With his cracking agoraphobic serial-killer short HIM INDOORS (which we previously covered here) reaping awards on the festival circuit, the green light has just been given this week to THE BODY, the latest grisly comedic venture from Paul Davis (pictured), the man behind the AMERICAN WEREWOLF IN LONDON documentary BEWARE THE MOON.

THE BODY, produced by Ten Cent Adventures and Paul Fischer (of the critically acclaimed documentary RADIOMAN), tells the story of a murderer who uses the cover of Halloween night to casually transport his latest victim to its final resting place. Everyone thinks it’s just an amazing Halloween prop—but a chance meeting with an old school friend who recognizes him lands him in a situation that grows increasingly more bizarre by the minute!

Davis and Fischer’s screenplay is based on a story by Mary Kerr. “I loved the concept and thought it was incredibly creepy,” Davis tells Fango, “but at the same time ridiculously funny. I then did a pass on the screenplay to add a bit of buffer to both the humor and horror side of things, and that’s the script we’re shooting next week.”

The film stars GAME OF THRONES’ Alfie Allen, THE CHILDREN’s Hannah Tointon, THE DEVIL’S BUSINESS’ Jack Gordon and BURKE & HARE’s Christian Brassington, and reteams the director with HIM INDOORS composer Osymyso and cinematographer Eben Bolter. “I feel completely spoiled by the cast and crew I have working with me, and I can’t wait to see this bizarre little story come to life!” says Davis, who discusses the project further herewith:

FANGORIA: HIM INDOORS’ less-is-more tone deftly shifted its weight between smirks, shocks and shudders; what can we expect from the tone of THE BODY?

PAUL DAVIS: THE BODY is pretty similar in the sense that the humor is constantly an undercurrent. As in HIM INDOORS, we establish that Alfie’s character is a murderer in the opening scene, so from there we give it that same buildup in which you know something is going to happen at some point; we’re just going to make you squirm a bit and wait for it. The less-is-more approach of HIM INDOORS was very much what I wanted to do with that piece. It was my love letter to Hitchcock, so I always set out to show as little as possible. While many applauded that, some would have liked to see a bit more blood. On THE BODY, I’ve listened to those people, and have found a beautiful marriage between the two. I’m calling it “Less is gore!” We have special effects supervisor John Schoonraad, who was the prosthetics man on KICK-ASS [and its upcoming sequel] and the last RAMBO movie, so expect a bit more of the red stuff in this one.

FANG: How did the amazing cast come together? It’s quite a coup.

DAVIS: We approached the casting the old-fashioned way. Alfie has a wonderful look and we’ve seen what he can do in GAME OF THRONES, so the idea of him being a cold-blooded killer was just too good to pass up. I’ve been a fan of Hannah Tointon since Tom Shankland’s THE CHILDREN. She is absolutely adorable and has wonderful comic timing that makes her perfect for the character she’s playing. Jack Gordon, I saw and loved in Sean Hogan’s THE DEVIL’S BUSINESS, and I did a scene in John Landis’ BURKE & HARE with Christian Brassington—and I now get revenge for him and Tim Curry cutting my leg off! We’re just lucky that these guys all responded to the screenplay and really enjoyed the story. 

FANG: HIM INDOORS was replete with knowing references to genre masterworks; will there be similar knowing asides in THE BODY?

DAVIS: There are a couple of nods to other movies, but they’re not as forced as perhaps they were in HIM INDOORS. Some that are in this script were there before I even got my hands on it. No reference should be thrown in for the sake of having it in there. If it doesn’t work within the confines of the story, then don’t do it. There are a couple of things in this that genre fans will go nuts for—one of which goes back as far as the Universal horror pictures of the 1930s—but at the same time, they don’t take you out of the story and won’t leave non-horror fans feeling left out.

THE BODY leaps into production this week and will hit the festival circuit in 2013; keep an eye on Fango’s pages for more on HIM INDOORS.