Zacuto Featured Filmmaker ~ The Booth Brothers

Twin brothers Philip Adrian Booth and Christopher Saint Booth have been making films together since the mid-80s, and are the CEOs of “Spooked Television” for the Sci-Fi Channel. The Booth Brothers got their start after moving from England to Los Angeles, and landed a job working for Playboy. It was there that they gradually learned the craft of filmmaking, and made roughly 59 films for the company. But their true passion is ghost stories. In 2005, they made the horror film Death Tunnel, based on the actual reports of ghost sightings at the Waverly Hills Sanatorium. The brothers chose to shoot the film at the real sanatorium, and made a documentary about its history on the side. It was this documentary, Spooked: The Ghosts of Waverly Hills Sanatorium, which attracted the attention of the Sci-Fi Channel. Since then, they have made a number of films that investigate real life ghost stories, most recently The Possessed, which was released in May 2009.

“I think the story is the most important thing. I’ve been doing seminars in LA on the subject of keeping independent filmmaking alive. Horror films like the Saw franchise do well because of the gore. We’ve assimilated their style in films like Death Tunnel, but the difference is that with Saw, there’s no story. Everyone dies and that’s it. I’ve been living in America for about twenty years. I love America, but everyone here thinks that the great tragedies in history have taken place in Europe or Serbia. America has its own share of tragic tales, and we’ve found success in telling uniquely American stories. We find the actual places where things have occurred, and ghosts have been sighted, and we shoot there. We also make sure that every one of our shows ends with a positive message in which good prevails. In Saw, everyone dies at the end, and all it does is glorify serial killers.” ~ Philip Booth


The Booth Brothers have become big fans of Zacuto equipment. According to Philip and Christopher, “The future of this industry depends on the relationship between the people who use camera equipment and the people who manufacture it. That’s why we admire both Jens Bogehegn and Steve Weiss.”

“Zacuto has the smoothest, most solid-locking knobs out of everything I’ve used and let me tell you, I’ve used a lot of people’s stuff, from Redrock to K-Vision, or any third party spin-off. I’ve been through them all, and I’ve bought cheap, though I wish I didn’t. I’ve wasted my money when I should have bought the better quality product in the first place, but you live and learn. Zacuto offers the smoothest gliding and tightest locking equipment available. It’s so smooth and well-crafted that it feels like it comes from a German supplier. I don’t think people understand the quality of Zacuto. It’s an investment that will benefit you for a really long time. Why would you choose to buy something two hundred dollars less and live the rest of your time regretting it?” ~ Philip Booth.

For more information on Spooked TV and the Booth Brothers, visit www.spookedproductions.blogspot.com