Dementia 13 - Production

Production

Francis Ford Coppola worked as a sound man on Corman's The Young Racers (1963), a racing film which starred Campbell and Magee. That film was shot in several different countries, and after production was completed in Ireland, Corman still had $22,000 of the film's allocated $165,000 budget remaining. Corman originally thought of using the funds to direct a "quickie" film himself, but his schedule made this impractical. Instead, Corman suggested that Coppola remain in Ireland with a small crew and direct a low-budget horror film, to be produced by Corman." Coppola later recalled, "Roger wanted to make Dementia 13 cheaply. He wanted it to be homicidal, sort of a copy of Psycho. You know, gothic and psychological, with some kind of terrible knife killing scene thrown in. So I wrote the script to order."

Coppola wrote a brief draft story idea in one night. The next morning, he described to Corman the most vividly detailed sequence: a half naked woman ties several dolls to the bottom of a lake, then surfaces to find herself at the feet of an axe murderer -"Axed to death!" Coppola exclaimed." Corman was impressed enough to immediately provide Coppola with the $22,000 for the film. The young director was able to arrange an additional $20,000 in financing himself by pre-selling the European rights to a producer named Raymond Stross. Coppola did not inform Corman of the production's additional funding, and quickly moved the initial $22,000 into a bank account in case an angry Corman ever attempted to reclaim his original investment.

Coppola’s friend Al Locatelli served as the film’s art director and helped Coppola write the final script in three days, uncredited. The speed in which the screenplay was completed resulted in unrealistic, “stilted” dialogue that Campbell recalled as being very difficult for the actors to speak.

The majority of the American actors in the cast were friends of Coppola’s from UCLA, and many of them paid their own way to Ireland for the opportunity to appear in a film. Most of the Irish cast members were from the Abbey Theatre and were paid strictly minimum wage salaries. Eithne Dunne received approximately $600 for her performance. Cast and crew lived together in a farm house located outside of Dublin.

During the filming, Coppola kept Corman updated on the status of the production in letters that promised lots of sex and violence would be in the film, "enough to make people sick". Coppola was left entirely on his own while directing the film, without interference of any kind from Corman. But after the completed film was shown to him, Corman stormed out of the screening room and demanded that several changes be made to the film that Coppola did not agree with. According to Coppola, Corman "insisted on dubbing the picture the way he wanted it, adding voiceovers to simplify some of the scenes. Worse, he wanted some extra violence added, another axe murder at least..." Jack Hill was later hired by Corman to shoot some brief sequences featuring actor Karl Schanzer as a comical poacher who is beheaded by the murderer.

Corman also complained the film was too short, and insisted that it be padded by at least five minutes. Gary Kurtz, one of Corman's assistants at the time, recalled, "So we shot this stupid prologue that had nothing to do with the rest of the film. It was some guy who was supposed to be a psychiatrist, sitting in his office and giving the audience a test to see if they were mentally fit to see the picture. The film was actually released with that prologue." The prologue was directed by Monte Hellman. This cheap William Castle-style gimmick also included a "D-13 Test" handout given to theatre patrons that was ostensibly devised by a "medical expert" to weed out psychologically unfit people from viewing the film. The test consisted of such questions as "The most effective way of settling a dispute is with one quick stroke of an axe to your adversary's head?" and "Have you ever been hospitalized in a locked mental ward, sanitarium, rest home or other facility for the treatment of mental illness?", with Yes or No as the only possible answers.

The rockabilly song that is played at the opening of the movie is "He's Caught" by Buddy and The Fads, written by Arthur "Buddy" Fowler. The song was recorded in 1959 in Hollywood, CA. for Accent Records.