From writer/director Addison Heimann, Touch Me follows two best friends who become addicted to the heroin like touch of an alien narcissist with plans to take over the world. Starring Olivia Taylor Dudley, Lou Taylor Pucci and Jordan Gavaris, TOUCH ME delivers a wild mix of horror, satire and genre-bending chaos.
As the film arrvies in Australia on various VOD platforms, and a special edition Bluray available from Out Run DVD, on May 6, Nick L’Barrow spoke to the film’s writer/director, Addison Heimann, about the bold opening scene and how discovering South Park as a kid influenced his style.
Nick: Touch Me absolutely feels like a “video store discovery” type of movie. I’d look at the DVD cover, read the premise, and go, “What the hell, why not?”. I’m curious to know what role the video store played in your journey of cinematic discovery?
Addison Heimann: I’ll tell you this, [the video store] is how I discovered South Park. I remember going to the video store back when it was still Laserdisks and VHS. It was a video store, I’m not sure if you had it in Australia, called Now and Later, and while my dad would browse the Laserdisk section, I found a VHS of South Park. And you know, I was like to my mum, “It’s a cartoon”, and she was like, “Absolutely not!” Then I showed my dad, and he wasn’t really paying attention to that shit, so I got it. And I walked away knowing that I didn’t want the video store clerk to catch me. My mum eventually found out, and she knew what South Park was. So she made me do the dishes and asked me what it was about, and I had to explain that this episode was about a new substitute teacher, and she was a lesbian, and they were learning to try and eat carpet [laughs].
But I also discovered things like Hedwig and the Angry Itch and Party Monster. Me and my buddies would have a movie club thing and show each other movies from Blockbuster every week. Gregg Araki, discovering him in the 90s. I went to a Q+A of The Doom Generation and he said his movies were discovered because people were passing them around on VHS and DVD back in the day.
Nick: I think it’s so exciting too that Touch Me is getting a Bluray release! Was that something you ever could imagine happening when you first started filmmaking?
AH: No! It’s not even something you think about at all. I came to film late. I was a theatre person and my plays were so weird. It made me think I should really write horror movies [laughs]. I was lucky enough to have my first film premiere at SXSW, and it got bought by a distributor who said, “You’re getting a Bluray release”. And I had no idea it was that important to me until I was offered it. It was amazing getting an indie theatrical release, then a Bluray with all of these essays and artworks. And that it’s getting released in like the UK and Australia! It’s so cool. If the apocalypse ever happens, and we’re all in bunkers, we can only assume someone will have a PS5 or something so we can watch it [laughs].
Nick: Talking about the film itself, you start the film with this incredible seven minute monologue that Olivia Taylor Dudley performs, and that you film in one shot. And what point in your creative process did you know a one-shot monologue was going to be how you wanted to start the film?
AH: For me, there are two movies that execute this thing really well. Pearl, where Mia Goth at the end of the movie just talks about her journey. And Rebecca Hall in Resurrection was just so effective. But, I had this whole movie outlined, and I was dragging my feet because I knew I wanted this monologue in the film to thrust the audience straight into this really stylised, bisexual, alien sex, horror comedy that is also dealing with trauma. And with this being my second feature, I wanted to take more risks and be bold. And that’s where the idea of a long, one-shot monologue came from. Also, Olivia is an absolute gem because she came into the set, which was my garage that we turned into a therapist’s office, and the take you see in the film was her first take.
Nick: You mentioned how the film explores trauma through this incredibly heightened concept. How did genre filmmaking give you an in to explore the film’s themes in such a unique way?
AH: You know, it almost feels taboo now to say you’re making a horror movie exploring trauma. But, technically all horror movies do that. They all deal with death as an immersive metaphor. People just weren’t always aware of it because there is also a sheer entertainment that horror brings. Horror has the capacity to get into these issues because you’re laughing, you’re scared, and then all of a sudden it ends up in this real place. I feel like Ari Aster and Hereditary and Midsommar are movies exactly like that. He didn’t pave the way necessarily, but modern horror has this profound ability to do these things. You know, I’m queer. I suffer from mental illnesses, and I know other people do too. So, my goal as a filmmaker is to explore and deep dive into every facet of people suffering from these things inside of these fantastical stories. You can talk about OCD and trauma, and have a puppet alien explore their goo all over characters!
Nick: Something you do so well in the movie is take a sense that can’t be conveyed in film – touch. Yet, you make the movie feel so visceral with the aesthetics and design. What was the process in trying to convey touch in an audio-visual way?
AH: For me, it’s the practicality of everything. It harkens to that aesthetic of 60s and 70s Japanese exploitation films where they were so visceral and tangible because it was made in a way that felt like a theatre play. And using practical effects was my whole modus operandi because even though we didn’t have a huge budget, I knew I could still make it feel like those 70s Japanese films. We built the sets, made these practical effects. That’s why when Olivia is touching these tentacles, you can feel it. She’s not touching a tennis ball or air – she’s actually touching it. The music also played a big part in that because it really heightens all of the things she is feeling and you understand why she becomes addicted to the touch.
Nick: There is a moment in the film where the characters’ journeys are thrust into action because, literally, the shit hits the fan. I want to take that allegory and make a parallel to your own career. Was there a moment whether, for better or worse, the shit hit the fan and you were forced to take a bold step into this creative direction of your life?
AH: Wow, what a good question. I was a theatre actor and writer in Chicago in my 20s, and it was a great theatre community and place to grow up in my 20s. But I was just trying to figure out what I wanted to do. I was getting paid like $150 a week for six weeks. I reached a point where I was writing plays, and nothing was being done with mine. Everything kind of stemmed from depression. I was in my shitty studio apartment, smoking cigarettes in the cold, eating pizza rolls, watching Gilmore Girls, dreading having to wake up at 3pm. I had no money, no prospects. But, I was also just waiting for permission. And it turns out, to become an artist, it’s on you to just do it. Art is delusion. You have to believe that you’re going to make it in this world where thousands of people are already doing it. So, I Googled how to write a pilot and I wrote a show about a bunch of sorority crime fighters trying to destroy and evil fraternity. I found a friend in LA, we crowdfunded it, and made it into a web series. And I thought it was insane at the time, but if me as 35 year old Addison were to talk to 24 year old Addison, his jaw would drop. Doing the work and growing outside of yourself, pushing through all of the sadness, good things come out the other side.
Thank you so much to Addison for his time, and to Walkden Publicity and Lightbulb Films for organising the interview. Touch Me is available now on various VOD platforms, as well as Bluray.