Little has been known about New Line Cinema’s The Gallows, a new found-footage horror film from up-and-coming filmmakers Chris Lofing and Travis Cluff.

Before it was a major motion picture, opening in theaters July 10th, 2015, it was a short film that premiered on Bloody-Disgusting. Now, Blumhouse is behind the feature-length horror film that stars Cassidy Gifford, Ryan Shoos, Reese Mishler and Pfeifer Brown.

In The Gallows, “Twenty years after an accident caused the death of the lead actor during a high school play, students at the same small town school resurrect the failed stage production in a misguided attempt to honor the anniversary of the tragedy—but ultimately find out that some things are better left alone.“

Bloody Disgusting, in addition to landing the world premiere photos (on display here, too) from The Gallows, caught up with Lofing and Cluff, who talked about everyting from the film’s genesis to its iconic villian!

“We were originally inspired when we saw movies like Paranormal Activity and The Blair Witch Project getting made,” the duo tell Bloody in an exclusive interview, where they speak about guerilla filmmaking. “We didn’t have any money or resources but we felt that we could tell a story we were passionate about and, like those two movies, shoot it in a very grounded real way. We developed a script and managed to raise a few thousand dollars here and a few there. We pretty much learned on the fly. We were guerilla filmmaking not by choice, but because we had no other choice. On a shoe-string budget and a crew of less than five people, the film was shot within Fresno in about two weeks. Looking back, it’s the best thing that could have happened to us. Because we didn’t live in Hollywood, we used the Internet to get attention. That’s when we cut a trailer and put it online.”

That was just the beginning of the micro-indie that could. Here Lofing and Cluff explain how The Gallows ended up at Blumhouse, and then at New Line Cinema.

“After seeing the trailer right here on Bloody-Disgusting, Dean Schnider at Management 360 contacted us and wanted to see more,” they explained. “Dean was looking at the project from a producer’s standpoint and thought there was something special with The Gallows. We had literally no experience in Hollywood so this was all very new and exciting to us. After spending more time with Dean, he wanted to take us on as clients as well. 360 shared the film with Jason Blum. Everyone seemed to agree that with a little more work on the movie, it could be great. It was important for us that any changes to the movie felt authentic and real. We were really encouraged that 360 and Jason were in our corner and really let us do our thing and were actually adamant that it remain our vision and we continue making the movie in the same way. We were over the moon when New Line/Warner Bros. were interested. Again, we are from Fresno and only know about these studios when we see their logos before our favorite movies. We couldn’t be happier to be working with them.”

The synopsis reminds me of Terror Train, which is why I asked about the duo’s 80’s influences.

They explained: “It was very much influenced by 80’s horror. Actually Chris is big fan of all things 80’s even though he was born in 1990. Both of us are fans of older horror films and admit that we are not as well versed in modern horror.

As for it being found-footage, the duo speak to the state of the subgenre and say exactly what I want to hear, found-footage was the most organic way to make this movie.

“We didn’t shoot our film in found-footage because it was popular and we didn’t shy away from it when several found-footage attempts fell short in recent years,” says the duo. “There were two big factors for us. We wanted to make The Gallows as raw and real as possible, and second, we barely had any money, production equipment or crew. This forced us to look at a more guerrilla approach. found-footage was the most organic way to tell our story and we believed it would make the overall experience more terrifying and simply more genuine and organic. We hope this comes through in our movie and makes it stand out. It was really important that the reason our characters were holding a camera felt natural. We went as far as withholding the actual script from our actors and having them use their real names in the movie so it would be as close to reality as possible. We think found-footage has been and will continue to be a great storytelling tool.”

Something else I gathered from one of the synopses is that The Gallows has a villain, and I was curious as to if it’s iconic enough to become part of a franchase (we really need a new Elm Street or Friday the 13th).

“The Gallows has a scary villain that we’ve never seen before so we hope he becomes iconic!,” they exclaimed while revealing they do have sequel concepts. “We have ideas for what a sequel can be but our total focus has been making this first movie as great as possible.”

The Gallows will open in theaters July 10th from New Line Cinema. Watch this spot for a trailer as soon as it arrives!