Fake Blood, Dish Soap, and Wrestlers: Austin Snell and his ragtag crew’s 16mm labor of lover unspools in They Call Her Death

Photo by Allani Gordon

For Austin Snell, it all started—as it has for so many filmmakers who came of age in the ‘90s and 2000s—with Sam Raimi.

“I got into filmmaking largely because of the original Evil Dead,” Snell says. “It’s so effective and fun, but you can still see all the strings and all the seams in it. That was the first time I encountered a movie where something could be perfectly imperfect, and I think that’s why it works so well for me. Slightly less than perfect is what I’m aiming for.”

Raimi’s DIY masterpiece was shot on 16mm film, which is what Snell also used to shoot his latest movie, They Call Her Death—a grainy, gritty, low-budget homage to spaghetti westerns and Italian horror. Snell filmed it using an Eclair NPR, the same camera and lens combination Michael Wadleigh used to shoot his Oscar-winning documentary Woodstock in 1969 (the editing crew included Thelma Schoonmaker and Martin Scorsese). More to Snell’s purposes, it was also the setup Tobe Hooper used to shoot The Texas Chain Saw Massacre.

Photo Courtesy of MMBN Productions

“I’m doing this throwback style that replicates bygone genres, but I never want to make something that feels like a parody or a joke on those movies,” Snell says. “Those movies weren’t trying to be bad, they were made by people who cared a whole lot. 16mm does a lot of the heavy lifting. It looks like an older grindhouse movie as a result.”

They Call Her Death is the story of Molly (Sheri Rippel), a woman living a simple, happy life on the prairie in the wild West with her husband Thomas (Patrick Poe). When Thomas is killed by a shady bounty hunter (Devan R. Garcia), Molly sets out to take violent revenge on the corrupt sheriff (Jeff Boyer) who allowed it to happen. She finds a tentative ally in the town’s new deputy (Dané Shobe), the only lawman around who isn’t on the take.

Snell, the cast, and crew started filming in August 2021 using locations like Wichita’s Cowtown Museum and the Missouri Town Living History Museum in Lee’s Summit, as well as sets Snell built in his garage.

“It took up every spare moment,” Snell says. “I can’t not work on it when it’s something I’ve invested so much in. It was a pleasure the entire time. I had so much fun doing it that looking back, it is a lot of work and seems crazy, but it never felt that way at the time.”

Photo by Matthew Lloyd

“How did they do that?”

Like many of the movies that inspired Snell’s love of 16mm films and low-budget filmmaking (he also collects 16mm prints that he and Stray Cat Film Center programmer Matt Lloyd show for Stray Cat’s 16mm Showcase series), They Call Her Death was a team effort. And by all accounts, it was a labor of love for everyone involved.

“I had a blast every time I got to work on it,” lead actress Sheri Rippel, says. “I hope someone’s foolish enough to let me do it at least once more.”

Rippel—who’s active in Topeka Civic Theatre and the Ad Astra Theater Ensemble—came to the project after a friend recommended her to Snell. “Austin asked if I’d seen any Westerns before, and I asked, ‘Does Fievel Goes West count?’ But edgy revenge flicks, like Quentin Tarantino movies, have been my favorite for a long time, so that made me want to explore it more,” Rippel says.

After reading the script, it didn’t take long for Rippel to know she wanted in. “I was sold on it immediately,” she says. “There were things in it I knew I’d never be able to do in any other project for the rest of my life.”

One of those things was a particularly grisly moment in which Molly smashes a bad guy’s testicles with the butt of her gun, a scene made uncomfortably realistic by makeup effects designer Jake Jackson. “There are a couple of directors I work with a lot, and they tend to bring bizarre things to me that you wouldn’t expect to put in a movie,” Jackson says.

This was definitely one of those requests.

“Austin said he wanted it to have some articulation, so I brushed silicone into a mold and left it hollow. I took bouncy balls and put silicone and other material around them to make them act like actual testicles. Then, I added Dawn soap in there and put silicone over the top so that when Sheri touches it with the butt of the gun, it could move around a little.”

The result is easily They Call Her Death’s most memorable practical effect. “My goal is always to make people wonder if we did it for real,” Jackson says. “If I get the, ‘How did they do that,’ I’ve accomplished my goal.”

Another scene that comes up frequently with the cast and crew is a scene where a pair of outlaws attempt to attack Molly in her home, and she responds by mercilessly dispatching them.

