July 1, 2025 • 43 mins
Mike talks with filmmakers Chris Rosik and Rob Cousineau about their 2025 film So Fades the Light, a quiet, unsettling drama about the long shadows of cult trauma. The story follows Sun (Kiley Lotz), once known as the “God Child” of the Iron and Fire Ministry, a violent extremist group shattered by a police raid. Years later, Sun lives in isolation, traveling the country in her van—until the release of the cult’s leader (D. Duke Solomon) draws her back to the ruins of her former life.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
Oh g is, folks, it's show tied. People say good
money to see this movie.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
When they go out to a theater, they want clod
sodas popcorn in No monsters in the Protection.
Speaker 1 (00:16):
Booth, everyone for tend podcasting isn't boring, Don and Off.
(00:43):
We can all be forgiven the monstrous things this bedevil's
world has made us too.
Speaker 3 (00:54):
We can all be forgiven. Oh, I see a terrible
fear of my words.
Speaker 4 (01:06):
At Brodie, you are blessed, You are blessed.
Speaker 5 (01:13):
Why mean, what was so special about me?
Speaker 3 (01:20):
You were born to die for us?
Speaker 6 (01:31):
Hey, folks, welcome to a special episode of The Projection Booth.
I'm your host Mike White. On this episode, I'm talking
with Rob Cusino and Chris Rosick. They are the co
directors of the twenty twenty five film So Fades the Light.
It is out there now available for streaming for purchase.
I highly recommend it. I had a great time talking
with Rob and Chris doing a great job with this
(01:52):
film and all the other stuff of theirs that I've seen.
Hope you enjoyed this interview and definitely check out So
Fades the.
Speaker 1 (01:57):
Light, Rob and Chris.
Speaker 6 (01:59):
I'm super excited to have your board tonight talking about so.
Speaker 1 (02:03):
Face the Light.
Speaker 6 (02:04):
I know you guys not from this movie but from before,
and I'm so curious how do you know each other?
Like how did you two become friends?
Speaker 1 (02:12):
I met Chris at a failed Comedy Central pilot that
I was hired to rent a camera to, and Chris,
I think, was also renting a camera to it, like
after hours after a job that he was at at
the time, and they asked us to operate and I
had literally no idea how to use this camera. I
just saved up enough money as a bar tend to
(02:32):
like buy this camera, and Chris was like the person
who was nice enough to explain to me how to
use it. That's how I remember it. Pretty much.
Speaker 7 (02:39):
Right after that, we have a mutual friend who was
at the bar Rob was working at, and he got
Rob in at a small agency we were working at.
Speaker 8 (02:47):
So Rob was producing.
Speaker 7 (02:50):
Small shoots that I was shooting and directing with the
owners of that company.
Speaker 6 (02:55):
And then how long have you guys been working together?
When was this?
Speaker 7 (02:59):
Oh god, this is like teen years now, I think, Yeah,
we've been doing the code directing for fourteen years. We've
been working together for fifteen years. Because I actually met
Rob like three weeks before my wedding, and so that's
coming on fifteen years, so I can always remember fifteen
years of Rob as well.
Speaker 6 (03:17):
Do you feel like you're as married to Rob as
you are to.
Speaker 8 (03:20):
Your wife fifty percent of the time?
Speaker 6 (03:23):
What's that working relationship? Like, like how do you guys
divvy up the work or how do you work in tandem?
Speaker 1 (03:28):
So I do a lot of the writing and producing.
Chris is the big ideas guy. He'll like throw a
few ideas at me. Then I'll make it into a
script and then he'll go, Okay, what if it's this,
So then I'll play with it, you know. But when
we direct, Chris is far more visual than I am.
I don't think about visuals at all. I'm very spoiled
by working with Chris at this point. Like I basically
focus on talent performance, talking to those folks, and you know,
(03:50):
we work rereally differently. We have been like in out
of set big enough to have like an AD and
like another producer, so like I'll be like coordinating the
crew getting everything set, so I'll kind of be like
AD while I work with and then Chris will be
like working with DP or shooting it himself, depending on
the project. I think Chris does the bulk of the
post production for our company as well. Chris can do
visual effects. It's done color. Sometimes you like to work
(04:11):
with colors.
Speaker 7 (04:12):
But I will say one of the best things about
co directing is you don't have to be one percent
on point because it is a lot of like managing
personalities or like crew members, and it's like there's a
lot more of like making sure everyone's happy. And Rob
is much better with like trolling his emotions on that.
(04:35):
Like there'll be times maybe on set where I'm just like,
nothing's going right, everything's gonna burn.
Speaker 8 (04:40):
Let me go sleep in my car.
Speaker 7 (04:41):
And Rob's good at like steering us back in the
direction so that we actually finish something.
Speaker 1 (04:46):
I have a theory that as long as it's fun
to do it, you'll make something pretty good.
Speaker 6 (04:51):
Is this your first feature together?
Speaker 1 (04:54):
This is our second feature we directed together. We've worked
on a bunch of features of other folks where we've
done various jobs, like The Russian Five. We produced it
as a company. I did a lot of producing or
to Joshua Reel, the director, and Chris got the bulk
of the film our first feature was called Future. It
was kind of us figure out how to make a film.
It's like a bit of an homage to Kevin Smith.
(05:15):
I don't know, it's something I'm proud of because we
made it, but I don't necessarily love that movie anymore.
But I think it's a very important film that we made,
and I think there's really great moments in it. I'm
kind of more harsh on it because I've gotten so
much better at writing since we wrote it, and I
think most of that film come from my writing. So
I'm a little bit more negative about it.
Speaker 6 (05:36):
Well that was only what twenty sixteen, I mean, you know,
just a couple.
Speaker 1 (05:39):
Of years ago.
Speaker 6 (05:40):
Yeah, but I do.
Speaker 1 (05:42):
Think it looks great and I think like it feels great.
There's some great moments, And my little brother was the
lead in that, Josh, and he's a really good actor,
and there's strong performances from other folks in it. So
it's just it's not something I regret. In fact, I
personally think that, like a lot of people get stuck
on the idea that the first thing has to be
so good, right, and I was a little bit stuck
on that. Chris was just kind of like, let's just
(06:03):
make a fucking movie. He like kind of forced us
into making a movie, and so we just did it.
And I learned so much through that process that if
that hadn't been our first movie, like anything else we
did wouldn't have been just going to I learned a
lot about acting and method and I learned so much
from making that because I was so afraid of fucking
it up that I was like, I don't want to
drop the ball, especially because like I had gotten investors
(06:24):
in that film. You know, he raised twenty five thousand
dollars to shoot it, which seemed like an insane amount
of money to shoot a movie with at the time,
you know, for like a dumb idea we made up.
I was like, oh my god, what if we lose
all this money? And we did because making profits on
independent hills isn't near impossible.
Speaker 6 (06:39):
How did so Fate's a Light come about?
Speaker 1 (06:41):
Who had that idea?
Speaker 6 (06:42):
And how did the script kind of start to form itself.
Speaker 7 (06:46):
I had the initial idea of, like, what would it
be like if you were raised in a cult and
you're worshiped as a child and then like the cult's
broken up, you're young enough to where you go to
a foster home, you grow up, Like, what is that
person like fifteen years later, like in their twenties, Like
(07:07):
how did they cope with everything? How do they view religion?
How do they view people? That was the initial thing
I wanted to explore. And then Rob went in on
the script and got a lot of the story beats,
and then Rob can talk a lot more about the
actual cult and the basis for that.
Speaker 1 (07:23):
In twenty twenty, when things got weird, I became obsessed
with studying the strangest right wing shit I could find,
like QAnon and Proud Boys and all that bullshit. So
I started looking into that stuff and learning more about it,
and I noticed consistent rhetoric among hateful people that I
(07:43):
kind of latched onto and like because I wanted to
understand it and be like, how is this working? How
is this working? This is so dumb? How is this working?
So like I lashed onto it. I sought out those
communities and like, study the hell out of them, and
things got even weirder. In twenty twenty one, I started
seeing different cults pop up, and I started learning more
about cults and researching it's As the film developed, it
(08:05):
was like, we knew a couple of base rules about
like things we did want to happen in the way
characters were represented. Right. For instance, something Chris and I
talked a lot about was we wanted the Reverend to
be charismatic and charming and have like those vibes of
like someone who you would be enticed by. Well, he's
(08:26):
saying the worst shit, but it would be so easy
to have him just to hate speech, right, Like, that'd
be so easy and boring, And that's not what these
people do. It's all very coded. It's very like under stated,
but it's all there. There's a subtext of it, like
words like globalist when they mean Jewish people whatever, Like
they use all these code words. It was important to
us that that came through in a way that matched
the tone of these right wing, hateful, piece of shit creators.
