Interviews
Interviews
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“Shooting in the Woods Can Be Really Exciting”: DP Wilson Cameron on Good One
On a trip to the Catskills, 17-year-old Sam’s father is so preoccupied looking out for his oldest friend that she begins to feel suffocated. Such is the premise of Good One, the debut feature by the Los-Angeles based India Donaldson. Also debuting on Good One is cinematographer Wilson Cameron (Glass Note). Below, Cameron discusses the film’s natural development toward longer takes, the fun and difficulty of shooting in the woods and the various films that served as reference. See all responses to our annual Sundance cinematographer interviews here. Filmmaker: How and why did you wind up being the cinematographer of your […]
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“Feedback Helped Shape a More Comprehensive Narrative”: Editor Stephania Dulowski on Tendaberry
When her boyfriend travels to Ukraine in order to care for his sick father, 23-year-old Daokta (Kota Johan) finds herself roaming around New York City, finding both community and adversity in Tendaberry, the feature debut from writer-director Haley Elizabeth Anderson. Tendaberry is also editor Stephania Dulowski’s first feature-length project. Below, she describes how she approached cutting Anderson’s film, which premieres during the 2024 Sundance Film Festival in the NEXT program. See all responses to our annual Sundance editor questionnaire here. Filmmaker: How and why did you wind up being the editor of your film? What were the factors and attributes […]
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“I Was Keen to Challenge Myself with Film Language That I Hadn’t Tried”: Editor Arttu Salmi on Sebastian
Seven years after the premiere of A Moment in the Reeds, Finnish-British director Mikko Mäkelä has followed up with the Sundance World Dramatic Competition Sebastian. For his second film, Mikko Mäkelä plunges the viewer into the life of a novelist who, first as research for his own novel and then for the thrills the double life grants him, enters the world of sex work. Editor Arttu Salmi, whose previous work includes the TIFF 2023 premiere The End We Start From and both the New Man and Degeneration installments of Dau, discusses the unique circumstances of editing Sebastian on two Avids and how he found the film in the […]
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“I Prepared Myself by Digesting a Lot of Close-Ups and Portraits”: DP Iikka Salminen on Sebastian
In Sebastian, Finnish-British writer-director Mikko Mäkelä’s follow-up to 2017’s A Moment in the Reeds, 25-year-old Max enters the world of sex work as research for his debut novel. These experiences alter Max’s sense of self as Max moves from hesitant to exhilarated as he throws himself deeper into his “double life.” Cinematographer Iikka Salminen, who also worked with Mäkelä on A Moment in the Reeds, discusses how he complemented the observational nature of the film by shooting it like a “moving portrait.” See all responses to our annual Sundance cinematographer interviews here. Filmmaker: How and why did you wind up being the […]
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“The Easiest Thing to Get People to Do on Film is the Sexual Stuff”: Scott Cummings on His Sundance Doc Realm of Satan
A decade after Buffalo Juggalos, which explored the Faygo-spattered milieu of the Juggalo subculture in his native Buffalo, N.Y., Scott Cummings returns with a full-length immersion into another misunderstood community, the Church of Satan. Realm of Satan, which premieres Jan. 21 in the NEXT section of the Sundance Film Festival, is a deeply collaborative endeavor that adapts the philosophy and practices of the church into a rigorous yet playful visual approach that also takes liberties with observational form through inspired use of VFX. Cummings, who began work on the film in 2016 and persisted through the pandemic, spoke with Filmmaker […]
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“Retain the Depth and the Breadth of This Community”: Editor Nathan Punwar on Sugarcane
Tackling a timely but under-discussed contemporary issue in both the United States and Canada, journalists Julian Brave NoiseCat and Emily Kassie investigate a string of abuses and missing persons cases at an indigenous residential school in Sugarcane. The film, naturally, spends a great deal of time with indigenous peoples, and the filmmakers sought to maintain evidence of the deep culture and community of their subjects. Below, editor Nathan Punwar explains how they reconciled that goal with the need to keep the film moving. See all responses to our annual Sundance editor questionnaire here. Filmmaker: How and why did you wind up […]
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“It Was a Lot of Experimentation Along the Way”: Editor Jennifer Vecchiarello on My Old Ass
While tripping on mushrooms during the summer before her first semester of college, Elliott (Maisy Stella) encounters a future version of herself (Aubrey Plaza) in My Old Ass, the sophomore feature from writer, director and EP Megan Park. What ensues is a process of self-discovery that eschews scientific conventions of time and space. Jennifer Vecchiarello delves into her experience cutting Park’s film, where her duties included “teasing out the relationships” between characters and utilizing temp ADR and voiceover during the edit. See all responses to our annual Sundance editor questionnaire here. Filmmaker: In terms of advancing your film from its […]
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“To Get Soaked Into the Story and Not Be Aware of the Camera”: DPs Tom Bergmann and Konrad Waldmann on Eternal You
The advent of AI now offers the bereaved an opportunity to connect with deceased loved ones via avatars, a creation that captured the interest of filmmakers Hans Block and Moritz Riesewieck. Their documentary Eternally You investigates the benefits and dangers of digital immortality. Cinematographers Tom Bergmann and Konrad Waldmann reveal how they collaborated on this project, which required equal parts empathy and adhering to a specific artistic vision. See all responses to our annual Sundance cinematographer interviews here. Filmmaker: How and why did you wind up being the cinematographer of your film? Bergmann: Georg Tschurtschenthaler, producer extraordinaire, reached out to me […]
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“This Isn’t Just Any AI”: Director Pete Sillen on Bina48 and His Sundance Documentary, Love Machina
By the time in 2010 Martine Rothblatt completed the first iteration of Bina48, the “social robot” modeled after her real-life partner, Bina Aspen (now Bina Rothblatt), she had already trailblazed an extraordinary career across multiple industries. A lawyer and entrepreneur, she cofounded Sirius Satellite Radio as well as biotech company United Therapeutics, the latter an outgrowth of her work developing a medication that saved her daughter Jenesis’s life, along with over 40,000 others suffering from pulmonary arterial hypertension. So when Rothblatt, a transgender rights activist, who, at one point, was declared the world’s highest paid female CEO, and her wife […]
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“Bringing Different Stories Together To Create an Exciting Narrative”: Editors Anne Juenemann and Lisa Zoe Geretschläger on Eternal You
The prospect of creating personal AI avatars to comfort loved ones after death is the premise of Eternal You, a film by co-directors Hans Block and Moritz Riesewieck premiering at the 2024 Sundance Film Festival in the World Cinema Documentary Competition. Below, co-editors Anne Juenemann and Lisa Zoe Geretschläger discuss how they divvied up the workload while being based between Berlin and Vienna, with Block and Riesewieck also splitting their time between the two cities. See all responses to our annual Sundance editor questionnaire here. Filmmaker: How and why did you wind up being the editor of your film? What […]