“I was covered in fake blood,” Rippel says with the kind of happy reminiscence that most people reserve for joyful childhood memories. “It was mixed heavily with dish detergent, so that smell will always bring back memories of being on set.”

The scene used so much blood, in fact, that it soaked through the set itself, according to visual effects coordinator Adam Jeffers. “Blood went through all the paneling and got to the garage floor and the walls,” he says. “Jake’s blood recipe is pretty easy to clean, and he did his best to wash it out, but with the amount of time it sat there, I think some of it’s there for good.”

Photo Courtesy of MMBN Productions

Bulls, Bodyslams, and Burns

In a later scene, Garcia’s dastardly bounty hunter burns Molly’s house to the ground while she sleeps. That scene, another practical effect, required Snell to build and burn his own miniature cabin.

“I’m really proud of the miniature cabin I built,” Snell says. “I love miniature work and I’d rather see a not-so-great miniature than great CGI.”

Jeffers, who wore many hats on the production (stunt coordination, prop work, and painting They Call Her Death’s impressive poster, in addition to working on vfx), helped shoot the burn with Snell and Lloyd at a controlled burn area outside of Lawrence. He describes it as one of the weirdest days on set.

“Some county volunteer firefighters came and waited for us to be done and spray it down. It seemed like it wasn’t nearly as exciting as they hoped for,” Jeffers says. “We burned Austin’s four-foot cabin miniature the same day. Taking things out, dressing them up, and filming them while they burn is maybe the purest art that moviemaking’s ever been.”

Jeffers also takes responsibility for creatively figuring out the problem of hiring stunt performers on a budget. “I’m a fan of regional wrestling and I hit on the idea that if we couldn’t hire professional stunt people, we could hire wrestlers, who know how to fall, take a hit, and make it look good,” he says.

The production’s go-to guy was Ryan Greeness—who goes by the professional moniker Moonshine Mantell. “I’d seen Moonshine at some Central States Wrestling events and was really taken with him,” Jeffers says. “He was carrying four grown men in a tag team match and I thought, If he has the athleticism to pull that off, this is our guy.”

Mantell also brought in Scott Tyler—a wrestler with a smaller build who served as a stand-in for Rippel in the more intense fight scenes. During a climactic fight shot at Missouri Town, the pair’s battle brought about unintended side effects.

“While they were fighting outside, there was this bull in a kind of rickety pen, and every time Moonshine did his wrestling yells and grunts, it was aggravating this bull to the point where he was pushing against the fence posts,” Jeffers says. “The staff had to calm down the bull, and then we had to continue shooting the fight dead fucking silent. Moonshine would crack Scott over his knee and no one could expel air or make a real pain noise even if they were feeling it, because if they did, the bull would get loose and kill us all. They put their bodies on the line for our movie, and I love them both for it.”

Photo by Jake Jackson

“This is what my life is for.”

They Call Her Death had its local premiere on June 20 at Screenland Armour Theatre. Now, Snell and Jeffers are working on a festival run and potential further theatrical engagements. Jeffers says the whole project has been a culmination of “a lifetime of watching trash film.”

The experience has been an inspiration for Rippel as well. “I’m proud of mastering how to twirl a gun,” she says. “The one I have in the movie is a monster, and definitely not fit for a lady’s hand. It’s one of those great hero shots that would be on an actor’s bucket list, and I’m so glad I got to do it.”

Not only that, but she’d gladly take the opportunity to work on a movie again. “If I could keep doing what we did for the rest of my life, I wouldn’t even have to get paid for it or anything,” she says. “It was joyful work.”

For Jackson, who also helped produce the film, the experience was more than just another gig. “It was a really fun, arduous experience,” he says. “It’s one of those deals where if you believe in the project and like working with the people, sticking with it to the end is the most important thing. It’s not just a job, it’s a production I’m proud of.”

Whatever happens next, Snell says, the project has been the shot in the arm to energize him to make more movies. “This is what my life is for,” he says. “I’ll be making films until I can’t anymore.”

Just like Sam Raimi, the 16mm man, Snell’s already got his grass-roots hustle mindset going for the next project.

“I’ve got a couple of ideas kicking around,” he says. “It’s likely I’ll keep shooting on film, but whatever happens I’m gonna pivot to the next thing.”