(08:48):
So we found that tone and we layered that in.
And another thing that was really important to was our lead, Kylie,
Kylie Lotts. We wanted to find a lead that played
someone who had a history of trauma well but didn't
play it in a way that it sucks whenever I
see films where the main characters had a history of trauma.
It sucks. They're like slumped over. They like, I don't
(09:09):
want to be around that fucking person. I had a
real fucked up childhood. I'm super fun to talk to, Like,
can we find more people like that that are like
funny and like fun So that was the two big
tone setters. I think that helped define the film, and
I think we really focused on in the writing it's funny.
Speaker 6 (09:23):
I got a lot of David Koresh from the Reverend.
Speaker 1 (09:26):
One hundred percent. I think I think honest to God,
Duke just brought a lot of that because it's a
really charming, sweet guy in real life. So I think
he was able to take the best parts of his
personality and like use that to highlight the worst parts.
Reverend A very.
Speaker 7 (09:43):
Important part of the movie in the opening is we
open with like rhetoric and hate speech, and the guy's
saying the most horrible things, and it's like, how can
this guy be likable? And then we cut to the
camera operator who's been recording this whole thing. We see
he's really confused and saddened by all of it, and
then you just see the Reverend like turn it on
to like you're a special boy, we love you and
(10:07):
that's why you're here. So I think that shows really quickly,
like how these people get be sucked into it. A
lot of people are looking to be like, oh, you're
a special boy, and people looking for that, I think,
can get really sucked into some of this gnarly stuff
like far too easily.
Speaker 8 (10:23):
My only thing to add to that.
Speaker 6 (10:25):
Once the script is in a more finalized state, how
do you actually go about producing this movie and getting
all the elements together? I know it's kind of I
always compare independent movies to like going to War, So
how did you.
Speaker 1 (10:37):
Play in the battle?
Speaker 8 (10:38):
Ours?
Speaker 1 (10:39):
Is funny because Okay, so I wrote the first draft
of the script in I think two days, and then
I edited it for three months. We're taking notes from
different people, the smarter people than me that put their
two cents in, and we kept like like playing with
the idea of making the film, but not really committing
to it. And then finally we got to the point
(11:00):
we like, ex send a date. We were just like,
all right, let's go. So we got a bunch of
our friends together that worked in commercials. John Beaver shot
the movies Great DP. We worked all the time in commercials,
you know, Scotia Lighting was a company that we worked with.
They gave us a couple of the guys they came out,
you know, our friend Don Walker, Hen's Vision Bridge Media.
He lent us like some camera equipment. Like basically, like
all of these friends that we had commercials that we've
(11:22):
like given commercial work with, become friendly with, they kind
of just like gave us their time. Our whole crew
for this film was right around ten people for most
of it, and our whole budget for the film was
about sixty two thousand dollars. So we were able to
do that because of all the other work we do
and all the goodwill that we built up. So essentially,
about a week before we're supposed to shoot, Chris and
(11:42):
I started like it was even maybe in Leslie would
have been like four days were supposed to share shooting.
Our production designer Angie like pitched and started making stuff.
We started scouting. She got COVID, so our friend Doug
tagged in and helped her out on set, and then
she came back later and helped us bring the thing home.
But she did a lot of leg work and Doug
(12:03):
was great on set, and then Chris also got COVID
eight days we were supposed to shoot.
Speaker 8 (12:09):
No, it was three weeks.
Speaker 7 (12:10):
So it's interesting because, yeah, I remember we had a
production meeting and I went and skated before work, and
then I was about to come into work and I
was the first one there, and before I went to
the door.
Speaker 8 (12:20):
I just had like a weird panic.
Speaker 7 (12:21):
I was like, oh, I think I'm sick, and so
like before going around to anyone else, Like, I went home,
took a test. My wife knows I'm a little bit
of a hypochondriac, so she was like blowing it off,
like it'll be fine, you just go to work, and
then like she took the test and like two minutes
later she's like, yeah, go get another test, like it's positive. So,
which is a crazy thing to be in isolation three
(12:44):
weeks before your movie with nothing but like time and
a shot list and a shot designing program and the script.
Just like became a little bit of an insane person.
Once I was able to talk to people again. In
those four days, it was a lot of like these ideas,
all these ideas, all these ideas, So it was probably
a little bit annoying to people as well.
Speaker 1 (13:04):
Yeah, he was like Charlie it's always sunny with like
the fucking pin board and the strings walked away in
a room without his sense of taste. So Chris got
that done and then we popped out. We just started shooting.
I think, like what a week after you were out
of quarantine, not even yeah, but yeah, it was. It
was pretty wild and we just kind of fat it together,
like it was a bunch of weird shit that just
(13:25):
kind of worked out. Like my friend Scott, he plays
the biker singer in the movie, the guy, the big
guy who singing at the beginning of the movie with
the great voice. He just went to this weird like
church camp when he was younger. So we had a
compound that existed that looked like that. Like we didn't
have to do much to it, you know. The cast
was all our friends. We'd been casting it on and
off for a little while before, about two months before
(13:47):
we started looking for people, right, we just already had
all the pieces around us, like Tony the Skater was
our friend Lou that would hang out there great. And
then Kylie I met through the music scene and through
friends of my wife, so and they're great. And Ailie
introduced this to Anika. Anika was a singer of a
punk band that Chris really liked, and I really loved
her folky stuff and she's great. It all kind of
(14:07):
worked out, and Duke was a guy we knew from
advertising and he's great. It just kind of worked and
then everybody kind of pitched in to fill in the blanks.
Like I said, our whole crew was like ten people,
and it was a very ambitious film. When I say that,
plus the scale and the budget, it was like, we
just got lucky. My friend Tom Way Cities, who's like
the best location guy I ever worked with. He just
helped us find substitute locations. Our buddy Julian, who was
(14:29):
like an associate producer on it, hit so many jobs.
He was helping us scheduling, and he was doing second
ac work and he was shooting some stuff. It was
just everybody just did everything.
Speaker 6 (14:38):
Higley is amazing and I'm so glad that you found
them because performance they give is just phenomenal. And like
I always say, when it comes to independent film, it
lives and dies by those performances, because you can have
the best looking thing in the world, but if your
lead actor or actress is clunky, and Kylie is the
opposite of clunky. In fact, I think straight down the lay,
(15:00):
there are so many good performances, thank you.
Speaker 4 (15:03):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (15:03):
And I do think like so much of what this
film is rested completely on Kylie, because so much of
this film is just living with this person, and that
person needs to be so dynamic and not be you know,
some doll sad sack, which is like, again, something we
talked a lot about. Not that I mean whatever. I'm
not judge people are depressed. I'm just saying, like, as
someone who experiences depression, I'm not one note and I
(15:25):
think I find that a lot of times in film,
this is a person who's like got like shooting fun
things in their van and they like have a little
life and they're doing all these things. Like it was
a fully fleshed out character, and a lot of it
came from I mean, Kylie. We met with a lot
before the film. We talked to Kylie. I'm many guests,
like thirty or forty times about like tone and character.
And another thing we did prior to shooting was we
(15:47):
did a table read with all of the talent, and
in that read, we would go scene by scene. At
the end of each scene, I go, how did that feel?
Would you say that? Because a lot of these people
were first time actors or non actors too, and I
would just have to rewrite the script in their own words,
and it was great, Like a god of what is
the sci fi writer's name that Lou brought to the table,
(16:07):
it's they reference it in the skater scene. But that
was that bit where like Lou talks to Tony but yeah, yeah,
So I didn't know who Actavit Butler was until Lou
brought Actavia Butler up to me. So like that bit
where they're talking, that was a bit I wrote around
as I lay dying with Focner. So the whole scene
was supposed to be out a Faucner reference of like
(16:28):
going home this long road home, and Lou is like,
have you read Actavia Butler? And they gave me this
like reference and that works so much better because it's
something Lou connected with. And by the way, Luke came
so prepared, Chris, that was the first time Lo's ever
been in a film, and they were great. We just
got lucky.
