There’s People In My House

There’s People In My House is a new psychological horror short written and directed by Austin King of Sun Monkey Productions.

A man subdued in the bedroom closet of his brand new house attempts to decipher whether the voices he’s suddenly hearing are invaders of his home or invaders of his head. 

Check out the film + a Q&A with Director Austin King below.

Rabbit: Congratulations on your new psychological horror film, There’s People In My House! How’d you come up with the concept? 

Austin King: When coming up with ideas for horror, the first thing I try to explore is the idea of just about anything that would personally terrify me. And from there I think, “Now how would other people react to these types of scenarios?” So for There’s People In My House, the concept of home intruders came to me through both cinematic influence and through personal real-life experiences as well. And that’s a fear that I feel a good amount of people can relate to. Basically, I like to try to scare myself and express it through writing.

Rabbit: I like the approach you took with narrating the story through the main character. Why did you decide to go that route?  

AK: Well, I wanted this particular film to be very dialogue-driven since I intended for it to be a psychological horror film. I really wanted the narration there to show not only the main character struggling in his own head on what to do, but to also have the audience tied in and right there with him through his pain in these intense situations. 

Rabbit: What are some of your favorite horror films? Did any of them inspire There’s People In My House?

AK: John Carpenter’s Halloween was the first horror movie my parents showed me as a kid and I loved it right away. The score from that movie, I would say, had a pretty decent influence on There’s People In My House. Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining had an influence on this film as far as the camera shots and where they specifically are. But to pick my favorite horror films, that’s pretty difficult. Lately, though, I have been really into anything that comes from Ari Aster, Rob Zombie, and Jordan Peele.

Rabbit: The main actor, Steven Horkey, did a fantastic job with the material. How did you know he was right for the role?

AK: I knew immediately that Steven Horkey was the one for the main role. We’ve been friends our whole lives, and when I wrote this script I knew that he could go from being completely composed and precise into full-on theatrical and dramatic mode on camera in the snap of a finger. And I knew that Steven, being a brilliant artist himself in many ways, would have the dedication to really deliver what, in this case, was my vision.

Rabbit: The film has a piercing score, that really keeps your nerves up throughout. How important was this element of sound in your filmmaking process?

AK: Well being a musician myself, the score for this film was equally as important to me as everything else involved. Even as a kid, before I  picked up my first instrument, the music and sound effects of movies would always matter to me and would set the tone of any movie I was watching whether or not it was a horror, comedy, action, drama, etc. So writing the score for There’s People In My House, I wanted to wait until the footage was all put together in post-production to really dive into writing music that really defines and accents the tone I wanted to deliver.

Rabbit: What’s next for Sun Monkey Productions?

AK: Well I don’t want to reveal too much too soon, but I will say that the next film from Sun Monkey Productions will be pretty different from this first one. It is going to be a black and white silent horror film. Bigger production and a higher budget for this one. And we couldn’t be more stoked to get into production for this one. 

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Sponsored Feature: Sun Monkey Productions

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