TIEF OBEN: A True Halloween Story

I was filming in Austria on Halloween night in the ancient mining town of Eisenstadt, the film TIEF OBEN.  We had great steaming wooden vats of hot red wine for everybody to keep them going.  It was arctic weather, snowing fiercely when the director suddenly asked all the extras to be naked other than their boots and the little mining lamps on their heads.  Naturally they refused.  At which point the director tore off his own clothes in a rage as a challenge…and was the lone white freezing body in the dark night. 

In the middle of this frenzied rebellion, I decided to walk home alone. The local villagers had made little paper boats that they sent down the river set alight, a ritual of remembrance for their dead relatives… 

Suddenly a dozen motorbikes came roaring by with everyone on them dressed as skeletons. They got off their bikes and started to dance around me in a circle holding hands – then they mounted their motorized steeds and took off into the night making unearthly shrieks and whistles….

I continued walking on in this medieval village surrounded by ghosts….

by Barbara Steele