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Which is more evil: an ancient Irish vampire with the power to control your mind or a modern-day social media influencer?<\/p>\n
After watching writer-director Marco van Belle\u2019s FEED, the answer may not be as obvious as one might think. Although, personally, I\u2019m putting my money on the influencers.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s a wickedly clever juxtaposition at the heart of van Belle\u2019s contemporary spin on ancient Irish vampire mythology, and one born from a deceptively simple desire: he wanted to make what he calls a \u201cvampire movie with a capital V.\u201d<\/p>\n
No sparkle. No romanticized immortality. Van Belle wanted to go back to the darkness\u2014to the ancient mythology surrounding vampires and the powers originally attributed to them.<\/p>\n
And that\u2019s where things got interesting.<\/p>\n
Working with Irish producers Jack and Dom of Ripple World Pictures, van Belle began digging into some of the earliest vampire myths from Ireland and Europe. What he discovered was not only a way into the story, but a bridge spanning centuries.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was very relieved to find that the first power, the original power ascribed to vampires in Irish and European legends, was mind control,\u201d says van Belle.<\/p>\n
And mind control, he realized, is influence.<\/p>\n
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\u201cRealizing that mind control was this OG vampire power before anything else that we\u2019ve seen in cinema, of course, mind control is the power of influence, and we have a culture now where we are besieged with both influence and influencers, but also, which is what I became interested in, the lure of the power of influence, the attraction of becoming an influencer.\u201d<\/p>\n
Suddenly, the centuries separating an ancient Irish vampire from a group of social media influencers snapping photographs, hawking products, and curating their lives for an audience begin to disappear.<\/p>\n
The vampire promises power. Immortality. The fulfillment of desire. Give yourself over and everything you want can be yours.<\/p>\n
Social media makes much the same sales pitch.\u00a0\u00a0At least the vampire has the courtesy to bite you first.<\/p>\n
For van Belle, however, discovering that connection also solved a much more practical filmmaking problem.<\/p>\n
FEED is a low-budget production. A period film steeped entirely in ancient Irish mythology was simply beyond its means. Van Belle needed a way to preserve that mythology while placing it within a world the production could afford.<\/p>\n
Rather than taking contemporary characters into the ancient past, he brought an ancient creature into the present.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was looking for some sort of way in to find a way to link ancient myths about vampires to contemporary characters,\u201d he explains. Once the connection between vampiric mind control and modern influence revealed itself, \u201cit felt like there wasn\u2019t a huge amount of work to do to see the parallels.\u201d<\/p>\n
Those parallels take physical form in Orla (Grace Collender), a grieving young woman whose friends gather for a weekend intervention only to awaken the Dearg-Due, an ancient vampiric entity whose influence offers Orla something infinitely more seductive than eternal life: the possibility of being reunited with the family she has lost.<\/p>\n
But before van Belle could unleash an ancient evil, he needed somewhere to put it.\u00a0\u00a0And that required coffee.<\/p>\n
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FINDING THE IMPOSSIBLE<\/strong><\/p>\n FEED needed an isolated house surrounded by forest. It needed to be visually interesting inside and out. The owners needed to be willing to leave for the duration of the shoot. And it needed to be located in an area of north Wexford where the production could accommodate its cast and crew.<\/p>\n And, van Belle adds, \u201cWe don\u2019t have Hollywood money.\u201d<\/p>\n After repeated trips through the area, van Belle stopped at a place where he knew he could get a good cup of coffee. The barista asked what kept bringing him back.\u00a0\u00a0Van Belle decided to chance his arm.<\/p>\n \u201cI used to be a reporter. I used to be a journalist. I know the best way to get information is to talk to people, put boots on the ground.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0So he described the impossible house.