice by semi-retired Magic announcer Ward Everaardt. This was inspired by times in which the Cairnes brothers took writers' retreats outside of Melbourne.
“Whenever we were driving around we'd have on the local country radio-station, or Magic 693,” says Colin. “Driving around listening to Magic on country roads, there's this timelessness to it, you tend to feel like time is lost.”
The brothers themselves came up with the playlist for the fictional radio station, which flips from Chad Morgan and Slim Dusty to Brian Cadd, and its spots, too. “Most of the jingles that you hear throughout the film are things that we came up with ourselves, when we had a lot of time on our hands in pre-production,” Colin laughs.
100 Bloody Acres has just opened in the US to super-positive reviews, and the Cairnes brothers flew over for a bout of hardcore press-mongering. “We did three roundtable interviews in a row, locked in a room, where no one says hello to you, it's just question after question. Then we did about ten phoners back-to-back,” recounts Cameron. “It's the unglamorous, behind-the-scenes work that makes you respect those big Hollywood stars, and make you realise what a factory it is. When we were done, we walked out of our little shoebox room, and saw that in the next one, Elijah Wood was doing the same thing.”
