Christopher Setterlund, In My Footsteps : horror

Showing posts with label horror. Show all posts

Tuesday, June 2, 2026

Help Bring The Cabin To Life!

Help me bring my first feature-length film to life!

The Cabin is a suspenseful psychological horror movie about a man who takes a vacation far from civilization, only to be confronted by a mysterious and dangerous creature. The film is a claustrophobic and suffocating tale of survival. The main character must decide between staying and facing an unknown entity, or attempting to escape and being at the mercy of the unforgiving elements.

My name is Christopher Setterlund. From the time I was a teenager in the 1990s, I wanted to work in film. As a 16-year-old, I spent all of my savings to purchase a camcorder from Sears. I used this to craft dozens of videos starring my friends and family. Here, now thirty years later, as I approach 50, I have the chance to make those long-lost dreams a reality.

With your help, we can fund the first attempt at a feature-length film. I will be producing my own original screenplay, The Cabin. I am partnering with the well-respected and prolific director of over one hundred films, Mark Polonia, who will be behind the camera for this project. Together with an amazing cast and crew, we are looking to create a truly terrifying horror film.

For The Cabin, we are seeking a budget of $4,000. This funding will be used for the following. The aforementioned cast and crew and their basic necessities. Securing filming locations in Pennsylvania. Props, equipment rentals, and post-production.

This project is proof that nobody’s dreams have an expiration date. Even if it has been many years, you can still chase your passions. I believe in the script. I believe in Mark as director. I believe in the talents of the cast and crew. However, we all need you and your generous donations, big or small, to help bring this project to life.

Please consider giving anything you can toward this project. If you believe in independent filmmaking. If you believe in chasing your dreams. If you believe in being a part of something artistic, unique, and authentic. You can help us. If you cannot donate, please consider sharing this campaign with anyone you believe it might resonate with.

The goal is to have The Cabin filmed in August 2026 with a tentative date for Blu-Ray release, streaming, and limited theatrical run in the fall of 2027.

On behalf of Mark Polonia and our cast and crew, we say thank you.

Since I roamed the halls at Dennis-Yarmouth High School on Cape Cod in the 1990s, my ultimate dream was to make films. Now I’m asking for your help to bring this one to the screen.

Let’s bring The Cabin to life together.

With deep gratitude,
Christopher Setterlund

Monday, December 22, 2025

Initial Impressions 2.0 Blog #100: Back In Time, Fox Sounds, 90s Mindset, etc.

1. I got an important message on Facebook this week. I need to convert my security to two-factor authentication before a certain date. The date? December 31, 1969. So not only do I need to change my security settings on Facebook, but I also need to find Doc Brown and the DeLorean and go back over 50 years to do it. It doesn’t give me a lot of confidence in security settings when they can’t even get the year right. If I have no other choice, I’ll wait until they at least get the date right before I go switching up my security settings.

2. Stand By Me and The Princess Bride were two of the most important films of my childhood in the 1980s. Rob Reiner was one of the most important directors of the last 40 years. Far beyond his work as Mike ‘Meathead’ Stivic on All In the Family, he created some of the most beloved films of my life. Death comes for all of us. It is undefeated. But for someone so beloved in Hollywood to be murdered in his own home in his late 70s, it’s beyond awful. I’m sure more details will be coming out in the weeks to come, but it appears as though it was his own son who did it. Sad, so damn sad. RIP Rob Reiner.

3. I signed up again for Netflix this week. It was mostly due to my FOMO over the final season of Stranger Things. I signed up for the lowest tier, with ads, for $7.99. I was anticipating being overloaded with ads. Thus far I have watched four episodes of Stranger Things Season 4, because I have to catch up, and I have yet to see one single ad. I even had to go check and make sure I didn’t accidentally sign up at a higher tier. You know what that means, right? At some point in the near future, the luck will even out, and I’ll be watching a show that is 75% ads. I have jinxed myself, but it’ll be worth it for Stranger Things, Cobra Kai, and Black Mirror.

4. I absolutely loved IT: Welcome To Derry. The show was loaded with easter eggs for lovers of the IT movies and also expanded the lore of those movies and the book. The plan is for 2 more seasons, each taking place in a different year as Pennywise continues his quest to destroy his enemies, present and future. If you enjoy horror, you’ll love this. It’s shot beautifully and should win an Emmy for cinematography, and other things. The acting is first-class. There are 8 total episodes, and each one feels like a movie in and of itself. I will not spoil anything for those who are watching or are going to watch. All I’ll say is that at the end, you’ll see how the prequel show lines up with the movies. Excellent.