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m looking for a house surrounded by forest in the middle of nowhere, that\u2019s really interesting inside aesthetically, and I need owners who\u2019d be willing to move out.\u201d<\/p>\n The barista thought for a moment.\u00a0\u00a0\u201cI think I know the house.\u201d<\/p>\n One phone call and a text exchange later, van Belle was standing on the property within half an hour.\u00a0\u00a0\u201cI knew that we were never going to find anyone better.\u201d<\/p>\n There was just one tiny problem.\u00a0\u00a0Approximately 100,000 Christmas trees.<\/p>\n The house was surrounded by a commercial Christmas tree farm filled with six-foot trees. Cinematographer Aidan Gault took one look and warned van Belle that he might have to veto the location.\u00a0\u00a0Because it doesn\u2019t take much to alter the visual vocabulary of a movie.<\/p>\n \u201cYou put a Christmas tree in a movie, even if there\u2019s no snow, even if there\u2019s 100,000 of them, you put a Christmas tree in a movie, it\u2019s a Christmas movie.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0FEED was emphatically not a Christmas movie.<\/p>\n Enter production designer John Leslie.<\/p>\n Eight approximately 30-foot pine trees elsewhere on the property were already scheduled to be felled later in the year. A deal was struck with the landowner. The trees were cut, hauled to the house, holes were dug, and all eight were effectively replanted to construct an artificial forest edge around the property, masking the Christmas tree farm beyond it.<\/p>\n \u201cSo when you watch the movie and you look out the back doors of the house and you see a forest, what you\u2019re actually seeing is one layer of already felled and replanted pine trees, and they\u2019re masking 100,000 Christmas trees.\u201d<\/p>\n Even van Belle remains somewhat mystified by how Leslie and the production team managed it.\u00a0\u00a0\u201cI don\u2019t know how they afforded the truck that brought the trees there. I don\u2019t know how they afforded the ratchet straps that were there, hidden, holding them in place, but they pulled off a miracle.\u201d<\/p>\n And you would never know.\u00a0\u00a0That illusion became only the beginning.<\/p>\n MAKING EVERY SHOT PURPOSEFUL<\/strong><\/p>\n The house presented another challenge. It looks spacious on camera, but once actors, camera, lighting, and crew were squeezed inside, even its largest rooms became tight.<\/p>\n For van Belle and Gault, necessity could not be allowed to become an excuse for visual monotony.<\/p>\n Van Belle spent the weekend before production walking through the house with the script, drawing floor plans and working through camera positions. He established a rule for himself:\u00a0\u00a0Never put the camera in the same place twice.<\/p>\n \u201cI basically set myself the goal of always having every choice dictated by the story and the character and the moment and what they were going through and what I wanted the audience to go through.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0Camera position, lens selection, movement\u2014everything needed to be what van Belle calls \u201cvisually purposeful.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0Never simply: This is the only place we can fit the camera.<\/p>\n Gault\u2019s willingness to embrace darkness and negative space becomes essential to that visual grammar. From the violent, blood-saturated historical prologue through the shadowy forest and increasingly ominous interiors, darkness isn\u2019t merely the absence of illumination in FEED. It becomes a presence.<\/p>\n And that was a deliberate choice at a time when the realities of streaming exhibition can encourage filmmakers to do precisely the opposite.<\/p>\n \u201cWe all know that certainly the age of streaming and people watching things on multiple platforms has meant that there\u2019s been a technical push to not make films that have too many true bits of dark shadow in them, because people are concerned that the audience might be playing it if they can\u2019t see it well enough.\u201d<\/p>\n Van Belle and Gault resisted.<\/p>\n Between Gault\u2019s photography and the final grade, they found a balance that would satisfy the technical demands of home viewing without surrendering the deep shadows and negative space van Belle associates with the horror films on which he grew up.<\/p>\n \u201cWe were able to pass the technical tests to make sure people can see it at home, but also keep those dark vibes.