Chicago Feminist Film Festival - Quiver
Horror and desire meld when Suzanne arouses a ghostly presence and begins an unusual courtship across space and time.
Interview with Writer/Director Shayna Connelly
Congratulations! Why did you make your film?
Thanks! I’m obsessed with ghosts and cannot stop making movies about them. Quiver belongs in a loose series of six shorts about hauntings I made over the past five years. While developing the story, it occurred to me that desire is often the first feeling that penetrates the numbing effects of grief. Both desire and grief are reactions to absence. I wanted to make a film about a woman falling in love with what haunts her and taking a new direction after a traumatic shift in her life. The ghost intrigues rather than terrifies her and that is reflected in the film’s tone.
Imagine I’m a member of the audience. Why should I watch this film?
My challenge to audiences is to expand what horror cinema can be. Often an individual’s subjective reaction determines whether they categorize a film as horror. If they were scared it is horror and if they weren’t, it wasn’t. The problem is that what scares us is highly individualized. Horror cinema examines abjection, uncanniness and uncertainty. Gore, monsters and jump scares, frighten or repulse us and trigger our fight or flight response. I find dread and uncanny feelings more disconcerting because they don’t dissipate quickly. Infiltration from the unknown creates an insidious feeling that has the potential to unseat our very being. People should see Quiver to examine the boundaries of the genre, to experience a female main character within a horror film who has agency and a ghost that haunts without terrifying.
How do personal and universal themes work in your film?
My narrative films feature isolated women plagued by ghosts. Horror cinema in general fascinates me, but specifically grief, death and trauma – the things that haunt us – are the subject of my films. My obsession is with haunted states and trying to exist in the space between absolutes, the way a ghost straddles the natural and supernatural world. A ghost is present and absent from each realm simultaneously and as such is out of synch with both. So much of our time is spent similarly in transit from one milestone to the next and yet we tend to collapse those spaces between, negating huge parts of our experience. Horror cinema allows for exploration of philosophical questions to which we have no clear-cut answers. These are the questions that consume our lives and are more compelling than ones we can answer quickly. The mystery and allure of what I can’t know compels me to continue making movies.
How have the script and film evolved over the course of their development?
Going into production on a narrative film I usually have every detail planned out in advance. This was the first time I was working remotely with my DP, Jonah Rubash, and when he came to Chicago a few days before the shoot the storyboards we’d developed seemed foreign. It was strange for both of us, but collaborating via Skype had prevented the very last step in finalizing the shots. Luckily the way we work together meant that we could address the issues effectively and we went into the shoot with confidence. Something else unusual happened during my final rehearsal with Meg Elliott, the film’s lead. I asked her to improvise a scene with a set of hand mirrors. It was an impulse, but I didn’t know why it was important until I saw what she did as the character. The improvisation went into the shooting schedule as a new scene at the last minute and ended up as the film’s opening, which I love.
What type of feedback have you received so far?
As of this writing the film has yet to premiere and I’ve only experienced feedback from the cast and crew screening, rough cut reviews and select reviews of my body of work – all private exhibitions. Since the audience so far has viewed it within the context of my past work, I think the abstraction of Quiver took them by surprise. My favorite comment was along the lines of my having gone off the deep end with this film. It’ll be hard to top that observation, but I can’t wait to see how audiences react at upcoming festival Q&As.
Has the feedback surprised or challenged your point of view?
One thing I learned from responses to the film is that people have a specific way of visualizing a ghost, regardless of whether they believe in ghosts or not. If they don’t buy into your visualization, they tend to give up on the film as a whole. That’s the danger of having a ghost visible on screen for any length of time and something I need consider for my next ghost movie.
What are you looking to achieve by having your film more visible on www.wearemovingstories.com?
