VIFF 2018 Interview: FROM ACROSS THE STREET & THROUGH TWO SETS OF WINDOWS director Steven McCarthy

“The film opens on a woman in the dark in her sleek, modern condo staring at the building opposite hers. Her neighbour across the street, is a man, naked at his window. The story is about voyeurism, the desire for connection, and the stories we tell ourselves when we need to isolate ourselves from the world for a time.” Director Steven McCarthy on FROM ACROSS THE STREET & THROUGH TWO SETS OF WINDOWS which screens at the 2018 edition of the Vancouver International Film Festival.

Congratulations on your film playing and welcome to VIFF! Is your first time here and are you planning to attend your screenings?

It is the first time for me having a film at VIFF. I’d love to come but I also just got married and I’m finishing another movie and I’m broke! Rayisa is planning on coming.

So how did you get into this business? Talk to me a bit about how you got your start and what you have worked on in the past.

I have been acting for a number of years. I was too scared to start directing so I started a band instead. That band, The ElastoCitizens, soon grew to a full on production with 12 people. We were playing sold out, sweaty funk shows in storied Toronto venues and I learned that I liked being in charge of a group. It also taught me a lot about creating and collaborating in large groups over a long time. Which is a lot like making films. In 2012 my two loves, acting and the band, intersected when my pal Kate Melville decided to make a movie called PICTURE DAY and cast Tat Maslany as the lead and me, and my real band, opposite her. I realized how great filmmaking could be and a few years later I got up the courage to make my own short film. O NEGATIVE premiered at TIFF and, for a tiny little movie I made on my own dime with some old friends, it opened up a lot of doors for me. I got to travel to festivals and meet other filmmakers. It’s made me realize what an exciting community of up and coming filmmakers there are in this country.

How did this project come together for you? Give me a rundown from the preparation, to shooting, to post-production to now!

Rayisa Kondracki had written the project and she had a whole plan with another team fall apart and so she and producer Marc Swenker were interviewing new directors.  O NEGATIVE had been recommended to her and she saw something she liked and when I met her I could tell that our ideas were in sync. Her script was very cinematic and I felt it wasn’t the usual kind of stuff actors wrote for themselves. She picked me to direct the film and from that point it was only a few weeks until we were shooting. The whole thing came together pretty quickly. Rayisa had some people in mind for some roles and I found others. Deadlines have a way of making things happen and we had a firm deadline in that Raya was moving out of her apartment, which was our location, at the end of the month. Marc put me in touch with Jordan Kennington who I hired as our DP  – he and I just could speak in shorthand about what we wanted right from day 1. After production I had the privilege of editing the film with the awesomely talented James Vandewater who did Sleeping Giant. Rayisa gave us a lot of trust and the tone and shape of the film really came together bit by bit as we started to trust the mystery of this character. Then onto post with our buddies at RedLab who also worked on O NEGATIVE and now we get to show the movie for the first time at VIFF!

What keeps you going while making a movie? What drives you? How much coffee are we talking about here?

So MUCH COFFEE! Yes! I also do a lot of stretching. We were in pretty cramped quarters in the condo so it was hard to stay limber on those night shoots!

What was your biggest challenge with this project, and the moment that was the most rewarding to you?

It was the first time I’d ever directed someone else’s script, at least in terms of movies. I’d done it many times in theatre. But there’s a long term relationship to the material that is different in film and it can be easily to lose focus of what your goals are, of what’s good about the piece and what’s important. What your guiding light is.  Rayisa was incredibly generous in welcoming me in to her very personal project and very open to the aspects of it that I felt were important to telling the story. That aspect of finding my own way into a story that was not my own, while wanting so much to be true to Rayisa’s story; those were both the most challenging aspects of the story and the most rewarding. I think the collaboration is richer for it.

I’m about to get technical, but I would love to know about the the visual design of the movie; what camera did you film with, your relationship to the director of photography and how the movie was photographed.

As I mentioned working with Jordan Kennington was one of the highlights of this process for me. We spoke the same language. He understood what I wanted to emphasize. Rayisa had referenced films like A GHOST STORY for the time it takes to simply watch it’s characters existing in that house and I studied them and passed them onto Jordan. There was something poetic about the way we want to attack this story. Something oblique and mysterious that would be killed if we shot it head on like a normal movie with normal tv-type traditional coverage. At one point in prep I said to Jordan, “we might not even get a straight on close-up of her until the last shot of the film” which is kind of outlandish for a film that is basically about one person, and that was probably an exaggeration, but Jordan got it. He emotionally understood what we were aiming for and he found ways to frame it and to light the story and to give it a mood and feel that has a lot of texture and just FEEL, you know? Another decision we made in our quick prep was to shoot it in 4:3. I was looking at frames from Andrea Arnold’s FISH TANK and IDA and other films like that about one person. It just seemed right. In the end, looking at the lines of the film, the windows, the doorframe, the cabinets, building across the street, the lines are all vertical which works so well with 4:3. I can’t imagine shooting it any other way. It’s a perfect frame for one person.

After the film screens at Vancouver, where is the film going to show next? Theatrical, online, more festivals?

This is our world premiere so we hope to play some more festivals.

What would you say to someone who was being disruptive through a movie?

At TIFF last week I gave someone about 4 chances to check their phone and then said “Hey, is it possible for you to do that somewhere else.” Very polite, very Canadian, but with enough edge for them to know I meant it. It’s better than getting into fights which is what I used to do but that’s a longer story.

We have a lot of readers on our site looking to make movies or get into the industry somehow. What is the ONE THING you would say to someone who is wanting to get into the filmmaking business?

Just do it. Everyone has a camera now and no one knows anything except what they’ve learned by doing. Don’t feel you have to be good or smart. Just pick smarter people and treat them well, acknowledge their expertise, ask them questions and thank them often. Also, nothing says thank you like a Mexican fiesta with lots of margaritas and tequila shots. Someone very wise taught me that and it’s never let me down.

And final question: we saw each other at TIFF recently. What were some of your favorites?

Last week at TIFF I saw Capernaum, 22 July, Roma and Fahrenheit 11/9. All essential movies that tell us a lot about the world we’re living in right now.  Artists are stepping up to engage with the world and the challenges we’re facing. Go see them and feel a little less lost.

 

For more information on the film screenings at VIFF, point your browser to www.viff.org!

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