5. In the continuing adventures of training my 12-year-old client comes this gem. We normally throw a 10# medicine ball back and forth for almost our entire 30-minute session. This week, his shoulder was tired, and his legs were tired from snow fun. I found a workaround by having him kick a kid’s rubber ball. His heart rate was still getting up there, and we made a game out of it. Luckily, without any weight to the ball, it could hit anything and not cause damage. Well, almost anything. During our session, the very first kick he did managed to be a line drive to my nuts. I had to not sell the impact, otherwise the whole session would have turned into him trying to nail me in the junk with the ball, or something more dangerous. In all, it was a fun time with 300 calories burned by me.

6. I have vivid dreams quite often. I will wake up multiple times per week, remembering whatever the dream was that I had. Most of the time, they are just random stuff, as most dreams tend to be. This week I had a dream like that, although it did feel like it had more meaning. I was at a school track with my friend Mike, of Monday Runday fame. For the first time ever, we were joined by our other friends Steve and Greg. What made this dream stand out was that our friend Pete showed up. Sadly, he passed away from cancer a little over 3 years ago. In the dream, he was drinking a specific type of water that, in the dream world, we recognized as being one taken off the market because it was proven to cause cancer. He had to have me and Greg scrub down the bleachers with soap and water so he could safely sit on them, as he had a compromised immune system in the dream. I don’t remember much of what we spoke about; it was brief, but I remember the water and us all bringing up how it had been pulled for causing cancer. I wish there were some special message Pete had for me to relay to the others. Maybe there was, but I forgot it. I think the fact that he was there, and I had never dreamed of all of those other friends before, makes this a special dream. Thanks for visiting, Pete.

7. As a big fan of the Back to the Future movies, I’ve always been fascinated with the idea of time travel. I can’t build a time machine. I don’t know how to make a flux capacitor. However, little did I know that I didn’t need to build a time machine. I have access to one in the basement in the form of the dryer. I was drying my laundry this week and waiting for the last 3 minutes to tick off on the timer. All of a sudden, boom! It’s back up to 19 minutes! I went 16 minutes into the past just like that. Nothing important happened, like me knowing the Powerball numbers or being able to save someone from an accident. Nope. In fact, it was just the fact that my clothes apparently weren’t dry in the time the dryer said they would be. So, in conclusion, the dryer isn’t a time machine, but it is a liar.

8. A strange occurrence happened one afternoon this week. We had a day of pretty steady rain, but as the sunset drew close, I noticed that there were some breaks in the clouds. I figured it was a perfect excuse to get outside since it was in the 50s in mid-December. I drove to a nearby beach and snapped a few cool photos before heading back to my car to post them on social media. While I was sitting in my car, I heard a strange sound. I thought it was either a kid screaming or an odd dog barking. I looked in my mirrors and saw a fox standing in the parking lot, maybe 20 feet behind my car. I stepped out and began shooting a video. It trotted away, but not before making that same odd barking sound on video. I went back to sitting in my car, but heard the barks a few more times and saw the fox walking through the parking lot toward the beach. Being foolish, I got out and started trying to find it to get more photos or videos. Now I had watched the fox running, and it didn’t look injured, so I felt like I wouldn’t get attacked. It was also dusk, so it was hard to see where it could have been hiding. Eventually, after walking across the entire beach, I heard it barking again. It was sitting up on a hill next to a fence, barking. I didn’t dare get too close, so I didn’t end up getting any more video. A person walking to the beach also heard the fox and thought it might have been calling its mate. I wasn’t going to keep chasing after it, especially since it disappeared under the fence. I did get the video, though.

9. I have been writing for decades. I first wanted to become a writer when I was in 2nd grade. I’ve done poetry, song lyrics, short stories, novels, blogs, and various other types of books. Despite having some experience in writing, I am surprised at how much of a learning curve there is for me when it comes to script writing. As some of you know, I am working on a script for a feature-length film that will be happening in the summer of 2026. It’s based on an old short story of mine, The Cabin, which I wrote in 2009. First off, I have to revise the actual book since my writing has improved in the last 15 years. Then I have to adapt that into a script. Why is it a learning curve? I guess it’s having to include a lot more ancillary details like where the scene is, some of how the camera should shoot, descriptions of actions, and the like. Think of it as having to describe everything that’s happening in as much detail as possible. Luckily, I have some time to get the first draft of the script done. After that, the director of the film, who has loads of experience, can help guide me to the finish line.

