Fallsnewspress.com - Midnight Syndicate keeping busy between films, music

Ed Douglas of Midnight Syndicate finished filming for "The Dead Matter" in early September. Midnight Syndicate is known for its spooky orchestral tracks, which have frequently been used in haunted attractions.

by April Helms

Special Products Editor

Ed Douglas of Midnight Syndicate in Chardon recently reached an important milestone: finishing the production of "The Dead Matter."

Or rather, reproduction of the film, which was first done about a decade ago, but a project Douglas wanted to re-tackle with a larger budget and more resources.

"When I came out of college, I knew I wanted to do horror movies," Douglas said. "In 1996, I did 'The Dead Matter' with $2,000. It took about a year to complete. It was real guerilla, low-budget film making. It was a learning experience to work on this film, to do it again."

Now Douglas is taking his film through post-production, which will take anywhere from four to six months.

"We are now in post-production, which is a big process," he said. "We need to take the film and edit it, add the music."

"The Dead Matter" is the story of a young woman, who will do anything to contact her deceased brother, who comes across a vampire relic.

Douglas said he hoped to have a final version of the movie by spring, so it can be entered in movie festivals. He said the filming itself "went really well."

"The cast and crew were great," Douglas said. "They were mostly from Ohio, many from Northeast Ohio. I wanted to do the filming in four weeks time, and we made that deadline."

The clincher for Douglas was when he went to the movie set of "The Rage," directed by Robert Kurtzman, which he and Gavin Gozka, co-founder of Midnight Syndicate, helped do the music score. Kurtzman also helped Midnight Syndicate with "The Dead Matter."

Much of "The Rage" and "The Dead Matter" was filmed in Ohio, Douglas said.

"I am not aware of any other film, besides 'The Rage' and 'The Dead Matter,' that were filmed locally and done by local people at this level," Douglas said. "I feel we are making a contribution to the scene. It's not easy to do these, there are a lot of challenges to putting together quality film."

Working on "The Dead Matter" has been time-consuming, but fans of Midnight Syndicate's spooky orchestral music needn't fear: there will at least be a soundtrack for the movie in the summer of 2008, and "Gavin and I are tossing around ideas for a Midnight Syndicate CD for 2009," he said.

"It's exciting," Douglas said. "I'm a little tired, but boy, I'm so excited. I hope 'The Rage' and 'The Dead Matter' bring some well-deserved attention about what we can do in the region. My goal is to be an independent producer of horror films in Northeast Ohio. I don't plan on going to New York or Hollywood. I want to do films right here."

For details on Midnight Syndicate, visit www.midnightsyndicate.com online.

E-mail: ahelms@recordpub.com

Phone: 330-688-0088 ext. 3153