\u201d<\/p>\n And sometimes what appears to be lurking within those shadows isn\u2019t where you think it is at all.<\/p>\n One particularly striking overhead image finds leaves carpeting the forest floor as an oily, rancid-looking black substance appears to bubble upward from beneath the earth. Similar imagery recurs as the Dearg-Due\u2019s liquid form moves through the story.\u00a0\u00a0Except those shots weren\u2019t made in a forest.\u00a0\u00a0They weren\u2019t even made outside.<\/p>\n They were photographed on the abandoned third floor of an unfinished office building.\u00a0\u00a0\u201cAll of that was built on plywood platforms in this empty office,\u201d van Belle reveals.<\/p>\n The platforms could be tilted, allowing the filmmakers to pour the black liquid across them and control its movement practically rather than spending money creating it digitally. Leaves and other dressing completed the illusion.<\/p>\n And the wind rustling through the imaginary forest?\u00a0\u00a0Very tired camera and lighting crew members waving leaves in front of lights on the final day of photography.<\/p>\n \u201cYou come up with great ideas under the budget gun to your head.\u201d<\/p>\n It\u2019s an observation that could almost serve as the production mantra for FEED.<\/p>\n SHOOTING THE EDIT<\/strong><\/p>\n That same pressure shaped the construction of the film itself.<\/p>\n Van Belle knew FEED\u2019s schedule wouldn\u2019t permit the luxury of shooting exhaustive coverage and handing mountains of footage to his editors to discover the movie afterward.\u00a0\u00a0Instead, he had to arrive knowing what he needed.<\/p>\n \u201cI had to take the kind of David Fincher approach, which is, you know, coverage is for wimps.\u201d<\/p>\n The montages threaded throughout FEED weren\u2019t discovered in the editing room. Van Belle designed and photographed them largely as they were intended to appear, particularly a major midpoint montage involving the spreading black liquid.<\/p>\n \u201cI shot for an edit.\u201d<\/p>\n Virtually everything photographed appears somewhere in the finished film. Van Belle can think of only one unused shot, lost because the entire scene containing it was removed.<\/p>\n That created an unusual challenge for editors Andrew MacRitchie and Karenjit Sahota. Their job wasn\u2019t to excavate a movie from hundreds of hours of material. It was to find creative possibilities within something already tightly prescribed.<\/p>\n For van Belle, that meant learning another skill: letting go.<\/p>\n MacRitchie and Sahota needed room to contribute their instincts. Producers and executive producers had notes. Scenes could be subtly reordered, shots shifted, rhythms adjusted. Within a limited amount of material, the editors found ways to honor what van Belle had designed while allowing him to see his own scenes differently.<\/p>\n For a director who had walked onto the set knowing where virtually every camera position would be, stepping back became its own creative exercise.<\/p>\n KNOWING WHEN TO STOP<\/strong><\/p>\n If FEED\u2019s images rely heavily on darkness, its soundscape knows how to fill that darkness\u2014and when not to.<\/p>\n The historical prologue announces itself with sonic violence. Van Belle wanted the Dearg-Due\u2019s shrieks and the brutality surrounding it pushed toward maximum intensity.<\/p>\n Later, however, the soundtrack becomes seductive.\u00a0\u00a0Leaves. Wind. Nature. Whispers. Voices almost imperceptibly summoning Orla toward the forest.<\/p>\n The contrast is crucial.<\/p>\n Ancient evil doesn\u2019t always have to scream to exert its influence.<\/p>\n Van Belle arrived at post-production with strong ideas about sound, perhaps helped\u2014and, he admits, occasionally hindered\u2014by his own background in broadcasting. Before filmmaking, he spent two years in radio and additional time in television news. As a radio journalist, he constructed pieces by layering interviews, Foley, and environmental sound.\u00a0\u00a0It gave him confidence in his ear.\u00a0\u00a0Perhaps a little too much.<\/p>\n His sound team wasn\u2019t afraid to tell him so.\u00a0\u00a0They would essentially tell him no, something was too much; less would accomplish more. The soundtrack could remain rich and intricately layered without calling attention to every ingredient.<\/p>\n Or, as van Belle jokingly characterizes their instructions to him:\u00a0\u00a0\u201cSit in the corner there, please, go on your phone for five minutes, and let me just dial this back a touch.\u201d<\/p>\n The experience reinforced an idea that extends well beyond sound.