Speaker 6 (16:45):
I do have to ask, because you have some non
binary people in here, You've got your main character su Wen,
but can also be heard as as oh, and I mean,
how much was gender factor when you were writing this?
Speaker 1 (16:59):
When I was right, it was very little. Once we
started casting it, I became very cognizant of it in
the writing. The funny thing about Sun is I based
a lot of the cult off of an actual existing cult,
which I don't know if I can say it, just
in case they're litigious, but like, the names came from
real people in that cult. So that was where it
was like the reverend had a name and the lawyer
(17:21):
was like, absolutely not, don't do.
Speaker 8 (17:22):
That, so that went away.
Speaker 1 (17:24):
But yeah, no, I became very cognizant of it in
the process, Like casting Lou made that scene. Even kyl
that was talking about how that scene felt like a
little bit of like a crush then, and it was
this fun new element and I hadn't thought of any
of that stuff until I had watched the actors interact.
Then I became very cognizant of it, and I think
Chris and I really adapted to Like I said, we
really tried to adapt it to their voices. And I
(17:45):
always knew that I wanted everyone that Son encounters to
be someone that would be othered by or rejected by
the people in the cult. So that way Son could
meet these folks and have a positive interactions with them,
because in a way, it's like you're seeing, you know
what ripening in America has put on this person, and
you're seeing them interact with these folks in real life.
(18:06):
And Sun doesn't have those like preconceived notions that they
were raised with, but like you're seeing them interact with
these people in real life, and you're seeing the kindness
that comes from these communities. And even though a lot
of these folks, like the couple at the campfire, have
been rejected by or like damaged by these communities, they
don't shy away from meeting new people. And in fact,
Anika is like, I'm done apologizing for the way I've
(18:28):
been treated. I'm not going to apologize for that. I'm
my own person. We found our own world outside of
the world that's been they rejected the world, they didn't
get rejected by it. And that was like kind of
seeing Sun being welcomed by those people. It meant a
lot to me, and I think it meant a lot
to the actors.
Speaker 6 (18:44):
Tell me a little bit more about the shoot. I
mean other than Chris getting COVID any major stumbling blocks Otherwise.
Speaker 7 (18:50):
There's a van in the movie that didn't run eighty
percent of the time, which is actually funny because we
bought a VW Bus US a month before that. The
day before the shoot stopped running, so we actually happened
to find the van from our friend Jeff, who was
just his secondary car. So yeah, having like a road
(19:14):
trip movie that the van kept breaking down was a
bit of a hassle. I mean it broke down since
you're from Michigan, like in Frank and Mooth when we
were trying to go to Bay City, so it broke
down about an hour and a half away from us,
in maybe like forty minutes away from where we were
trying to get.
Speaker 1 (19:33):
Other than that, though, the production wasn't really like fraught
with a lot of problems. I mean it was exhausting,
right because I was doing like the next day schedule
and the call sheets with Julian and Nyat, who were
both in the movie. They were both helping against as well.
It's like coordinating and stuff. But you know, it wasn't, uh,
it was exhausting, but like it wasn't a miserable experience
pity means like a lot of times I think it
(19:55):
can be, and I think a lot of indie films
get into that trap of like oh this is so hard,
this is hard. But like it was fucking fun, you know,
like we're making a movie and we're doing something cool.
I mean, there was some challenges as far as like
I had to drive to Atlanta to get the fake
guns because they wouldn't ship them, so like I literally
drove to a prop house in Atlanta, like well I think
two days before we shot and cut the guns and
(20:16):
brought them back and I had drive them back afterwards.
But me and my wife turned into like a little
mini vacation. We hung out in Atlanta for a day.
It was fun. But you know, none of the guns
on sat were like ever real guns by the way,
So like we did safety meetings, but we didn't really
need nothing like rubber or plastic or corked, so like
there was never an opportunity for them to be dangerous,
but we still have to treat them like they were
(20:36):
because we didn't want to be disrespectful of like shit
that happened with rust and stuff like that. So like
we still had to take them very seriously. And then
that was I guess the struggle for me, because doing
anything serious is a bit of a tough th for me.
But we just got really lucky. We had great locations.
You know, we used young Up Donuts. I don't know
if you ever been there downriver. That's not Chris and
the order like met me once and just handed me
(20:57):
the keys. He's like, yeah, I just lock it up
when you're done. You can stay overnight like cool. And
then you know we had the compound, which is great.
You know, we shot Autumn's houses. I'm looking at it
right now from my window. It's my in law's house.
They are my neighbors now I've moved into the house
next door since we shot the film. It was a
lot of the leveraging relationships we had. And you know
(21:18):
Ray Rivard, who is our steady cam op. He came
out for like next to nothing and fucking just would
hang out all day, Like he'd wrap his steady cam
shit and he'dn't be like what else can I do?
And he'd like set his rig down. And this guy
does this at for like huge budget commercials and he
was just like on board. People just like really committed
like John Luca committed, and Jake RG and e guys.
They were just everybody's like a huge part of the
(21:38):
team and it was a great experience.
Speaker 6 (21:40):
When did you actually shoot this and how long was
the shoot?
Speaker 7 (21:43):
It's probably about three years ago was the initial shoot.
We shot it actually in three parts. We shot a
big chunk of the movie with like full casting crew,
and we knew there was just like smaller parts that
we could get, like just Rob and Die and like
Julian who was producing with us, and then Dug our
(22:04):
props person and an audio person. We also shot very
like weird hours just because everyone was doing favors. There
was like a diner scene in the movie, and we
shot for four hours and then you know, we wrapped,
and Rob and I worked on getting the next day
shoot ready, and like we didn't really go over ten hours,
so I think.
Speaker 1 (22:23):
I think it was only one day we even hit
ten hours.
Speaker 7 (22:25):
Yeah, so it's probably like a three week shoot. And
then just like pick up days where Robin I would
go and shoot out the car window to get scenery
or blue Kylie into town and shot like like van
breakdown scene and like just little flavor stuff like them
going to the laundrymat and small stuff like that.
Speaker 1 (22:44):
I think we shot the last day on my fortieth birthday,
but we did, which.
Speaker 7 (22:48):
Also is good because we would see stuff in the
edit where we were missing it. So our ability to
like have a cut and then show it to people
and people would be like, oh, this goes by too
fast or I feel like, you know, like base it
out like this, and then we had the ability to
just like grab gear and go and shoot that stuff,
cut it in, show it to more people again and
(23:09):
they would say like, oh, So it was actually very
helpful that we could work as a very small crew
after having like big crew, because I think having the
like the our bigger crew really gave like a high
quality look to the movie. And then we were able
to like sneak in some smaller stuff and it kind
(23:31):
of like seats in there being helped by the larger
stuff we did.
Speaker 6 (23:37):
And it probably helps that you're the editor as well.
Speaker 1 (23:40):
Yeah, the editor.
Speaker 7 (23:41):
And also in working with commercial you do learn how
to check your ego at the door, because no matter
if Rob and I are directing and editing the commercial,
it's always for the client in the end. We don't
get offended if someone comes back and this part's way
too slow or this part makes no sense, instead of
all there's stupid, they don't know what they're talking about.
(24:01):
Why would they say that, and then kind of readjusting
and then like sending it out to another person to
see what they say, and then back to that person,
Yeah your name.
Speaker 1 (24:11):
Yeah. We had a lot of awesome people give us
notes on the edit to like Jen Wexler, who's like
a director we look up to. She gave us some
great notes, and Joe Swanberg actually watched it and gave
us some great notes. And we were very lucky just
by reaching out to some folks that we've you know,
had like interactions with that where they were like invested
(24:32):
enough to watch the film and tell us our thoughts,
and we definitely I mean Joe gave us one of
the best edits in the movie, which is the gag
where Son's drinking the juice and then you cut to
them seeing the stain on this shirt. That was a
Joe Swanberg note. Like we had a whole sequence where
they just filled it and Joe was like, well, that's
the obvious cut, and we're like it's so good, and
(24:52):
it's the best cut.
Speaker 7 (24:53):
Also, yeah, if you have someone like Joe Swanberg telling
you that, like you just need to pick up the
edit at the back half, you're like, oh man, this
guy makes the kind of slow movies that we really
really like.
