McGoldrick/McGuigan Productions announced today that principal photography has been completed on the upcoming slasher thriller ‘Braxton’. Shooting began July 6th, with the entirety of the film being shot in and around Northern Ireland. Leo McGuigan, 19, directed from his own screenplay and co-produced with Margaret McGoldrick. Together the pair have made a handful of award-winning shorts. Braxton is their first feature venture. Pic will play festivals and seek distribution through 2015.
“It’s unbelievably thrilling to complete principal photography on Braxton,” McGuigan said today. “This is a project which has been with me for a very long time. I have so much love for this genre, and for the elements of cinema that it celebrates. [The film] is very much an affectionate throwback to classics like My Bloody Valentine and the Scream series, but hopefully we’ve got some themes and ideas in here that will make it appealing for a new generation”.
Every town has a devil. For the small community of Braxton, that devil is Tommy Miller. A bullied and tormented teen who finally snapped, killing his friends and family at the annual Braxton town hall party, Miller escaped into the woods, never to be seen or heard from again. Until now. Ten years later, a group of fresh-faced young teens find themselves targeted by a masked man in a hooded cloak. It’s up to Detective Ryan Fenton and his fish-out-of-water partner to protect the town from Miller’s clutches; there’s just one issue — Ryan himself is a survivor of the original massacre. Is Miller opening up a new chapter, or has he returned to attend to some unfinished business? A roller coaster ride filled with suspense, terror and gallows humour, Braxton is a shameless love letter to slasher cinema of the past, present and future.
The film features an ensemble cast of newcomers (first-time actors Jenna Byrne and Vicky Allen portray the leading teenagers) and rising talent (Shaun Blaney, soon to be seen in Halo: Nightfall and Diona Doherty of Britain and Ireland’s Next Top Model fame). “To work with such a huge and sprawling cast on such a tight budget was an ambitious challenge,” McGuigan revealed, “But as a first-time director I really won the lottery with this cast and crew. Their generosity, talent and hard-work deserves to be applauded, for they made a potentially-gruelling 38-day shoot one of the most joyous experiences of my life”.
Braxton is now entering post-production. It is expected to play the horror festival circuit in 2015.
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