John Carpenter has often collaborated with those closest to him throughout his career. But making “Cathedral,” a graphic novel with an accompanying original album out Friday, was truly a family affair.
The famed director of seminal horror films like “The Thing” and “Halloween” says the movie business is all “corporate” nowadays. So the 78-year-old prefers to find alternative, less expensive ways to stay creatively fulfilled.
After a dream about an abandoned downtown Los Angeles church with an elevator that goes to hell, Carpenter, who is also a prolific composer, enlisted his godson, Daniel Davies, and his son, Cody, to collaborate on the album. It’s comprised of spooky instrumental tracks evocative of some of his iconic classics, like the theme from “Halloween.” He then turned to his wife, Sandy King, who is a comic book publisher, for help with the graphic novel.
Carpenter, his son and Davies spoke about their artistic process, concerns over artificial intelligence and having nightmares about Boston Celtics great Larry Bird. The interview has been edited for clarity and brevity.
Q: Tell me where the idea for this project came from?
JOHN CARPENTER: I thought, I’m a movie director by profession in the old days, and this album would be a great score for a movie. However, this movie would cost several hundred million dollars, so why not do a graphic novel? My wife owns a comic book company, so let’s write the novel and illustrate it, and we can score that.
Q: Has that been your process in the past? To come up with the music first and then the film?
JOHN CARPENTER: No, the other way around. I direct the movie, cut it together the way I want it, and then I look at it for music. So, the music is simply functional. It supports the story and the characters and so forth.
The movie business has changed since I was in it full-time. It’s all corporate now. I came from student filmmaking, where we didn’t have any money, so we couldn’t hire a composer. I had to do it myself. But now I got these bums to do it with me, and so I don’t have to work as hard.
Q: The idea for this came to you in a dream. Do you often draw inspiration from dreams?
JOHN CARPENTER: Never. This is the first time. Most of my dreams are pretty similar, and they’re not made for movies. They’re always about me being lost in a city and trying to find my way home, but the streets change on me, and I can’t find my way home. Or I’m looking for the movie theater district, and when I get there, they’re all closed.
CODY CARPENTER: I’ve been keeping a dream journal since college. I have these psychotic dreams. I just like to remember them, you know?
JOHN CARPENTER: The basketball dream? Didn’t you see somebody start dribbling?
CODY CARPENTER: It was Larry Bird. But it turned out that he was dead and I was interacting with his ghost.
Q: John, as someone who has worked with low budgets and who likes to experiment, have you played around with AI at all?
JOHN CARPENTER: Well, people tell me it’s dangerous. I don’t — what does that mean? Does that mean it’s starting to learn on its own?
Q: I think it depends on who you talk to.
DAVIES: We like to make music. I would like it to help do more task-kind of things, like predict new tracks and know my workflow. But we like to make stuff, so why would we use it?
CODY CARPENTER: I don’t know. I know someone who does AI music stuff a lot, and he sends me all this stuff that he does and, I mean, I think at some point we won’t have a job anymore. I really think it’s amazing, just how fast it’s progressing. But I don’t know. Nobody knows.
JOHN CARPENTER: Music, I think, is the greatest art form. I hate to say it. But it doesn’t require anything. We can all listen to it in different countries. Great music moves us. And you’re telling me a machine can do that? I don’t believe it. That bothers me. This is a human thing. I want it to come from us. I really do.
Q: I recently watched “Prince of Darkness” for the first time. I really liked it. It seems under-appreciated.
JOHN CARPENTER: Why is it that you just saw it?
Q: You’re right. I wish I had seen it sooner. Are there films of yours that you feel like maybe have been under-appreciated?
JOHN CARPENTER: I’m glad you liked it. I am happy with almost every movie I made.
Q: What are you not happy with?
JOHN CARPENTER: I’m not going to tell you.