Speaker 8 (25:03):
So if he's saying pick it up, like, you got
to take that note.
Speaker 6 (25:07):
Not to nerd out, but what did you cut on Chris?
Speaker 7 (25:10):
We did Premiere and Rob actually did the initial cut.
I was actually kind of really burnt out at that point,
and so Rob did the first assembly and then I
laid everything got in a row.
Speaker 8 (25:21):
It was there and it was very helpful.
Speaker 7 (25:23):
But so we used Premiere Pro and I guess the
nerdiest thing to say about it is Premiere has a
feature that a lot of people don't talk about, called production,
and so it works in a way where it's more
like how an Avid project would be. Were like, it
just really simplifies and organizes the project so that you're
not opening up like one hundred sequences. Every time you
(25:44):
open up a project, you're opening up one sequence and
then it's all referencing back to a master project. So
that's my nerdy thing is Premiere And then like I
love the productions for a narrative.
Speaker 6 (25:55):
Tell me a little bit more about the post process,
especially around the music. Tell me more about how the
soundtrack came together.
Speaker 1 (26:01):
So I wrote in the movie or in the script,
I was listening Analogy Bloom, which is the band with
the song that plays in the van, and then again
at the end, I was listening to their album a lot,
and I like reached out to them and I was like, hey,
I'm writing a movie and I love your music. Can
I use the song? And They're like sure, which is wild.
So that one was kind of on board. I think
(26:22):
that might have been a bit of a tone setter
because from that point on, like Chris pulled a bunch
of well, you had a bunch of friends. I mean,
you love Bouurgeois philth that's a band that's in there,
And what are some of your friend's bands? Chris like, sorry,
I can never. I mean our friends Fireworks is a
great band that we know, so they gave us access
to music. You know, they're really good friends of mine
and my friend Masha Mirchai. She has that opening song
(26:48):
with a reverence getting out of prison, that open sequence,
and that that film. I even told Masha this, like
that was one of the songs I was listening when
I was writing, and it kind of set a tone
when I did the first pass of like laying out
the edit in my head for like the pace because
that song, I don't know what it means, Tomasha, but
it very much reminds me of like a funeral march.
(27:09):
It's like finding that song set a pace where I
was like when I was laying out the first pass,
and I think some of that that pacing stayed in there.
Every time I thought I should cut, I'd be like,
what if it's just a little bit longer, you know
what I mean? And I don't know if that pace
landed in the film, but I think that idea stuck
with me and Chris of like what if it is
a little bit longer, what if it stays with us
a little bit longer? And that was also on set
(27:30):
a bit of that as well, But no Chris talk
about some of the music he brought to the table.
Speaker 7 (27:35):
The mixtape minus Algae Bloom, I think is mostly music
I actually listened to in middle school in high school,
and so like my friend's band, the same Fate is
in there. And then like Rob mentioned unknown, Chris from
fireworks since he was maybe in middle school. The song
that they're skating to is just like one of my
favorite bands from when I was in middle school, like
(27:57):
a local Michigan punk sky band, and so a lot
of it is just like music that Robin I really
really like, and like I was kind of excited. It's
like middle school in me is very excited to get
to use like a ska punk band from Berkeley, Michigan.
Speaker 8 (28:12):
You know.
Speaker 1 (28:12):
In a narrative feature, I will also say too, there
was a funny moment where and one of the songs
got taken off because of sony music. But it was
one point where we had two far more successful directors
than ourselves on the soundtrack. So our buddy Andrews met
a great, amazing sound designer, a great guy, and sat
pe'sp worked with Lucky McKey forever, and we have Lucky's
(28:33):
band on the soundtrack. They're called Uglodar. They're great. And
Andrews like, you should ask Lucky for some music. And
Andrew asked him, and he gave us some stuff and
it's a fucking great album. Google Diar, everybody check out Uguladar.
But like, yeah, so he gave us one and then
our buddy Adam Raymyer. He just did that film Dinner
America and Snack Chatty. She's a Michigan dude. He's actually
shooting his new movie, which I don't know if I'm
allowed to talk about. But he had this great song
(28:54):
Watermelon from Dinner America that we had on the soundtrack,
but like when we put it in it and by
the time we were putting the movie out, he's like, man,
I don't own it anymore. So we had to swapped
that one out. But the other thenue where we had
much more successful directors that I thought the.
Speaker 7 (29:08):
Soundtrack, which is a lesson of just get the contract
signed right away, even if it is like it wasn't
Adam like it was a handshake deal. He was good
to his word, and it was before that movie had
like its big resurgence and that like song went up
really really huge on like Spotify.
Speaker 8 (29:24):
It was out of his hands, but had we.
Speaker 7 (29:26):
As soon as like he was like, yeah, totally use it,
Like we're like okay, and here's an email of the
paperwork sign that it would be a different story.
Speaker 8 (29:33):
But that's just I guess it sucks.
Speaker 7 (29:36):
But even if they really want to do it, you
still have to get the paperwork signed.
Speaker 6 (29:41):
You talked about sending this off, getting those bits of
feedback and everything, all the notes. When do you actually
get to see this with a audience.
Speaker 1 (29:50):
Our buddy Julian and his father Carlos put together a
test screening, probably like a two months before lock cut,
not even They got us like the small room at
the Imagine in Birmingham and we had about twenty people
come out and we just listened to feedback and that
was really great. Chris unfortunately was stuck kind of commercial job,
(30:10):
so you didn't get to go to that, which sucks,
but it was really great and I think we got
a couple of notes out of that. I don't remember
what they were, but we had a few pretty good
thoughts out of that. And actually the craziest thing was
out of that process we were able to introduce one
of our investors and Julian to our friend Josh Mallerman,
and we ended up doing a documentary with him that's
(30:30):
going to be premiering at a festival soon because of
that night, because we did that note session, so it
was like, oh, this is another new project. I know.
We definitely got some great feedback out of that, and
then I think we watched it a lot with our
producer Bill Sturtz. He was very helpful of the post
notes in process. He was like super fucking healthfully great ideas.
He was around for some of the earlier passes. What else,
(30:51):
Chris Well.
Speaker 7 (30:53):
Then we premiered at the Charlotte Film Festival, which is
like a really great film festival, and it's in a
recently updated art house theater, so I mean like projection
and seating and sound was like actually one of the
best places. I think it sounded amazing and it looked amazing,
and it actually hasn't looked or sounded as good since then.
(31:15):
But so that was kind of our first experience having
it in front of an audience of people who didn't
know us at all, which is maybe one of the
more nerve wracking things because getting friends and family feedback
is like one thing because it's a lot of other
filmmakers and you're able to make changes from that. Like
people who don't know you, though they could walk out
(31:35):
during they could just you know, ask you some of
the gnarliest questions, like why do you think you could
make this movie? But no one did but you just
always have that in the back of your head. So
that's kind of the most nerve wracking thing, I think
is playing it in a different stay with no one
you know in the theater.
Speaker 1 (31:53):
Then Charlotte. Also, there was one dude to the audience
who asked us a question that we was something we
really wanted to come across, very subtle performance, and he
was like, is this what you were doing with that?
And I was like, yes. It felt so good that
he got that. I was like, we did a thing
that's really fucking hard to do and someone got it,
because like a lot of times, I think when you
talk with filmmakers about intent that they can see it
(32:14):
and not the audience can. So I was really proud
to like get past that hurdle and have somebody like
recognize a very intense like moment and of intent and
be like, yeah, that's awesome.
Speaker 6 (32:25):
I don't usually praise the poster art for films when
I talk about the filmmakers, but the poster art with
the bullets so beautiful, absolutely stunning and such an eye
catching image.
Speaker 7 (32:38):
I was in a filmmaker group on Facebook for one
of the festivals that a short of Arts had played
back and someone else just posted the question like, hey,
I need art any recommendations, And so I looked at
kind of followed that thread and you know, found his
website and he actually did the Dinner in America artwork
and oh Jeeves full Circle. He did twenty four exposures
(33:01):
to Joe Swanberg posters, so just like two things that
I really liked, and then we sent him the movie.
He really dug it and like pitched us so many
ideas and it was hard to narrow down. But you know,
we came down to that one and it was I
don't know, he was ridiculously fast, had so many different ideas.
(33:23):
It was just a great experience to do that. And
also he had a pre existing relationship with our distributor, so.
Speaker 8 (33:29):
That made it even easier.
