On Oct. 19, indie film “Hell Squad 2” premiered at Howell Theatre in Smithfield, North Carolina. The film featured numerous NC State students as both cast and crew, and was a culmination of countless hours of hard work and dedication, all projected on the big screen. 

That night at Howell Theatre, the room was packed. The excitement in the room was palpable, a theater filled with people of all ages — friends of the project, parents, siblings and even some curious, random moviegoers. Many in their best suits and dresses, the audience members sat in anticipation for “Hell Squad 2” to start. 

From the minute the film started, there were cheers for every name on the screen, and every face was met with the enthusiastic point and whispered exclamation, “I know that guy!” The crowd spent the next 90 minutes together laughing at the jokes, gasping at the scares and recoiling at the kills like one big happy horror family. 

“Hell Squad 2” follows the story of Janey, who after a massacre that left her the sole survivor of her cheer team, attempts to pick up the pieces while her trauma is commercialized by a local tourist attraction. 

Assistant director and star in the film Kailin Rojas-Echeverria reflected on her reaction to the success of the premiere. 

 “I never thought that I would be able to do something like this — creating a movie,” Rojas-Echeverria said. “It was cool to see people from different stages of my life coming to support this movie that I helped create.”

Grayce Anne Mosier, a graduate from East Carolina University who founded Opal99 and co-directed the film, spoke about the do-it-yourself attitude that she and her team took to their filmmaking. 

Co-director Carter Bentley spoke about the collaborative process behind making the film. 

“It was in our favor to not be working with only people going into acting and filmmaking,” Bentley said. “People still have good ideas … and most everyone can understand the language of movies.” 

Both Mosier and Bentley said the 1981 film “The Evil Dead”served as a major inspiration behind the film. To make this movie, Sam Raimi, writer and director of “The Evil Dead,” rented some cheap equipment, conscripted the help of his friends and ran to the woods to shoot what is now one of the most iconic horror films of the ‘80s. 

Mosier reflected on her thought process and go-ahead attitude when it came to their decision to make the film.

“Why couldn’t we do that?” Mosier said. “It was stuff we love and directors we admire and we were like, ‘We could do that.’”

Although an independent, mostly volunteer-created project, “Hell Squad 2” was certainly not constrained by their small budget. Mosier said she and the crew wanted to push themselves to see what they could come up with based on what they had at home. 

“Like, could we make someone’s head explode if we wanted to?” Mosier said. 

The production “Hell Squad 2” was suffused by these different perspectives as well as the directors’ openness to considering them. 

“Working with people who aren’t necessarily filmmakers brings freshness to those ideas,” Bentley said. 

Cassidy Petrykowski, an NC State alum and lead actress of the film, was introduced to the world of Hell Squad through a casting call put out by the directors on NC State Green Room, University Theatre’s in-house communication forum. She spoke about the environment on set, and how it contributed to the film’s success

“Everybody was just really there because they loved it, and nobody took themselves too seriously,” Petrykowski said. “Everyone was collaborative.”

Blake Davis, a fourth-year studying physics and with minors in nuclear engineering and film studies, helped edit and shoot the film and spoke about his attitude towards getting into filmmaking.

“Pick up a pen, start writing,” Davis said, “Pick up some software, start editing. Pick up a camera, start shooting.”

There are many people who want to make films, music or work in other art forms, but feel that they don’t have the time or that it won’t turn out how they want it to. “Hell Squad 2” is one big, bloody answer to this feeling. 

Being able to see people with such confidence to make something so meaningful, while still having fun is truly inspiring. It’s a reminder that everyone, no matter their background or skill set, has stories to tell. 

As Petrykowski succinctly put it, “All you have to do is start.”

For more information on “Hell Squad 2”, visit their website.