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United States of AmericaA dying psychic corrupts the naive inhabitants of a small sea-side town.
SynopsisA dying psychic, consumed with bitterness, corrupts the
naive inhabitants of a small sea-side village
and in the process, alienates her daughter.
Noir-influenced black comedy.
I wanted to make a black comedy featuring some very good local actresses in black and white in a noir-esque style.
The script was specially written for the cast I had in mind and the look of the film developed in association with the very talented cinematographer Mark Finlay.
The locations were used in keeping with the bleak, downbeat feel and the absurdist humour we had in mind for the tone of the film. The music was also specially written by David Barclay to reflect the offbeat, quirky and pessimistic mood.
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Directed by
Paul Bruce -
Written by
Paul Bruce -
Produced by
Margaret Henderson & Paul Bruce
Written by: Paul Bruce
Produced by: Margaret Henderson & Paul Bruce
Cast
: Margaret Henderson: Keiran Ure
: Fraser Goodall
: Esther Cohen
: Tonia Flynn
: James Allen
: Yulia Allen
: Michael Frame
: Pamela Gladstone
: David Barclay
Crew
: Paul Bruce: Mark Finlay
: Billy Wilson
: Mark Deas
: Continuity
: Margaret Henderson
: David Barclay
: Margaret Henderson
: Paul Bruce
: Paul Bruce & Margaret Henderson
: Mark Finlay
The Film was shot in Edinburgh, and in rural East Lothian in the United Kingdom during the winter of 2009.
Several aspects of the film were shot under extremely trying circumstances, the lighting control pack didn't work and caused the lights to flicker continuously. We got around this by introducing a close-up of a candle, this lulls the audience into thinking the flickering was candlelight! No one has ever commented on the light flickering at any screening!
We achieved the shot where we look up through the water, past Madame Zola's hat to Marie looking down at the viewer, by filming the hat floating in a tank through a mirror placed on the floor of the tank. We then matted in the shot of Marie.
Another difficulty we faced was the sound of very busy traffic passing by the sequences filmed in the village streets. The sound editor (Mark Finlay) painstakingly replaced each of these traffic sounds with a seagull sound effect recorded for this purpose earlier in the day.
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Director
Paul Bruce
This is a great slice of tartan melodramatic noir, I caught this at the Leith Short Film Festival in Edinburgh and was very impressed with it's bleak sense of humour and dry irony. I love the camerawork and the pacing and editing are just right.