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| The Haunted Forest |
The essence of a good horror film is that needling fear that somehow, the threat you’re observing could pass through the screen and reach you in real life. Haunts, as in the popular US spooky season phenomenon, provide the opportunity to experience something like that, turning purely fictional scares into an exhilarating physical experience. A popular contribution to Frightfest 2025, Keith Boynton’s The Haunted Forest returns the favour by setting a story in such a venue and then asking what would happen if a real killer mingled with those playing pretend.
What might have been just another gimmicky slasher movie is elevated by a character-driven story, a great central performance from relative newcomer Grayson Gwayze, and an ambitious approach to every aspect of production. I was particularly impressed by the gorgeously shot opening vignette, which reminded me of an urban legend popular during my schooldays, so when Keith and I met a few days before the festival, that was the first thing we discussed.
“I was trying to play with the most prototypical scares that they are,” he explains. “That's why I thought, you know, a young couple necking in a car in a deserted place at night. It felt like the essence of a slasher film.”
It feels like a calling card for the rest of the film as well, I suggest, because it's so nicely done. It feels like they took a long time over that scene. Was that the case?
“Relatively. I mean, our whole shoot was 18 days, so we had limited time for all of it. But we spent most of a night on that scene. It was definitely a priority to get a lot of compelling coverage and to tell that story as visually as possible because we knew it was the opening scene of the film. It was a moment to come out and announce our cinematic intention. I think maybe it's the most cinematic thing that I've ever shot, and I love that it is almost like a short film in itself. I love that scene.”
The whole film benefits from an investment in quality. It’s not uncommon for genre directors to focus on story and let other things slide, but here there is a clear love of the visual.
“Yeah – I wanted that look,” he says. “I think storytelling is the thing that, in some ways, I take for granted. My background is in playwriting, and so I feel pretty confident that I can write dialogue, that I can write character, that I can tell a story. I think the visual element is the problem that I have to give extra thought to and bring in the best collaborators for, because it doesn't come as naturally to me, but it was definitely a priority for this. I wanted it to feel cinematic, feel like a big screen experience. We shot in a very wide format. We tried to get the lighting as beautiful as possible and to be stylish, to do interesting things with the handheld camera and get in characters’ faces. I wanted it to be a sort of style showcase.”
I explain that we don’t really have haunts in the UK, so that’s a new experience for many Frightfest viewers. The stylishness of the film seems appropriate for a celebration of such places.
“My relationship is mostly to this specific haunt,” he says. “Markoff's Haunted Forest is a haunt that's been in the woods in Maryland outside of DC for well over 30 years now, and it was built by my cousins, the Markoffs. So it's a place that I've known by reputation for my whole life and have gotten to experience in person in the last 10 years or so. And that's really my connection to the world of haunts, that particular place. It's an incredibly special place. Every inch of it is just full of the passion and the vision and the care and the dedication of the people who built it, mostly Nick Markoff, but also his incredible team. And that's what drew me to it.
“I wanted to be a part of it. I wanted to be a part of something that felt that special and that invested. And I wanted the film to feel that way, too. My brother, Devin McEwan, is the one who had the original vision for the film. We went there together to Markoff's Haunted Forest, and he was the one who turned to me and said ‘This is a movie, let's develop the story.’ And we really developed it together. But, yeah, I think ‘celebration’ is a great word. I hope the film does feel like a celebration. I hope it feels like a ride. I hope it feels like a treat. I think of it as pure cinema, or at least that's the goal that I aimed for.”
Should we be looking at haunts as a form of artistic expression in themselves, like theatre?
“In a way, yeah. Nick in particular was the primary visionary behind the Haunted Forest. He is an artist. This is his medium of expression. And they rework the forest every year. I mean, they could rest on their laurels. They've built up a reputation over a long time, but they don't. They are constantly reimagining the place. There's always a new scene. Not one new scene, several new scenes. There's always a new theme. They're reinventing themselves every single year, and they win awards for this. I mean, they are recognised as one of the best haunts in the country.
“For people who've never been to a haunt, you can think of a haunted house experience. But it doesn't have to be in a house, right? In this case, it's in the woods in Maryland. Sometimes it's a haunted cornfield. So you have to imagine something that starts out as visual, where it's an intricately crafted scene that has an evocative element, a spooky element, but then there's something interactive about it. Usually there's someone jumping out and scaring the bejesus out of you when you least expect it.
“The first time I ever walked down the trail, I had a great moment where one of these scare actors wearing a mask lunged out of the darkness and wrapped his arms around me, which they usually don't do. But he wrapped his arms around me and I jumped. And then the thing didn't let go. But it said in my ear, it said, ‘Keith, it's your cousin Nick.’ So the scare went out of it in that moment, but the initial response was definitely what he wanted. I don't know, I love that place and I love that we got the opportunity to shoot there.
“They were incredibly open. I mean, yes, there was a shortcut because we're family, but they really were very open minded about how the haunt was presented. So we changed a lot of real detailing. For example, in the movie, it's one guy who seems to run the haunted forest by himself. He has a staff, but it's really one guy. Basically, the three Markoff brothers were condensed into one person for purposes of the film. And they never said, ‘Hey, wait a minute, there's three of us!’ They never pushed back on that.
