February 1, 2010

To celebrate the release of the short film for "Snuff" we had Jen Guyre, formerly of Rhapsody, now a staffer at Roadrunner, talk to Clown about the filming of Snuff and his inspiration as a film maker. You can read the full interview below, enjoy!

M. Shawn Crahan Discusses "Snuff" From Behind The Camera

By Josh Reline

As Slipknot's 4th single from their #1 album All Hope is Gone sonically demonstrates a departure from the Iowa contingent's staple heaviosity, showcasing a more emotional side with a profound message, it couldn't be a better moment for M. Shawn Crahan - the percussionist better known as Clown, but the director better known by his given name - to take his filmography to the next level as well. Turning Corey Taylor's conflicted verse "Snuff" into a heart rendering and head-scratching short film, Crahan describes the work as "a love story… It's not transvestite stuff or Hollywood hookers, this is just a completely detached love story." Read on to find out more about Crahan's cinematic vision, personal attachment to the song, and what went into the making of the film.

How did you come up with the concept for this short film?

I think everybody was feeling the pressure of this video because of the caliber of the song and what the song could do and what it makes people feel -- I think everybody was worried. And I knew that my treatment was going to be a hard sell. If they don't really see it and taste it and deem it something that can be worthwhile, you're not going to get a chance to do it. So it was very important that I write something that was not going to justify the word 'snuff' in what the literal word [means], because I don't support that, and I'm not going to make something that would support that. I had to go [deep], and a lot of it just came around this story that Corey has written and these lyrics about, more or less, this person who's so gone and will not return, that she's basically dead, but he becomes her and that became more or less the definition of 'snuff.' So it was important that I tried to give Corey as much integrity behind what he was doing, because I was in his house, he played it as a demo, and it affected me then, and I've been writing it ever since. I wanted to do something that was a love story that could be that moment that all of us get to where we don't realize that we could get to that place, but then time slows down and we might have a moment of just rage or depression or fits of anxiety, and life changes, and we just never knew we could actually step into those boundaries -- that's more or less what this is about. It's not transvestite stuff or Hollywood hookers, this is just a completely detached love story.