Other Worlds Film Fesival / DUST 2019 – Regulation
In the near future, a young social worker (Sunita Mani, Glow) travels to a small community to administer behavior-modifying "patches" that guarantee happiness for the wearers. She must decide what to do when a precocious girl (Audrey Bennett, Frozen on Broadway) refuses to accept the patch.
Interview with Writer/Director Ryan Patch and Producer Joanne Vo
Watch Regulation here:
Congratulations! Why did you make your film?
RYAN: As someone with a close family member who struggles with severe mental health issues, the way that we understand and help people with these challenges is always on my mind. So, when I stumbled across a Harvard bioethicist’s blog about the idea of always-on, perfectly-administered drip dosage of antidepressants, an entire world began to form in my head where this technology was a part of everyday life.
I started to think about what this could do for people in our country, but also what it would do for our country’s culture. Who would use it? How would we handle this as a society? And also, how might the government address the disparity in privilege this technology would create between children who grew up with the wealth to be “happy” and those who did not? This leads me to think about what the government’s responsibility is to “level the playing field” in health and where can human freedom be factored into these decisions?
Imagine I’m a member of the audience. Why should I watch this film?
It's a short, distilled look into a question that pits personal freedom against societal good.
How do personal and universal themes work in your film?
RYAN: This is mainly a film about a universal theme that I've worked hard to make personal for the characters in the film.
How have the script and film evolved over the course of their development?
RYAN: To be honest, it didn't go through many changes. Once I had the idea, the script didn't change much.
What type of feedback have you received so far?
RYAN: The most interesting thing that has happened is that many people - maybe a third of every American audience - thinks that this is an anti-vaxxer film! This was not a theme that I had on my mind in ANY way while making the film and not something that I believe in or wanted to comment on. However, it was really interesting to see how so many people read these themes in my film. The film was supposed to challenge a general theme about human freedom, government's place in society, and how we make a better world for us all - but I did not expect that conversation to extend to vaccines!
Many people said it was actually the "scariest film" that they saw, which was a fun complement in the midst of screening with horror films all of the time.
Has the feedback surprised or challenged your point of view?
As I said above, the anti-vaxx feedback certainly surprised me! It also made me realize how different people may interpret art differently!
What are you looking to achieve by having your film more visible on www.wearemovingstories.com?
We would love to build anticipation for our public release on DUST (www.watchdust.com, or Roku apps) in December, as well as raising interest in the feature film!
Who do you need to come on board (producers, sales agents, buyers, distributors, film festival directors, journalists) to amplify this film’s message?
Journalists for sure as we release on DUST this month.
What type of impact and/or reception would you like this film to have?
RYAN: I hope that this film presents the two sides of a "government regulation" argument eloquently. Often, liberals and conservatives are divided over "how much government" we should have in our lives.
There is a lot of bad blood between these sides, and both accuse the other of some pretty nasty things, assuming the worst of one another. However, I live in DC and have good friends on both sides of the aisle - big-government liberals, and small-government libertarians. And I can say that neither of them believes what they believe because of spite for the other side.
So, I would love the film to bride this political divide. I would love for liberals, who are generally pro-government regulation/intervention, to see that there may be a place where something might be good "for society" but actually bad for human freedom. On the other side, I'd love for conservatives to understand the motivations and intention of people who are in charge of government programs - they are not some maniacal control freaks wanting to meddle in citizen's lives - but genuinely believe what they are advocating is best for everyone.
What’s a key question that will help spark a debate or begin a conversation about this film?
RYAN: There are a number of contentious issues in our country that, at their core, are discussions that pit something that might make society “better” against a loss of individual freedoms. We all agree it’s good the government removes citizens’ “freedom” to drive on the left side of the road in return for having safe roads. But where should the line be between giving up a freedom that makes “society” a better place, and allowing citizens to retain important autonomy? Many of us disagree about where this line might be for different issues like guns, education, or medical care, but I hope that this film serves as a starting place to discuss these issues, and for each side to empathize with the values and motivations of the other.
Would you like to add anything else?
RYAN: In writing the film, Mia and Kaleigh are both characters based on my wife, Alison. She inspired Mia as an optimistic, hopeful millennial who wants to make the world a better place. Kaleigh is based on stories that Alison told me of making up magical kingdoms and worlds for herself to play in as a lonely 10-year old. I combined these ideas with my own memories of childhood - roaming around Colorado, scraping knees and finding tree forts - and created a single conversation between Mia and Kaleigh that distills this tension between the benefits and costs of sacrificing personal freedom for the benefit of our larger community.
Casting both Sunita and Audrey were fantastic surprises. As soon as Sunita came into our world, we knew almost immediately that she was our ‘Mia’. She had an earnestness in her eyes that perfectly captured the tenseness of ‘Mia’s pivotal scene at the end. We were very fortunate to bring Audrey to the screen for her first time - an accomplished Broadway actress, she has an amazing subtlety to her reactions and brought an innocence and tenderness to Kaleigh that would cause the audience to “root” for her in a way that I could not have written.
