Dominic Burns talks Van Damme and Alien Invasion
The Fan Carpet‘s Marc Jason Ali had the pleasure to speak to British actor/writer/director Dominic Burns ahead of the release of U.F.O. his latest Sci-Fi offering.
A violent earthquake is followed by strange lights in the sky. All power has been cut across the planet. As the clouds clear, a UFO appears, a UFO the size of a city.
The attack has yet to begin but with no electricity, humanity is helpless in the face of a vast alien army. The battle for earth is drawn gear and everyone will need to fight not just for their own survival but for that of the human race.
With a stunning cast that includes explosive new stars Bianca Bree and Sean Brosnan alongside Sean Pertwee (Event Horizon, Dog Solider), Julian Glover (Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, The Empire Strikes Back), and action legend Jean Claude Van Damme (Expendables 2, Timecop), UFO is an action-packed sci-fi spectacular.
Revolver Entertainment release U.F.O tomorrow, it is being described as an explosive mix of Independence Day and District 9.
Congratulations with the release tomorrow, you must be thrilled, can you tell us about the film?
I had fun imagining what would you actually do, there’s not much you could do and how quickly it would be until that descended into chaos and ultimately survival of th fittest and I thought to myself that that would happen quite quickly.
Then chatting to my friends and working out what might have caused it, and that’s where the alien invasion element came from.
And I found it quite interesting that all an alien presence would have to do, it wouldn’t even have to bother attacking us, all it would have to do is cut the off the power and communications and hover above us and sit and watch us turn on ourselves. That’s where the concept of the film came from and what it’s about.
What inspired you to make it?
I always try and be ambitious and we got told kind of the rules of independent film – don’t use special effects, don’t do scenes where you’ll need a lot of extras, explosions, action scenes. So we tried to take the rules and throw them out the window and say ‘well we definitely need to try and do that’ and that was kind of the attitude of the project.
We wanted to take a story that everyone is familiar with and tell it from a different point of view, I like to describe the film as a sort of marmite film – you eighter love it or you hate it, I think you either get it or it goes over your head. I’ve not had the public reaction just yet, so I guess I’ll find out if I’m right.
You must have been thrilled to get Van Damme on board, can you talk about that?
Yeah. I grew up watching his films and it was extremely exciting. It was exciting really to get a cast together of people who I think will be significant in the next decade; Bianca our lead and Sean Brosnan as well, the whole ensemble was exciting for me.
Of course it was a thrill to work with Jean-Claude and it was a privilege to get to direct him, and he was absolutely wonderful, it was fantastic, the time that he was there is something that I’ll never forget, and I don’t think the crew will either.
The experience on the whole was about the lead five and the chemistry between them, and the work and effort that they put themselves through on this shoot, and they really did, it was a tough shoot, there were no luxuries, and that’s what stands out in my mind about the whole shoot.
And obviously you have Sean Pertwee in the film, was he always on your mind?
He wasn’t actually! When I wrote the part there were a few people in my head, but I had always wanted to work with him; I think he’s an incredible actor, really, really powerful and I’ve seen him in a lot of films.
I know that Sean is quite picky in his roles, he only picks roles that he feels he can contribute to, and his presence is justified in the movie rather than just making up the numbers.
Sean came and he just blasted it out, with loads of ideas, the tattoos on his face in the film were all his ideas, and I love it when an actor takes the script and creates a character and a background and he really cared about the role.
That’s what you get with Sean Pertwee, he’s just fantastic to work with, I think it’s an incredible performance from him as well.
Dom, you had a busy year this year what with the likes of Cockneys vs. Zombies, Airbourne and UFO, what’s next for you?
Well the next project that we’re looking at is a film called Blood Staff, and it’s a bit of a mouthful but the best way to describe it is a post apocalyptic, post pandemic, action thriller with a Vampire element, and I’m going to be doing that with Bianca again, it’s an absolute bad ass part so we’re looking at that now.
Will you look to tempt Jean-Claude back?
No, we are going in a different direction with this one I think, we are looking at some really exciting names, but it won’t be Jean-Claude, but equally as exciting, I wish I could gush and talk more.
U.F.O. IS OUT FRIDAY 14TH DECEMBER FROM REVELOVER ENTERTAINMENT