Director BIO: David Jeffrey

Playing at the HORROR Short Film Festival in October 2017

Director Biography

Davidjefferypic

David Jeffery is known to his colleagues as one of the hardest working Producer/Directors in Hollywood. When he’s not working on “Bones,” the quirky forensic series on Fox (225 episodes, including the pilot) or co-producing the upcoming -event mini series, “Prison Break,” (also on Fox), Jeffery thrives in the indie movie world, as an award winning filmmaker.

He produced and co-directed the critically acclaimed feature documentary “Lesson Plan: The Story of the Third Wave” which garnered Jeffery two awards, Best Director and Best Feature Documentary at the 2012 Independent Filmmakers Showcase. After playing in dozens of film festivals around the world, “Lesson Plan” is now available on I-tunes distributed by Journeyman Films.

In his first professional effort, Jeffery wrote, produced and directed the horror/thriller “The Last Stop Café” which debuted at the Nashville Film Festival before becoming a popular short on the festival circuit. The film earned numerous awards including three Tellys, a CINE Golden Eagle and the Best Horror Short film prize at Shockerfest. Lead actress Christie Lynn Short received a best actress nomination at the Eerie Horror Film Festival.

David is a member of the Producers Guild of America and the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences. He began his career in New York City after receiving his BFA in Film Production from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts. An avid scuba diver, Jeffery resides in Los Angeles.

Director Statement

“Girl #2” was a chance to simultaneously poke fun and pay homage to the scary, fun and cheesy sorority horror movies of the 1980s. These films tend to get maligned by critics but a few of them contain some really great plot twists, charismatic performances and sharp dialogue.

It goes without saying, every film poses its own unique set of directorial challenges, but for me, the first was to dupe the audience into believing they were watching a credible B horror movie for the first few minutes. Hopefully, the horror film aficionado will see these first moments as laced with imagery that indicates the tone is bordering on satirical. To the average viewer however, these images are seen as merely building the tension of the story. The second challenge was to edit the film in such a way that no one saw the comic twist coming, a task that took months of experimentation and testing to nail down!

In terms of visual style, cinematographer Brad Lipson and I perused and studied countless horror films. The look of the 2013 hit “The Conjuring” proved inspirational. Like any horror film, we made sure we had plenty of slow moving steadicam shots in the first few minutes of the picture. When the tone of the film shifted, we opted for a more locked down or hand held style of shooting.

Our music style proved itself unique as well. Masterfully composed by Sean Callery, Julia Newmann and Jeff Lingle, the score shifted from a classic horror film menacing tone to something quirkier and yet unnerving in just nine minutes.

By horrorfestival

Festival for Horror Showcases the best of Horror Films and Screenplays from all over the world.

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