I have two big hopes for Quiver in relation to the rest of my work that wearemovingstories.com can help with. I’d love for someone to become curious about the set of films as a whole. DIY distribution isn’t something I can take on alone and I would love to find curators anywhere in the country who would program a night of the films. There are so many intimate exhibition spaces around the country doing this blend of theatrical-gallery hybrid programming and it would be an honor to have the equivalent of a filmmaker solo show. Especially since the films total under an hour and are thematically linked, it makes sense to exhibit them together. Their impact would be exponential and I’m curious to see how audiences respond to the set.
Because I’m also writing two feature scripts with related themes, I’m looking for funding. The group of films reveals what I’m capable of doing as a feature film in terms of tone, visual style, themes and experimentation.
Who do you need to come on board (producers, sales agents, buyers, distributors, film festival directors, journalists) to amplify this film’s message?
Writers interested in looking at my body of work would help in the search for exhibition opportunities and producers for future work.
Exhibitors wanting to program a variety of thematically-linked short films that lend themselves to a good discussion sought!
Producers who love ghost stories and want to fund a feature film.
What type of impact and/or reception would you like this film to have?
Quiver invites discussion on a number of issues related to women in cinema, too. I would like for audiences to see what a female director is capable of and what a predominantly female crew can achieve. I’ve been interested in conversation about what it means to have a ‘female voice’ and whether there is such a thing.
Would you like to add anything else?
This film was produced through a faculty grant at DePaul University, where I teach film production and directing. With the exception of my long-time collaborator Jonah Rubash as Director of Photography, the rest of the production crew - including department heads - were students. Over 50% of the crew were women, as well. About half of the crew graduated and are working professionally in film and TV production, either in Chicago or Los Angeles. The set was well-run and the quality of their creative contributions was extraordinary. You’d never know by looking at the film that it was made by a young crew with varying levels of experience.
What other projects are the key creatives developing or working on now?
Writer/Director Shayna Connelly is in post-production on two experimental documentary shorts and one found footage experimental film that frame her identities as artist and mother as haunted states. She is also writing two narrative features that push the boundaries of the traditional ghost story.
Producer Claire Wiles is producing a feature-length documentary about the corruption and politics of the Cook County property tax assessment system, and a short narrative film exploring the female view of life longitudinally affected by sexual harassment.
Editor Sharon A. Mooney is a filmmaker who works in experimental, narrative and documentary portraiture, all focused on investigating desire and the human condition. She is currently editing and post producing two short films, and in pre-production on a new film called Marla.
Interview: February 2018
_______________________________________________________________________________
We Are Moving Stories embraces new voices in drama, documentary, animation, TV, web series, music video, women's films, LGBTIAQ+, scifi, horror, world cinema. If you have just made a film - we'd love to hear from you. Or if you know a filmmaker - can you recommend us? More info: Carmela
_______________________________________________________________________________
Quiver
Horror and desire meld when Suzanne arouses a ghostly presence and begins an unusual courtship across space and time.
Length: 13:41
Director: Shayna Connelly
Producers: Anna Powers, Claire Wiles
Writer: Shayna Connelly
About the writer, director and producer:
Writer/Director Shayna Connelly’s films explore hauntings, liminality and boundaries between experimental, non-fiction and fiction filmmaking.
Producer Anna Powers resides in Los Angeles works at Anonymous Content. She continues to produce independent films, pursuing creative content with a passion for producing.
Claire Wiles is a creative producer who makes fiction and documentary films that range in subjects such as self-discovery, politics, and social matters.
Key cast: Meg Elliott, Aaron Potts
Looking for (producers, sales agents, buyers, distributors, film festival directors, journalists): producers, distributors, film festival directors, journalists
Social media handles:
Twitter: @shaynaconnelly
Instagram: shaynacon
Other: shaynaconnelly.com
Funders:
Made in association with: DePaul University
Where can I watch it next and in the coming month?
Chicago Feminist Film Festival
Idyllwild Film Festival
Toronto Short Film Festival
Columbus International Film Festival
HorrorHound Film Festival
Azalea Film Festival