Pearry Teo Talks The Curse of Sleeping Beauty
In The Curse of Sleeping Beauty, a man inherits an ancestral mansion that has been in his family for generations — only to learn that he has also inherited an ancient curse stemming back to the Crusades. Forced into his new role as the guardian appointed to keep the evil demons in the house at bay, he must unravel the mystery of the house, while struggling to awaken the beautiful Briar Rose (aka Sleeping Beauty).
Dread Central: The Curse of Sleeping Beauty is a classic tale of dark fantasy with a lot of horror and mystery aspects… what is it about fantastical genres like this, and sci-fi, that keeps drawing you in, and could you ever see yourself directing a non-genre movie?
Pearry Teo: I believe that artists out there have a responsibility to give you a window to peek into their soul. What makes them unique as an individual and to see the way they view our world. What keeps drawing me back to sci-fi, horror, and fantasy is just the escapism. As a child, my greatest joy to escape life (high school, actually) was to immerse myself in different worlds that only genre films can offer me. That need for dark solace through entertainment shaped me today as an adult, and I truly feel that this is the reason I continue to share these experiences I had growing up with my audience. For non-genre films, I have always enjoyed them. But these were also the culmination of the experiences writers and directors have that made these films a pure joy to watch. I just feel that my experiences in life growing up wouldn’t have led me to create a really good non-genre film.
DC: You do have some CGI in the movie, but it has a very organic feel… like it could have been made in the 80s. There’s almost a Jim Henson 1980’s Labyrinth look to some of the Sleeping Beauty moments. Please tell us what some of your visual references were before and during filming.
PT: I really held off on CGI as long as I could. Most of the film, we did everything practically because that’s what I believe in. Perhaps it is that very reason that the CGI feels like it could come from the 80s. Because back then, it was the absolute last resort. What happens then is that the CGI becomes reserved for truly fantastical things that would be impossible to re-create practically. And since my visual references came from movies like Pan’s Labyrinth, The Cell, and Silent Hill, I really tried to focus more on the creatures and environments being practical than using the cheap way out (CGI), which in my opinion – is just a shortcut to thinking.
DC: You have two “kids” of movie stars in this. Did that factor into their casting, and did you get to hear any juicy stories about Old Hollywood?
PT: We cast the best people for the role. It was an interesting tidbit that Ethan Peck (Gregory Peck’s grandson) and India Eisley (Olivia Hussey’s daughter) were both children of movie stars. But we knew going into the movie that we would focus on the art in front of screen and not rely on ‘star names’ to sell the movie. India and I had a professional relationship. But since she IS Sleeping Beauty… I never had that connection as a director and actor with her as I did with Ethan Peck. In her defense, there’s only so much direction I can give to a person who spends most of the movie asleep so most of my character building work as a director was focused on Ethan. (Ha!) Ethan, on the other hand, not only became a great friend but is somebody I admired very much. He was very fortunate to grow up in a family where fame and fortune were never a priority. I am constantly humbled by his down to earth character. If you want to find Ethan on set, he is probably in the corner reading a scientific thesis from a groundbreaking discovery. Ethan is a stud, but he acts as a true nerd. Something very rare these days!
DC: You sets and locations are so sumptuous – the attention to detail is amazing, and the cinematography highlights it all… please tell us about your crew and where you shot.
PT: We shot Sleeping Beauty entirely in L.A. The crew and I had a great obstacle to overcome because we were trying to create a fantastical world, but everything in L.A. was too iconic to shoot. We ended up finding back street alleys, deserts a mile away, and various other locations to help the audience get a sense that they are really in an alternate universe. We paid attention to geometry. For example, for every dream sequence that Ethan Peck (Thomas) encounters with India Eisley (Sleeping Beauty), there is one encompassing cylindrical design in it. But in the real world, we used very sharp defined geometry to try to distinguish between them. Color schemes are very carefully calculated and you can see the color change – not just in the way we shot it, but in the selection of the prop colors and everything. Christopher Pearson (DP) and Alessandro Marvelli (Production Design) really took extra steps to make sure there is a consistency to the evolution of our journey leading into the gates of hell.
DC: We are a horror site, first and foremost, so please… tell us why horror fans should check out The Curse of Sleeping Beauty!
PT: Oh dear, that’s the toughest question ever! I love the horror community because of their diverse taste. Rarely will you find another industry that its fans are so varied. There are slasher fans, paranormal fans, zombie, vampires… you name it. That’s the beauty of the horror community. How different we all are. But Sleeping Beauty does have some paranormal elements, and it also touches on creature feature aspects of the genre. I’ve explored the horrifying feeling of sleep paralysis in the movie and how djinns, demons, and ghosts encompass our everyday life. To me, when you watch Sleeping Beauty, you’re not just watching a movie about popcorn scares or spooky-looking ghosts or demons. You are exploring a dark recess of my mind… where fairy tales and the darkness somehow come together to form this world in my head. Influence that with movies like Silent Hill, The Cell, and Pan’s Labyrinth… and you have The Curse of Sleeping Beauty.
I do hope horror fans enjoy it. We certainly had a lot of fun making it. We scared each other in the process. Poured our blood, sweat, and tears into it. And what came out of it was something that we are all proud of… something unique to add into the collection of horror films. We don’t aim to be the best horror film out there. Instead, we aim to make a horror film that can become a vehicle where our audience can watch comfortably our darkest fears, memories, and recesses of our life.
The Curse of Sleeping Beauty stars Ethan Peck (Eden), India Eisley (Underworld: Awakening, “The Secret Life of the American Teenager”), Natalie Hall (“True Blood”), and Academy Award nominee Bruce Davison (X-Men). The film was produced by Ehud Bleiberg (The Iceman) and Pearry Teo (Cloud Atlas). Teo directed from a screenplay he wrote with Josh Nadler, inspired by characters from the Brothers Grimm tale.
Synopsis:
Thomas Kaiser inherits an ancestral mansion that has been in his family for generations — only to learn that he has also inherited an ancient curse stemming back to the Crusades. Forced into his new role as “protector” — the guardian appointed to keep the evil demons in the house at bay — Thomas teams with an ambitious local realtor and paranormal cleric to unravel the mystery of the house while struggling to awaken the beautiful Briar Rose, held captive in a terrifying netherworld seen previously in his dreams.
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