"Angels Die Slowly" is a dark ballad about two serial killers in pursuit of a thrill and the Bourbon Street bouncer in search of justice. Set against the post-Katrina French Quarter, pursuer and and prey become intertangled.
During the Easter holidays of 2005, while attempting to work on a sitcom, writer/director Charlie Brown had a flashback. Ten years earlier, he had done laundry next to a Goth couple in the Mid-City area of New Orleans where he was living. Three weeks after being creeped out by this couple, he saw the woman on the front page of the Times-Picayune. It seems her and her boyfriend, both self-proclaimed “witches,” had murdered their roommate and stuffed him under their house. When the body began to smell, they tried to bury it in St. Bernard Parish, where the police caught them. It was in those two that the idea for “Angels Die Slowly” germinated.
When Hurricane Katrina hit, Brown temporarily evacuated to San Francisco. With nothing but time on his hands, he began to research and write the screenplay.
“Initially, I saw this as a weekend movie, shot down and dirty on MiniDV with a mostly improvised scene setup. But Veronica Russell (the store owner Mordana in the film) said it's better to give actors some lines so they don't get lost. Well, I ran with it and wrote a real tongue-twister of a script.”
While the story is very simple (pursuit of bad guys in real time), the dialogue deals with arcane subjects, like the Tarot, urban magick, roleplaying and necromancy. But that is decoration on the central theme of sex and seduction.
“The characters of Angel and Dee are pulling one of the oldest scams in the book: the Murphy game,” Brown said. “The attractive female lures the victim with promises of sex and drugs and a good time, while the man lies in wait to knockout or kill the victim. I added the magical part of it to give it more intensity and Gothic flavor.”
On the other side of the coin is the mainstream world of Bourbon Street, represented by Ronnie, a bouncer who keeps his eye out for everything. Brown said he set up this parallel on purpose.
“There are many different subcultures in the Quarter and Marigny that the normal tourist doesn't see. In fact, they really aren't intended to see it unless brought there by a native. Ronnie is one of those guys that works the Quarter and lives there too. He's enmeshed in all of it and works to keep one side, the tourist side, going. It is only when he is dragged out of his world that he finds the strength to act.”