“We changed the way the trail is configured. The order of the scenes is different in the film. There are lots of little visual fakes that anyone who's been to the forest will recognise. Movies are always a distorted representation of reality. And so there are lots of things they could have called us out on and said ‘Hey, that's not really quite how it works.’ But they were pretty open and they let us do.
“The one note that I think we got that did result in a change was they wanted to explain why the main character is working every different job in the forest, because usually you would have your one job. You learn that job, you get that job. It's like working in a different place every night. And so it was adding one line where his cousin is like, ‘Hey, I want you to experience every job there is, so we're going to keep changing it up on you.’ That was probably the biggest change that we made to the script. The Markovs were just incredibly supportive.”
The main character, Zach, comes to the haunt because he has cousins who run it. is he somebody Keith feels close to?
“Yeah, I mean, he's a fish out of water. He's a guy who's enthusiastic, but also a little bit clueless and maybe a little bit naïve. I think probably most of us can relate to that somewhat. Most of us have had those experiences. And that's really one of my primary hopes for the movie, that people find something they can connect to in a way. It's not just a slasher film, it's a coming of age film as well. So we're hoping people don't all get slashed to death in the woods, but we're also hoping they learn something and grow as human beings. And I don't know, maybe there's even a little romance. Who can say?”
We talk about the casting of Grayson Gwayze.
“He's got an interesting background,” Keith notes. “He's done some stand-up comedy, he's done theatre. Not a ton of film. He’s a really interesting guy. He came through backstage.com. I was functioning as my own casting director because this is such a low budget film, we didn't even want to hire a casting director. And so he came through backstage.com and I was just struck by the presence that he has, the charisma that he has. I could have probably gone with a more seasoned film actor. He had certainly never played the lead in a feature before. But I just felt like he could hold the screen and he could carry the movie and that people would invest in him.
“I was anxious about putting that much responsibility on his shoulders, but we had a conversation right around the time that I wanted to offer him the role. I said ‘Look, this is not a small assignment. It's not like playing a supporting part in a feature. It's you, me and the DP, the three of us, all day, every day, and we will be the fulcrum of this thing. And if that doesn't work, if we're not doing our best, it's going to fall apart.’ He was like, ‘You can count on me.’ And he was right. I couldn't be happier with how that worked out.”
We don’t just see Zach at the haunt. There are also scenes in which he’s doodling and drawing the various characters we see there. Was that intended as a metatextual element? At times on might wonder if he's dreaming some of what we see, or creating it in his imagination.
“Yeah, people have had a lot of questions about what the status of his fantasy life is, which things are imaginary or real. It's all pretty clear in my mind. But yeah, I think there is a sort of meta commentary to it where his fantasy life is horror films. Meanwhile, he's in a horror film, and by being in a horror film he learns that maybe there's more to life than horror films. Maybe death isn't always where you want to put all your energy. Hopefully by the end of the film he's managed to synthesise his own interests with a broader life, a broader perspective. That's my wish for him.”
Keith also has a role in the film. Was it tough to combine that with his responsibilities as director?
“Yeah,” he admits. “Those scenes were really, really hard. I'm not an experienced film actor. I've done a decent amount of acting, but mostly stage. So those scenes were really hard. And trying to take my director hat off and trying to be in the moment and be in the scene while at the same time, in the back of my mind, I know that time is limited and that I'm going to have to be making decisions very, very soon, it was really hard. I'm glad that I did it, but at the time it made my life more complicated in a way that was sometimes burdensome. Looking back, I could say it was fun, even though in the moment it wasn't that much fun.”
Every director always wishes that they had more time and a little bit less pressure. Was there anything that he felt he wasn't able to do that he really wanted to?
He shrugs. “I think there are always things that you could execute better. There are always things that didn't quite meet that thing that you had in your head. So, yeah, I think there are a couple of moments where if we had a little more time or more money, or if I wasn't new to the horror genre, there are things that I could do better. But at the end of the day, I look at, are we telling the story that we wanted to tell and is the audience following along? Are they carried along on the journey? And I have watched the movie with little audiences of friends and family and people do get it and they are engaged and they do stay engaged throughout the whole film. So I feel like lessons were learned. Next time it'll be better. But I think we did our job.
“There were a lot of little things that were decided along the way, like where a particular scene would be shot, for example. There's a lovely little romantic scene by the pond between Zach and Sarah. I don't think that was originally in that location. I think that was partly a logistical decision. We knew we could get our trucks down to that pond. There was an access road. And so that idea came from the assistant director. He said ‘Look, we'll save some time, we'll save some aggravation.’ And it ended up being beautiful. It's just a gorgeous shot, it's a gorgeous moment. It adds so much atmosphere. So there are those happy accidents all the time and it's incredibly gratifying when that works out.”
Speaking of gratification, there’s Frightfest.
“I'm really excited,” he beams. “I mean, you're shooting your weird little thing in the woods. You don't know if it's working. You don't know if anyone will care. You know, we're an ultra low budget movie. We don't have big famous stars. We just put our hearts and souls into this thing. And then to get a tap on the shoulder from a place like Frightfest, it's incredibly gratifying. It really feels like a vindication, not just for me, but for the whole cast and crew and everyone who worked on it. People were so passionate about this project. It was such a good vibe on set. And it feels like this is a little bit of a reward for everybody, that we get to present our film on this kind of stage.”
