The Adventure Begins: Location Scouting

After a year of beating the molten iron of the Hoodoo Voodoo script over a fiery anvil, it is finally time to submerse it in a mound of cold Canadian snow. Holding it high above our heads, gleaming in the arctic sunlight, the script is finished and it is time to emerge from the depths Mount Doom and begin the long trek along the path of preproduction.

To many that have heard it's name, Hoodoo Voodoo has become a single speedily said word that has lost all trace of its original syntax and now only represents the title of the film itself. To most others though it the question remains, what exactly is a Hoodoo Voodoo?

The film is to be shot in Southern Alberta amongst the Hoodoos, which are large oddly shaped rocks created by millions, possibly billions, of years of erosion. My Uncle, a geography professor could probably explain it a lot better than I just did. Instead, I'll just show you a picture.

Pretty slick, hey?

But what does the Voodoo mean? Originally, I think it was just a cool word that rhymed with Hoodoo, but it has since come to represent a fictional ghost town in the story. Voodoo - Population 0.

As the locations are so important in the movie one of our first steps in the preproduction process was to get a lay of the land where we wanted to shoot.

Our first stop was Drumheller and surrounding area where apparently a lot of movies have been shot, including Unforgiven, The Assassination of Jesse James and Knockaround Guys, the latter of which I am watching now as I type this. Not because it's necessarily a great piece of cinema or anything. It's actually a really solid modern day gangster/western. Either way, it's good to get an idea for what other people have done with similar locations.


It was a bit tough to visualize since there was still a lot of snow, but it was great to see some of the terrain we had to work with. A lot of potential.

Next on our list of locales was a ghost town an 8Km hike out from Frank Slide, in the Crowsnest Pass. I don't think I've ever wanted to kill myself more in my entire life. Uphill, both ways, through ankle deep snow.

And it would appear that we had some company on our trip.

But when we got there, it was pretty amazing. Just picture it in the hot July heat, without the snow.

Some kind of mining building.

Remnants of the old hotel.

That's it for now. Still have to drive down to Writing on Stone, so check back for some pictures of that as well as another blog about our recent auditions.