Speaker 1 (33:31):
Yeah, he actually made us two posters and we went
with our favorite. But Chris Davidson is his name, and
everybody who's doing any film should reach out to Chris
David's to the Robot I because he worked with our
budget and he did amazing work. He really gave a shit.
You could tell he really poured himself into it, and
he's like an honest to God, like true artist. His
process was great. He gave us so many options to
(33:51):
pick from before he did the finish one. He was
amazing to work with. And yeah, that poster, Like, when
I see it, I get fired up. Actually just found out.
I'm so dumb about my own stuff. But I just
found that there's physical copies you can get from Amazon,
and I was like, oh shit, I gotta get a
blue ray this. This is so cool.
Speaker 6 (34:05):
Well, that kind of answers my next question as to
where can people see this movie?
Speaker 1 (34:09):
As far as I know right now, it's just Amazon
where you can stream it or watch or get the
physical media, or Apple TV Plus And is that it, Chris,
of those the two spots.
Speaker 8 (34:18):
I think Fandango Home and then.
Speaker 7 (34:21):
It's going to kind of like trickle out to just
every other streaming service after that. But I know right
now the two big ones are Amazon Prime and Apple
TV or iTunes, whatever you want to call it.
Speaker 1 (34:35):
It came out on the twenty fourth, available on Amazon
and iTunes.
Speaker 6 (34:40):
And is there a good place for people to keep
up with you guys?
Speaker 1 (34:43):
There's the Sofate's Light Film Instagram if you're curious about
the film. And then Chris kind of runs our company Instagram,
which is just gets super Red on Instagram and if
anybody wants to follow me, I don't ever use social
media outside of promoting new projects. But it's just Rob
Kuzina on Instagram. And also if you're a filmmaker, follow
me on Facebook and message me here whatever. I love
(35:06):
to meet you know, anyone but Michigan filmmakers especially. I
love talking to people and it's probably like my second
full time job is just trying to connect every filmmaker
I meet with people that can help them make stuffs.
Speaker 6 (35:18):
Chris and Rob, thank you so much for your time, guys.
This is great friendly being able to have a proper conversation.
I really appreciate it, and great work on the movie.
Speaker 7 (35:25):
Congratulations, thank you, and thank you very much for like
having us on something like this. It's really hard to
get in front of people in front of eyes, so
I really appreciate you taking the time to chat with us.
Speaker 1 (35:36):
Yeah, I also will say too, like you doing this
with us does lend a lot of your credibility to
us as far as you know, your reputation in the
film world, and we really appreciate that and you taking
the time means a lot to us. Thank you.
Speaker 6 (35:48):
Thanks guys, I really appreciate it. I know it's other
things you'd probably be rather doing on a Monday night, but.
Speaker 1 (35:54):
Yeah, it was great. This is it.
Speaker 6 (35:56):
It was nice connecting.
Speaker 5 (35:57):
So thank you so much, guys.
Speaker 9 (36:12):
See see see see see see see see set.
Speaker 4 (37:06):
Into until in question.
Speaker 2 (37:59):
Estcrash fish.
Speaker 9 (38:08):
Scrap the.
Speaker 10 (40:16):
Name, bring.
Speaker 2 (40:31):
Up it's she
Speaker 4 (43:00):
First school, stood St.
Oh g is, folks, it's show tied. People say good
money to see this movie.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
When they go out to a theater, they want clod
sodas popcorn in No monsters in the Protection.
Speaker 1 (00:16):
Booth, everyone for tend podcasting isn't boring, Don and Off.
(00:43):
We can all be forgiven the monstrous things this bedevil's
world has made us too.
Speaker 3 (00:54):
We can all be forgiven. Oh, I see a terrible
fear of my words.
Speaker 4 (01:06):
At Brodie, you are blessed, You are blessed.
Speaker 5 (01:13):
Why mean, what was so special about me?
Speaker 3 (01:20):
You were born to die for us?
Speaker 6 (01:31):
Hey, folks, welcome to a special episode of The Projection Booth.
I'm your host Mike White. On this episode, I'm talking
with Rob Cusino and Chris Rosick. They are the co
directors of the twenty twenty five film So Fades the Light.
It is out there now available for streaming for purchase.
I highly recommend it. I had a great time talking
with Rob and Chris doing a great job with this
(01:52):
film and all the other stuff of theirs that I've seen.
Hope you enjoyed this interview and definitely check out So
Fades the.
Speaker 1 (01:57):
Light, Rob and Chris.
Speaker 6 (01:59):
I'm super excited to have your board tonight talking about so.
Speaker 1 (02:03):
Face the Light.
Speaker 6 (02:04):
I know you guys not from this movie but from before,
and I'm so curious how do you know each other?
Like how did you two become friends?
Speaker 1 (02:12):
I met Chris at a failed Comedy Central pilot that
I was hired to rent a camera to, and Chris,
I think, was also renting a camera to it, like
after hours after a job that he was at at
the time, and they asked us to operate and I
had literally no idea how to use this camera. I
just saved up enough money as a bar tend to
(02:32):
like buy this camera, and Chris was like the person
who was nice enough to explain to me how to
use it. That's how I remember it. Pretty much.
Speaker 7 (02:39):
Right after that, we have a mutual friend who was
at the bar Rob was working at, and he got
Rob in at a small agency we were working at.
Speaker 8 (02:47):
So Rob was producing.
Speaker 7 (02:50):
Small shoots that I was shooting and directing with the
owners of that company.
Speaker 6 (02:55):
And then how long have you guys been working together?
When was this?
Speaker 7 (02:59):
Oh god, this is like teen years now, I think, Yeah,
we've been doing the code directing for fourteen years. We've
been working together for fifteen years. Because I actually met
Rob like three weeks before my wedding, and so that's
coming on fifteen years, so I can always remember fifteen
years of Rob as well.
Speaker 6 (03:17):
Do you feel like you're as married to Rob as
you are to.
Speaker 8 (03:20):
Your wife fifty percent of the time?
Speaker 6 (03:23):
What's that working relationship? Like, like how do you guys
divvy up the work or how do you work in tandem?
Speaker 1 (03:28):
So I do a lot of the writing and producing.
Chris is the big ideas guy. He'll like throw a
few ideas at me. Then I'll make it into a
script and then he'll go, Okay, what if it's this,
So then I'll play with it, you know. But when
we direct, Chris is far more visual than I am.
I don't think about visuals at all. I'm very spoiled
by working with Chris at this point. Like I basically
focus on talent performance, talking to those folks, and you know,
(03:50):
we work rereally differently. We have been like in out
of set big enough to have like an AD and
like another producer, so like I'll be like coordinating the
crew getting everything set, so I'll kind of be like
AD while I work with and then Chris will be
like working with DP or shooting it himself, depending on
the project. I think Chris does the bulk of the
post production for our company as well. Chris can do
visual effects. It's done color. Sometimes you like to work
(04:11):
with colors.
Speaker 7 (04:12):
But I will say one of the best things about
co directing is you don't have to be one percent
on point because it is a lot of like managing
personalities or like crew members, and it's like there's a
lot more of like making sure everyone's happy. And Rob
is much better with like trolling his emotions on that.
(04:35):
Like there'll be times maybe on set where I'm just like,
nothing's going right, everything's gonna burn.
Speaker 8 (04:40):
Let me go sleep in my car.
Speaker 7 (04:41):
And Rob's good at like steering us back in the
direction so that we actually finish something.
Speaker 1 (04:46):
I have a theory that as long as it's fun
to do it, you'll make something pretty good.
Speaker 6 (04:51):
Is this your first feature together?
Speaker 1 (04:54):
This is our second feature we directed together. We've worked
on a bunch of features of other folks where we've
done various jobs, like The Russian Five. We produced it
as a company. I did a lot of producing or
to Joshua Reel, the director, and Chris got the bulk
of the film our first feature was called Future. It
was kind of us figure out how to make a film.
It's like a bit of an homage to Kevin Smith.
(05:15):
I don't know, it's something I'm proud of because we
made it, but I don't necessarily love that movie anymore.
But I think it's a very important film that we made,
and I think there's really great moments in it. I'm
kind of more harsh on it because I've gotten so
much better at writing since we wrote it, and I
think most of that film come from my writing. So
I'm a little bit more negative about it.
