F.A.Q.

Where did you get the idea for your film ?

I wanted to shot an Indie movie with few bucks, so I checked for closed set piece ideas in theater plays and films I liked, because it offered good economical costs: few characters, few locations and a short time period (so less costly changes).

I first pondered over early Polanksi’s like Knife in the Water and other closed set pieces. Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining is an obvious reference, but the catalyst of the idea was a discussion I’ve had with a friend on an old comic book he had read about a lone hunter who goes crazy in the forest and fights against ghosts and monsters.

Who are your influences ?

Definitely Stanley Kubrick for his storytelling and his unique approach to the craft of making movie, which really allowed him to take the time to put maximum intention in the creative process of doing a movie.

I’m very interested in older storytelling tricks of the silent era, but also of experimental cinema. Today’s filmmaking technique seems too often stigmatized in a certain way, forgetting all those peculiar devices to tell a story that have been used and invented before.

Visual storytelling is what attracts me in filmmaking.

I’ve been dubbed Kafka by my classmates many many times.

What does the title mean ?

It links to a few things, the link with the native is obvious, but other correlations exist. If I wanted to know more, I’d start by checking out Freud’s book with the same name, but I wouldn’t stop there.

What’s the film about ?

It’s a story about a hunter who suffers from paranoia and hallucinations after hiding the accidental murder of an old hermit. This prevents him from keeping his passions repressed and makes him turns against his wife and daughter. It’s The Shining meets Jacob’s Ladder.

What’s the film really about ?

While reading about The Shining, I came upon an interview with Stanley Kubrick who said that his movie was about the scariest thing he could conceive which was that a member of your close family becoming a stranger to yourself. Reading that I wondered how that could be scary to myself, and thought that I would be even more scared if through my thoughts and actions I became a stranger to myself; that’s what Will, the main character, is all about.

Where did you shoot your film ?

We shoot nearly all principal photography in Pourvoirie Waban-Aki in La Tuque (Québec/Canada) in collaboration with the Natives there which co-produced the movie. The scenes that required differents landscapes, like hills and trees to interact with (La Tuque has only straight dry pines forest with flat ground) were shot in Mont St-Sauveur (Québec/Canada). Pick ups and reshoots were made on an island in Carignan (Québec/Canada), near my place.

How long did it take to shoot ?

I took around 4 weeks of principal photography and 1 week of pick ups & reshoots.

Were did you find your actors ?

All non-Native actors were found via Montreal School Of Performing Arts, with Josa Maule. Most actors are from Montréal area. For Cameron Hartl I had to do a casting call all over Canada, Vermont and NY States to find a non-union actor that was able to play character as it should be. Most Natives actors were found among Native populations in the area we shot.

What was the budget of the movie ?

I won’t say an exact amount, but under 100 000$ CAD.

How did you get the money ?

All private funding, from my own pocket and my parents helped with what was missing.

What kind of camera did you shoot with ?

We decided to shoot with HDV camera SONY HVR-Z1U for its great autonomy since we had little access to electricity that deep in the wood. Also, we used a P2 that the Co-Producer (Marc-Antoine Desjardins) was using to shoot the making off of the film on the rare occasions we had dual cameras setup. The footage was digitalized in Cineform HD 10 bit for editing.

Do you have another film in mind ?

I got loads of them in mind, but there are 3 I’m thinking more seriously about.

One is a drama about a lonesome contract killer which gets confronted to new found friendship when it meddles and compromises his work. Think of Shattered Glass meets The Talented Mr. Ripley.

Another is about a family dealing with its elder son been incarcerated after having committed a murder, and how they cope with life and picking up the pieces after such a trauma. Think of In The Bedroom.

The last one is collaboration with a friend (Mathieu L. Chevalier). It’s the story about a retired serial killer who has settled for a tasteless and lifeless existence after having stopped his killing spree. But he begins to kill again when a new serial killer starts to overshadow with more gruesome killings what the retired murderer considers to be his “proud achievement”. Think of Mr.Brooks meets Dexter.

Also, I’m currently working (with Mathieu L. Chevalier) on a spec board game about the Hollywood studios era, it’s called Hollywood Studios.