<\/p>\n \u201cCraft is knowing how to do it, but creativity is knowing when to stop.\u201d<\/p>\n THE SOUND OF SOMETHING ANCIENT<\/strong><\/p>\n Composer Max De Wardener extends FEED\u2019s collision between antiquity and modernity into the score.<\/p>\n Van Belle wanted music that could be simultaneously compelling and unsettling. The sound is contemporary, at times sparse and aggressive, with something of a Carpenter-esque quality, but beneath it are instruments and sounds reaching much farther backward.<\/p>\n De Wardener created sounds himself using instruments and objects and incorporated the work of a specialist playing an ancient Scandinavian string instrument.<\/p>\n Again, the reasoning returns to the central conceit of FEED.\u00a0\u00a0\u201cWe weren\u2019t taking a contemporary character into the ancient mythological past. We were taking an ancient mythological creature into the present.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0The score needed to make the same journey.<\/p>\n Even the end credits demonstrate how effectively De Wardener\u2019s musical language coheres. Unable to afford another bespoke cue, the filmmakers combined two existing score stems, mixing between them. They fit together\u2014and fit the length of the credits\u2014almost perfectly.<\/p>\n Necessity, once again, became invention.<\/p>\n FINDING ORLA\u2014AND A VAMPIRE YOU CAN THROW AROUND<\/strong><\/p>\n For all of FEED\u2019s technical challenges, none of it works without Orla.<\/p>\n She is the throughline of the film, appearing in almost every frame and carrying both its grief and its supernatural temptation. Van Belle knew he needed an actor capable not merely of playing the character but of embodying the collision between ancient and contemporary that defines the film itself.<\/p>\n He found that in Grace Collender.<\/p>\n Van Belle describes what he was seeking as a kind of timelessness\u2014not conventional attractiveness, but a quality that would allow Orla to feel equally plausible had FEED been set in the 1800s or today.\u00a0\u00a0Then he saw Collender\u2019s audition.\u00a0\u00a0\u201cThat\u2019s Orla.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cYou\u2019re not looking to be thinking, \u2018That\u2019s an actor who can play Orla.\u2019 You\u2019re looking for somebody to give you a new image of what the character you wrote looks like.\u201d<\/p>\n Collender brought something else equally valuable to a production operating under intense time pressure: preparation.<\/p>\n \u201cShe turned up with a level of preparedness for every individual scene that was equal to my level of preparedness.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0Given the director\u2019s meticulous advance planning, that\u2019s saying something.<\/p>\n And then there was the Dearg-Due.<\/p>\n Niamh Hogan brought something entirely different to the role. The vampire is an intensely physical presence, and Hogan brought not only performance ability and a love of horror, but extensive physical and stunt experience.\u00a0\u00a0That meant the production didn\u2019t need to double her.<\/p>\n \u201cShe was game for anything.\u201d<\/p>\n And on this production, that turned out to be considerably more important than anyone might initially have realized.\u00a0\u00a0Because FEED had one white dress for its vampire.<\/p>\n One.<\/p>\n There were no duplicates waiting in wardrobe after a stunt. No clean replacement ready after gallons of stage blood.<\/p>\n Van Belle remembers walking outside during a camera reset and seeing Hogan in costume for the first time while members of the crew poured pints of blood over her.\u00a0\u00a0Artistic considerations momentarily disappeared.<\/p>\n \u201cAll I was thinking was, \u2018Oh, holy hell! That blood\u2019s going to go everywhere in this house that we can\u2019t afford to replace.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n When someone asked whether Hogan needed more blood, van Belle decided perhaps they had achieved sufficient vampiric saturation.\u00a0\u00a0\u201cShe looks great. That\u2019s enough. That\u2019s enough blood, guys. Hold on the blood. That\u2019s perfect.\u201d<\/p>\n The costume team\u2014and its scrubbing brushes\u2014handled the rest.<\/p>\n Low-budget vampire filmmaking distilled to its essence:<\/p>\n One dress. Lots of blood. No room for mistakes.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/behindthelensonline.net\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/feed20.png\")
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