Speaker 6 (05:36):
Well that was only what twenty sixteen, I mean, you know,
just a couple.
Speaker 1 (05:39):
Of years ago.
Speaker 6 (05:40):
Yeah, but I do.
Speaker 1 (05:42):
Think it looks great and I think like it feels great.
There's some great moments, And my little brother was the
lead in that, Josh, and he's a really good actor,
and there's strong performances from other folks in it. So
it's just it's not something I regret. In fact, I
personally think that, like a lot of people get stuck
on the idea that the first thing has to be
so good, right, and I was a little bit stuck
on that. Chris was just kind of like, let's just
(06:03):
make a fucking movie. He like kind of forced us
into making a movie, and so we just did it.
And I learned so much through that process that if
that hadn't been our first movie, like anything else we
did wouldn't have been just going to I learned a
lot about acting and method and I learned so much
from making that because I was so afraid of fucking
it up that I was like, I don't want to
drop the ball, especially because like I had gotten investors
(06:24):
in that film. You know, he raised twenty five thousand
dollars to shoot it, which seemed like an insane amount
of money to shoot a movie with at the time,
you know, for like a dumb idea we made up.
I was like, oh my god, what if we lose
all this money? And we did because making profits on
independent hills isn't near impossible.
Speaker 6 (06:39):
How did so Fate's a Light come about?
Speaker 1 (06:41):
Who had that idea?
Speaker 6 (06:42):
And how did the script kind of start to form itself.
Speaker 7 (06:46):
I had the initial idea of, like, what would it
be like if you were raised in a cult and
you're worshiped as a child and then like the cult's
broken up, you're young enough to where you go to
a foster home, you grow up, Like, what is that
person like fifteen years later, like in their twenties, Like
(07:07):
how did they cope with everything? How do they view religion?
How do they view people? That was the initial thing
I wanted to explore. And then Rob went in on
the script and got a lot of the story beats,
and then Rob can talk a lot more about the
actual cult and the basis for that.
Speaker 1 (07:23):
In twenty twenty, when things got weird, I became obsessed
with studying the strangest right wing shit I could find,
like QAnon and Proud Boys and all that bullshit. So
I started looking into that stuff and learning more about it,
and I noticed consistent rhetoric among hateful people that I
(07:43):
kind of latched onto and like because I wanted to
understand it and be like, how is this working? How
is this working? This is so dumb? How is this working?
So like I lashed onto it. I sought out those
communities and like, study the hell out of them, and
things got even weirder. In twenty twenty one, I started
seeing different cults pop up, and I started learning more
about cults and researching it's As the film developed, it
(08:05):
was like, we knew a couple of base rules about
like things we did want to happen in the way
characters were represented. Right. For instance, something Chris and I
talked a lot about was we wanted the Reverend to
be charismatic and charming and have like those vibes of
like someone who you would be enticed by. Well, he's
(08:26):
saying the worst shit, but it would be so easy
to have him just to hate speech, right, Like, that'd
be so easy and boring, And that's not what these
people do. It's all very coded. It's very like under stated,
but it's all there. There's a subtext of it, like
words like globalist when they mean Jewish people whatever, Like
they use all these code words. It was important to
us that that came through in a way that matched
the tone of these right wing, hateful, piece of shit creators.
(08:48):
So we found that tone and we layered that in.
And another thing that was really important to was our lead, Kylie,
Kylie Lotts. We wanted to find a lead that played
someone who had a history of trauma well but didn't
play it in a way that it sucks whenever I
see films where the main characters had a history of trauma.
It sucks. They're like slumped over. They like, I don't
(09:09):
want to be around that fucking person. I had a
real fucked up childhood. I'm super fun to talk to, Like,
can we find more people like that that are like
funny and like fun So that was the two big
tone setters. I think that helped define the film, and
I think we really focused on in the writing it's funny.
Speaker 6 (09:23):
I got a lot of David Koresh from the Reverend.
Speaker 1 (09:26):
One hundred percent. I think I think honest to God,
Duke just brought a lot of that because it's a
really charming, sweet guy in real life. So I think
he was able to take the best parts of his
personality and like use that to highlight the worst parts.
Reverend A very.
Speaker 7 (09:43):
Important part of the movie in the opening is we
open with like rhetoric and hate speech, and the guy's
saying the most horrible things, and it's like, how can
this guy be likable? And then we cut to the
camera operator who's been recording this whole thing. We see
he's really confused and saddened by all of it, and
then you just see the Reverend like turn it on
to like you're a special boy, we love you and
(10:07):
that's why you're here. So I think that shows really quickly,
like how these people get be sucked into it. A
lot of people are looking to be like, oh, you're
a special boy, and people looking for that, I think,
can get really sucked into some of this gnarly stuff
like far too easily.
Speaker 8 (10:23):
My only thing to add to that.
Speaker 6 (10:25):
Once the script is in a more finalized state, how
do you actually go about producing this movie and getting
all the elements together? I know it's kind of I
always compare independent movies to like going to War, So
how did you.
Speaker 1 (10:37):
Play in the battle?
Speaker 8 (10:38):
Ours?
Speaker 1 (10:39):
Is funny because Okay, so I wrote the first draft
of the script in I think two days, and then
I edited it for three months. We're taking notes from
different people, the smarter people than me that put their
two cents in, and we kept like like playing with
the idea of making the film, but not really committing
to it. And then finally we got to the point
(11:00):
we like, ex send a date. We were just like,
all right, let's go. So we got a bunch of
our friends together that worked in commercials. John Beaver shot
the movies Great DP. We worked all the time in commercials,
you know, Scotia Lighting was a company that we worked with.
They gave us a couple of the guys they came out,
you know, our friend Don Walker, Hen's Vision Bridge Media.
He lent us like some camera equipment. Like basically, like
all of these friends that we had commercials that we've
(11:22):
like given commercial work with, become friendly with, they kind
of just like gave us their time. Our whole crew
for this film was right around ten people for most
of it, and our whole budget for the film was
about sixty two thousand dollars. So we were able to
do that because of all the other work we do
and all the goodwill that we built up. So essentially,
about a week before we're supposed to shoot, Chris and
(11:42):
I started like it was even maybe in Leslie would
have been like four days were supposed to share shooting.
Our production designer Angie like pitched and started making stuff.
We started scouting. She got COVID, so our friend Doug
tagged in and helped her out on set, and then
she came back later and helped us bring the thing home.
But she did a lot of leg work and Doug
(12:03):
was great on set, and then Chris also got COVID
eight days we were supposed to shoot.
Speaker 8 (12:09):
No, it was three weeks.
Speaker 7 (12:10):
So it's interesting because, yeah, I remember we had a
production meeting and I went and skated before work, and
then I was about to come into work and I
was the first one there, and before I went to
the door.
Speaker 8 (12:20):
I just had like a weird panic.
Speaker 7 (12:21):
I was like, oh, I think I'm sick, and so
like before going around to anyone else, Like, I went home,
took a test. My wife knows I'm a little bit
of a hypochondriac, so she was like blowing it off,
like it'll be fine, you just go to work, and
then like she took the test and like two minutes
later she's like, yeah, go get another test, like it's positive. So,
which is a crazy thing to be in isolation three
(12:44):
weeks before your movie with nothing but like time and
a shot list and a shot designing program and the script.
Just like became a little bit of an insane person.
Once I was able to talk to people again. In
those four days, it was a lot of like these ideas,
all these ideas, all these ideas, So it was probably
a little bit annoying to people as well.
Speaker 1 (13:04):
Yeah, he was like Charlie it's always sunny with like
the fucking pin board and the strings walked away in
a room without his sense of taste. So Chris got
that done and then we popped out. We just started shooting.
I think, like what a week after you were out
of quarantine, not even yeah, but yeah, it was. It
was pretty wild and we just kind of fat it together,
like it was a bunch of weird shit that just
(13:25):
kind of worked out. Like my friend Scott, he plays
the biker singer in the movie, the guy, the big
guy who singing at the beginning of the movie with
the great voice. He just went to this weird like
church camp when he was younger. So we had a
compound that existed that looked like that. Like we didn't
have to do much to it, you know. The cast
was all our friends. We'd been casting it on and
off for a little while before, about two months before
(13:47):
we started looking for people, right, we just already had
all the pieces around us, like Tony the Skater was
our friend Lou that would hang out there great. And
then Kylie I met through the music scene and through
friends of my wife, so and they're great. And Ailie
introduced this to Anika. Anika was a singer of a
punk band that Chris really liked, and I really loved
her folky stuff and she's great. It all kind of
(14:07):
worked out, and Duke was a guy we knew from
advertising and he's great. It just kind of worked and
then everybody kind of pitched in to fill in the blanks.