10. It was three long weeks that I wasn’t able to go for any outdoor walks. The weather was the main culprit. The only thing better than the 45-degree and sunny day was digging deep into my past with 90s Pop Radio on Pandora. Oh, but not just '90s Pop, but the ‘Discovery’ setting, deep cuts, man. After about 3 miles of my 5.5-mile walk, I was full-on back in the 90s, and it was bliss. I want to find a way to make 2026 more like the 1990s because the 2020s have been the worst decade of my life. Not sure what I can do to make that happen. Music, yes, a lot of the same friends, yes. Unfortunately, I am on the downside to 50, no matter how much I listen to Nirvana and wear flannel, that won't change. Maybe it’s a mindset. In the 90s, my whole life was an open road, and seemingly anything was possible. Now in the 2020s, it’s like I’m on a pothole-filled dirt road running through a wide-open desert with no side streets and no scenic overlooks. Maybe that’s the goal for 2026, to bring back the wonder I had for life in the 1990s. I’ll get to work on that.

This is how the 2020s have felt in my life.

Wednesday, October 29, 2025

In My Footsteps Podcast Episode 218: Lesser Known 20th Century True Crime Stories, Freddy's Nightmares/Friday the 13th TV Shows, Craziest Animal Attacks(10-29-2025)

The stories behind some lesser-known true crime events. A pair of horror franchises that flopped on television. Some of the craziest wild animal attacks.

Episode 218 ends spooky season with a bang and a scream.

It all begins with a look at two iconic horror franchises that ultimately flopped on television. A Nightmare on Elm Street crossed into TV with Freddy's Nightmares, while Friday the 13th had a show of the same name. Though powerhouse films in the 1980s, the TV shows didn't fare as well. We'll look at both shows and some about why they did not succeed.

Many horrific true crime stories spring to mind when thinking of the worst of the worst. For this segment, we are going to go deeper and look at some of the lesser-known but just as terrifying true crime cases of the 20th century. Some might be familiar, some new to you, but they are all equally disturbing.

Animals can be cute and cuddly, but many are extremely dangerous. In this week's Top 5, we will look at some of the craziest wild animal attacks ever.

There is, as always, a brand new This Week In History and Time Capsule looking at the life of beloved actor John Candy.

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Helpful Links from this Episode

Listen to Episode 217 here

Wednesday, October 15, 2025

In My Footsteps Podcast Episode 216: When My Grandfather's Ghost Visited Me, A Disturbing Railroad Safety Short Film, Best 1960s Horror Movies(10-15-2025)

The stories of when my grandfather's spirit visited me as a child. A disturbing educational short film about railroad safety. Some of the best horror movies from the 1960s.

Episode 216 brings all of the spooky from fiction, to truth, to somewhere in between.

It begins with an educational short film, sure to give kids nightmares. The Finishing Line, released in 1977, is a British film that highlights the dangers of playing on railroad tracks. How do they do this? By turning it into a disturbing Game of Thrones style massacre where the players don't win, they just survive.

We move on to love from beyond the grave. As a small child, I was visited on numerous occasions by the spirit of my grandfather, who had passed more than a decade before I was born. It was a part of a creepy but all too real time in my family. Now I share all of the details from all of the stories straight from the mouths of those who were there.

The new Top 5 looks at some of the best horror movies from the 1960s. These are some of the most influential and highly regarded films ever. Which is your favorite?

There is, of course, a brand new This Week In History and Time Capsule centered around the very first World Series in Major League Baseball.

You can support my work by becoming a member on Patreon. Or you can Buy Me A Coffee!

Helpful Links from this Episode

Listen to Episode 215 here

Wednesday, November 13, 2024

In My Footsteps Podcast Episode 170: Freddy Krueger Turns 40, 1970s Educational Children's Shows, 1990s Movie Soundtracks(11-13-2024)

The 40th Birthday of the man of your dreams Freddy Krueger. Get a refresher course with some classic 1970s educational children's television shows. What were the top-selling movie soundtracks of the 1990s?
Episode 170 gets you warm and fuzzy with nostalgia as the weather gets cooler.
It begins with the 40th anniversary of Wes Craven's A Nightmare On Elm Street. From its roots based in reality, to how it forever changed the horror genre we take a deep look at the franchise and its leading man Freddy Krueger
Seventies kids rejoice! We go way Back In the Day to rediscover some classic 1970s educational children's television shows. Some of these transcended the decade while others definitely seem dated when looking back. We'll cover all of that ground.
This week it will be a Top 10 instead of a Top 5. We're going to look at the top-selling 1990s movie soundtracks. Many of these were likely on heavy rotation in your Sony Discman but how many of the movies themselves were big hits?
Over the decades thousands upon thousands of stunts have taken place in motion pictures. There had to be a first though. A new This Week In History and Time Capsule are centered around the first big movie stunt.
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Helpful Links from this Episode

Listen to Episode 169 here

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