Many other special things came together for us. Our award-winning DP, Matt Mitchell, was a true partner in helping me develop the visual narrative for the piece - going on multiple scouts in one week and passing a lot of emails and photos back and forth to get the tone right. The art team that built the treehouse in less than a day and dressed the entire set on a meager budget. Our costume designer who turned a vintage skirt suit into a well-fitting pantsuit of the future tailored just for Sunita. And the magical location that fit all three of our scenes into one property.
JOANNE: A fun story from the set about THAT CATERPILLAR:
Early in pre-production, Director Ryan found a beautiful black and white photo of the back of a young girl’s head, her hair trailing down her shirt with a delicate caterpillar hanging onto it. He joked to me, (Joanne, the producer), over the phone about what it would take to ‘produce a caterpillar’ for this particular scene. I laughed but quickly put it out of our minds - or at least, I thought I did. A few days before the shoot, Ryan ordered caterpillar larvae to our hotel to which the manager quickly called me and relayed to me that our “insects have arrived” and needed to be refrigerated. However, the caterpillars were so recently hatched that they were only tiny, wrinkly brown things that looked more like dry dirt than caterpillars. We hoped that in the next 24 hours, they would grow, but it wasn't looking promising.
A few minutes before wrapping on day 2 of 3, the family from the location stopped by the set. And as I was speaking to them, the daughter yelped and pointed to a wriggly, green and blue bug on her toes. She lifted her foot and I grabbed her arm and told her not to move - I needed that caterpillar. We scooped the little guy into my hands and it stretched and squirmed its body along with my palms, all 1.5 inches of him. I immediately showed it to Ryan and we both agreed. We had found our caterpillar.
Ryan’s wife, Alison, took the job of caring for, setting, and re-setting the caterpillar during the shoot - a responsibility that she took very, very seriously. She is still a bit upset that there’s no official credit for “Caterpillar Wrangler” on IMDb.
Audrey, by the way, decided to name him “Fluffy” and we let her keep it and the original larvae after the shoot. However, he quickly escaped the empty dried mango Tupperware we had placed him in upon arriving back in New York City. The other larvae, however, were cared for perfectly and turned into beautiful butterflies that Audrey released from her 42nd st. apartment patio.
What other projects are the key creatives developing or working on now?
Ryan is currently developing two feature films - a feature-film version of Regulation, and a British domestic thriller called Half Way Down, as well as a supernatural detective podcast called City of Ghosts which will release in 2020.
Joanne has taken a job in-house in Google, producing sweet commercials for them.
Interview: December 2019
We Are Moving Stories embraces new voices in drama, documentary, animation, TV, web series, music video, women's films, LGBTQIA+, POC, First Nations, scifi, supernatural, 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
Regulation
In the near future, a young social worker (Sunita Mani, Glow) travels to a small community to administer behavior-modifying "patches" that guarantee happiness for the wearers. She must decide what to do when a precocious girl (Audrey Bennett, Frozen on Broadway) refuses to accept the patch.
Length: 12:05
Director: Ryan Patch
Producer: Joanne Vo
Writer: Ryan Patch
About the writer, director and producer:
RYAN PATCH cut his teeth telling campfire stories in the mountains of his native Colorado, then decamped for the streets of New York, where he moved to earn his BFA at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts. Ryan then attended Royal Holloway, University of London and received a Master’s in Screenwriting. Ryan's screenwriting has placed in the second round or above of the Austin Film Festival’s screenwriting competition multiple times, and he was included in the Black List’s TV Staffing Book of the most promising TV writers in 2016. Other narrative films include horror thriller The Offering (played at Palm Springs ShortFest and awarded Vimeo’s Short of the Week), Ibrihim and the Dreamer, which was shot in Africa with an all-indigenous cast, and Gringa, which he produced and has played in over 20 festivals and won 14 awards on the festival circuit. He is currently pursuing funding for his first feature film, a domestic thriller set in the highlands of Scotland.
JOANNE VO is a commercial and narrative film producer based in Brooklyn. Before working in production in New York, she was busy avoiding the beaches of Southern California in the safety of edit suites. She has dual degrees in business and media studies which means that she can build excel spreadsheets as pretty as they are functional. Her clients have included agencies like Ogilvy, BBH, and Universal McCann and brands such as Tylenol, Walker & Co, and Facebook. Recent honors include a film about LGBTQ communities across America that was shortlisted for several festivals including the 2017 BFI Flare Film Festival, and a 2018 commercial series for a men's facial trimmer that was nominated for a Webby for Unscripted Branded Entertainment. Regulation is Joanne's first narrative film as the lead producer.
Key cast: Sunita Mani (Mia), Audrey Bennett (Kaleigh)
Looking for: journalists, buyers
Facebook: Regulation
Twitter: @d_ryan_patch
Instagram: @regulation_shortfilm
Made in association with: The Moving Picture Institute
Funders: The Moving Picture Institute
Where can I watch it next and in the coming month? Other Worlds Film Festival / Austin TX - 12/8/19; DUST / Online Screening Service - 12/19/19