Like I said, our whole crew was like ten people,
and it was a very ambitious film. When I say that,
plus the scale and the budget, it was like, we
just got lucky. My friend Tom Way Cities, who's like
the best location guy I ever worked with. He just
helped us find substitute locations. Our buddy Julian, who was
(14:29):
like an associate producer on it, hit so many jobs.
He was helping us scheduling, and he was doing second
ac work and he was shooting some stuff. It was
just everybody just did everything.
Speaker 6 (14:38):
Higley is amazing and I'm so glad that you found
them because performance they give is just phenomenal. And like
I always say, when it comes to independent film, it
lives and dies by those performances, because you can have
the best looking thing in the world, but if your
lead actor or actress is clunky, and Kylie is the
opposite of clunky. In fact, I think straight down the lay,
(15:00):
there are so many good performances, thank you.
Speaker 4 (15:03):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (15:03):
And I do think like so much of what this
film is rested completely on Kylie, because so much of
this film is just living with this person, and that
person needs to be so dynamic and not be you know,
some doll sad sack, which is like, again, something we
talked a lot about. Not that I mean whatever. I'm
not judge people are depressed. I'm just saying, like, as
someone who experiences depression, I'm not one note and I
(15:25):
think I find that a lot of times in film,
this is a person who's like got like shooting fun
things in their van and they like have a little
life and they're doing all these things. Like it was
a fully fleshed out character, and a lot of it
came from I mean, Kylie. We met with a lot
before the film. We talked to Kylie. I'm many guests,
like thirty or forty times about like tone and character.
And another thing we did prior to shooting was we
(15:47):
did a table read with all of the talent, and
in that read, we would go scene by scene. At
the end of each scene, I go, how did that feel?
Would you say that? Because a lot of these people
were first time actors or non actors too, and I
would just have to rewrite the script in their own words,
and it was great, Like a god of what is
the sci fi writer's name that Lou brought to the table,
(16:07):
it's they reference it in the skater scene. But that
was that bit where like Lou talks to Tony but yeah, yeah,
So I didn't know who Actavit Butler was until Lou
brought Actavia Butler up to me. So like that bit
where they're talking, that was a bit I wrote around
as I lay dying with Focner. So the whole scene
was supposed to be out a Faucner reference of like
(16:28):
going home this long road home, and Lou is like,
have you read Actavia Butler? And they gave me this
like reference and that works so much better because it's
something Lou connected with. And by the way, Luke came
so prepared, Chris, that was the first time Lo's ever
been in a film, and they were great. We just
got lucky.
Speaker 6 (16:45):
I do have to ask, because you have some non
binary people in here, You've got your main character su Wen,
but can also be heard as as oh, and I mean,
how much was gender factor when you were writing this?
Speaker 1 (16:59):
When I was right, it was very little. Once we
started casting it, I became very cognizant of it in
the writing. The funny thing about Sun is I based
a lot of the cult off of an actual existing cult,
which I don't know if I can say it, just
in case they're litigious, but like, the names came from
real people in that cult. So that was where it
was like the reverend had a name and the lawyer
(17:21):
was like, absolutely not, don't do.
Speaker 8 (17:22):
That, so that went away.
Speaker 1 (17:24):
But yeah, no, I became very cognizant of it in
the process, Like casting Lou made that scene. Even kyl
that was talking about how that scene felt like a
little bit of like a crush then, and it was
this fun new element and I hadn't thought of any
of that stuff until I had watched the actors interact.
Then I became very cognizant of it, and I think
Chris and I really adapted to Like I said, we
really tried to adapt it to their voices. And I
(17:45):
always knew that I wanted everyone that Son encounters to
be someone that would be othered by or rejected by
the people in the cult. So that way Son could
meet these folks and have a positive interactions with them,
because in a way, it's like you're seeing, you know
what ripening in America has put on this person, and
you're seeing them interact with these folks in real life.
(18:06):
And Sun doesn't have those like preconceived notions that they
were raised with, but like you're seeing them interact with
these people in real life, and you're seeing the kindness
that comes from these communities. And even though a lot
of these folks, like the couple at the campfire, have
been rejected by or like damaged by these communities, they
don't shy away from meeting new people. And in fact,
Anika is like, I'm done apologizing for the way I've
(18:28):
been treated. I'm not going to apologize for that. I'm
my own person. We found our own world outside of
the world that's been they rejected the world, they didn't
get rejected by it. And that was like kind of
seeing Sun being welcomed by those people. It meant a
lot to me, and I think it meant a lot
to the actors.
Speaker 6 (18:44):
Tell me a little bit more about the shoot. I
mean other than Chris getting COVID any major stumbling blocks Otherwise.
Speaker 7 (18:50):
There's a van in the movie that didn't run eighty
percent of the time, which is actually funny because we
bought a VW Bus US a month before that. The
day before the shoot stopped running, so we actually happened
to find the van from our friend Jeff, who was
just his secondary car. So yeah, having like a road
(19:14):
trip movie that the van kept breaking down was a
bit of a hassle. I mean it broke down since
you're from Michigan, like in Frank and Mooth when we
were trying to go to Bay City, so it broke
down about an hour and a half away from us,
in maybe like forty minutes away from where we were
trying to get.
Speaker 1 (19:33):
Other than that, though, the production wasn't really like fraught
with a lot of problems. I mean it was exhausting,
right because I was doing like the next day schedule
and the call sheets with Julian and Nyat, who were
both in the movie. They were both helping against as well.
It's like coordinating and stuff. But you know, it wasn't, uh,
it was exhausting, but like it wasn't a miserable experience
pity means like a lot of times I think it
(19:55):
can be, and I think a lot of indie films
get into that trap of like oh this is so hard,
this is hard. But like it was fucking fun, you know,
like we're making a movie and we're doing something cool.
I mean, there was some challenges as far as like
I had to drive to Atlanta to get the fake
guns because they wouldn't ship them, so like I literally
drove to a prop house in Atlanta, like well I think
two days before we shot and cut the guns and
(20:16):
brought them back and I had drive them back afterwards.
But me and my wife turned into like a little
mini vacation. We hung out in Atlanta for a day.
It was fun. But you know, none of the guns
on sat were like ever real guns by the way,
So like we did safety meetings, but we didn't really
need nothing like rubber or plastic or corked, so like
there was never an opportunity for them to be dangerous,
but we still have to treat them like they were
(20:36):
because we didn't want to be disrespectful of like shit
that happened with rust and stuff like that. So like
we still had to take them very seriously. And then
that was I guess the struggle for me, because doing
anything serious is a bit of a tough th for me.
But we just got really lucky. We had great locations.
You know, we used young Up Donuts. I don't know
if you ever been there downriver. That's not Chris and
the order like met me once and just handed me
(20:57):
the keys. He's like, yeah, I just lock it up
when you're done. You can stay overnight like cool. And
then you know we had the compound, which is great.
You know, we shot Autumn's houses. I'm looking at it
right now from my window. It's my in law's house.
They are my neighbors now I've moved into the house
next door since we shot the film. It was a
lot of the leveraging relationships we had. And you know
(21:18):
Ray Rivard, who is our steady cam op. He came
out for like next to nothing and fucking just would
hang out all day, Like he'd wrap his steady cam
shit and he'dn't be like what else can I do?
And he'd like set his rig down. And this guy
does this at for like huge budget commercials and he
was just like on board. People just like really committed
like John Luca committed, and Jake RG and e guys.
They were just everybody's like a huge part of the
(21:38):
team and it was a great experience.
Speaker 6 (21:40):
When did you actually shoot this and how long was
the shoot?
Speaker 7 (21:43):
It's probably about three years ago was the initial shoot.
We shot it actually in three parts. We shot a
big chunk of the movie with like full casting crew,
and we knew there was just like smaller parts that
we could get, like just Rob and Die and like
Julian who was producing with us, and then Dug our
(22:04):
props person and an audio person. We also shot very
like weird hours just because everyone was doing favors. There
was like a diner scene in the movie, and we
shot for four hours and then you know, we wrapped,
and Rob and I worked on getting the next day
shoot ready, and like we didn't really go over ten hours,
so I think.
Speaker 1 (22:23):
I think it was only one day we even hit
ten hours.
Speaker 7 (22:25):
Yeah, so it's probably like a three week shoot. And
then just like pick up days where Robin I would
go and shoot out the car window to get scenery
or blue Kylie into town and shot like like van
breakdown scene and like just little flavor stuff like them
going to the laundrymat and small stuff like that.
Speaker 1 (22:44):
I think we shot the last day on my fortieth birthday,
but we did, which.
Speaker 7 (22:48):
Also is good because we would see stuff in the
edit where we were missing it. So our ability to
like have a cut and then show it to people
and people would be like, oh, this goes by too
fast or I feel like, you know, like base it
out like this, and then we had the ability to
just like grab gear and go and shoot that stuff,
cut it in, show it to more people again and
(23:09):
they would say like, oh, So it was actually very
helpful that we could work as a very small crew
after having like big crew, because I think having the
like the our bigger crew really gave like a high
quality look to the movie. And then we were able
to like sneak in some smaller stuff and it kind
(23:31):
of like seats in there being helped by the larger
stuff we did.
Speaker 6 (23:37):
And it probably helps that you're the editor as well.
Speaker 1 (23:40):
Yeah, the editor.
Speaker 7 (23:41):
And also in working with commercial you do learn how
to check your ego at the door, because no matter
if Rob and I are directing and editing the commercial,
it's always for the client in the end. We don't
get offended if someone comes back and this part's way
too slow or this part makes no sense, instead of
all there's stupid, they don't know what they're talking about.
(24:01):
Why would they say that, and then kind of readjusting
and then like sending it out to another person to
see what they say, and then back to that person,
Yeah your name.
Speaker 1 (24:11):
Yeah. We had a lot of awesome people give us
notes on the edit to like Jen Wexler, who's like
a director we look up to. She gave us some
great notes, and Joe Swanberg actually watched it and gave
us some great notes. And we were very lucky just
by reaching out to some folks that we've you know,
had like interactions with that where they were like invested
(24:32):
enough to watch the film and tell us our thoughts,
and we definitely I mean Joe gave us one of
the best edits in the movie, which is the gag
where Son's drinking the juice and then you cut to
them seeing the stain on this shirt. That was a
Joe Swanberg note. Like we had a whole sequence where
they just filled it and Joe was like, well, that's
the obvious cut, and we're like it's so good, and
(24:52):
it's the best cut.
Speaker 7 (24:53):
Also, yeah, if you have someone like Joe Swanberg telling
you that, like you just need to pick up the
edit at the back half, you're like, oh man, this
guy makes the kind of slow movies that we really
really like.
Speaker 8 (25:03):
So if he's saying pick it up, like, you got
to take that note.
Speaker 6 (25:07):
Not to nerd out, but what did you cut on Chris?
Speaker 7 (25:10):
We did Premiere and Rob actually did the initial cut.
I was actually kind of really burnt out at that point,
and so Rob did the first assembly and then I
laid everything got in a row.
Speaker 8 (25:21):
It was there and it was very helpful.
Speaker 7 (25:23):
But so we used Premiere Pro and I guess the
nerdiest thing to say about it is Premiere has a
feature that a lot of people don't talk about, called production,
and so it works in a way where it's more
like how an Avid project would be. Were like, it
just really simplifies and organizes the project so that you're
not opening up like one hundred sequences. Every time you
(25:44):
open up a project, you're opening up one sequence and
then it's all referencing back to a master project. So
that's my nerdy thing is Premiere And then like I
love the productions for a narrative.
Speaker 6 (25:55):
Tell me a little bit more about the post process,
especially around the music. Tell me more about how the
soundtrack came together.
Speaker 1 (26:01):
So I wrote in the movie or in the script,
I was listening Analogy Bloom, which is the band with
the song that plays in the van, and then again
at the end, I was listening to their album a lot,
and I like reached out to them and I was like, hey,
I'm writing a movie and I love your music. Can
I use the song? And They're like sure, which is wild.
So that one was kind of on board. I think
(26:22):
that might have been a bit of a tone setter
because from that point on, like Chris pulled a bunch
of well, you had a bunch of friends. I mean,
you love Bouurgeois philth that's a band that's in there,
And what are some of your friend's bands? Chris like, sorry,
I can never. I mean our friends Fireworks is a
great band that we know, so they gave us access
to music. You know, they're really good friends of mine
and my friend Masha Mirchai. She has that opening song
(26:48):
with a reverence getting out of prison, that open sequence,
and that that film. I even told Masha this, like
that was one of the songs I was listening when
I was writing, and it kind of set a tone
when I did the first pass of like laying out
the edit in my head for like the pace because
that song, I don't know what it means, Tomasha, but
it very much reminds me of like a funeral march.
(27:09):
It's like finding that song set a pace where I
was like when I was laying out the first pass,
and I think some of that that pacing stayed in there.
Every time I thought I should cut, I'd be like,
what if it's just a little bit longer, you know
what I mean? And I don't know if that pace
landed in the film, but I think that idea stuck
with me and Chris of like what if it is
a little bit longer, what if it stays with us
a little bit longer? And that was also on set
(27:30):
a bit of that as well, But no Chris talk
about some of the music he brought to the table.
Speaker 7 (27:35):
The mixtape minus Algae Bloom, I think is mostly music
I actually listened to in middle school in high school,
and so like my friend's band, the same Fate is
in there. And then like Rob mentioned unknown, Chris from
fireworks since he was maybe in middle school. The song
that they're skating to is just like one of my
favorite bands from when I was in middle school, like
(27:57):
a local Michigan punk sky band, and so a lot
of it is just like music that Robin I really
really like, and like I was kind of excited. It's
like middle school in me is very excited to get
to use like a ska punk band from Berkeley, Michigan.
Speaker 8 (28:12):
You know.
Speaker 1 (28:12):
In a narrative feature, I will also say too, there
was a funny moment where and one of the songs
got taken off because of sony music. But it was
one point where we had two far more successful directors
than ourselves on the soundtrack. So our buddy Andrews met
a great, amazing sound designer, a great guy, and sat
pe'sp worked with Lucky McKey forever, and we have Lucky's
(28:33):
band on the soundtrack. They're called Uglodar. They're great. And
Andrews like, you should ask Lucky for some music. And
Andrew asked him, and he gave us some stuff and
it's a fucking great album. Google Diar, everybody check out Uguladar.
But like, yeah, so he gave us one and then
our buddy Adam Raymyer. He just did that film Dinner
America and Snack Chatty. She's a Michigan dude. He's actually
shooting his new movie, which I don't know if I'm
allowed to talk about. But he had this great song
(28:54):
Watermelon from Dinner America that we had on the soundtrack,
but like when we put it in it and by
the time we were putting the movie out, he's like, man,
I don't own it anymore. So we had to swapped
that one out. But the other thenue where we had
much more successful directors that I thought the.
Speaker 7 (29:08):
Soundtrack, which is a lesson of just get the contract
signed right away, even if it is like it wasn't
Adam like it was a handshake deal. He was good
to his word, and it was before that movie had
like its big resurgence and that like song went up
really really huge on like Spotify.
Speaker 8 (29:24):
It was out of his hands, but had we.
Speaker 7 (29:26):
As soon as like he was like, yeah, totally use it,
Like we're like okay, and here's an email of the
paperwork sign that it would be a different story.
Speaker 8 (29:33):
But that's just I guess it sucks.
Speaker 7 (29:36):
But even if they really want to do it, you
still have to get the paperwork signed.
Speaker 6 (29:41):
You talked about sending this off, getting those bits of
feedback and everything, all the notes. When do you actually
get to see this with a audience.
Speaker 1 (29:50):
Our buddy Julian and his father Carlos put together a
test screening, probably like a two months before lock cut,
not even They got us like the small room at
the Imagine in Birmingham and we had about twenty people
come out and we just listened to feedback and that
was really great. Chris unfortunately was stuck kind of commercial job,
(30:10):
so you didn't get to go to that, which sucks,
but it was really great and I think we got
a couple of notes out of that. I don't remember
what they were, but we had a few pretty good
thoughts out of that. And actually the craziest thing was
out of that process we were able to introduce one
of our investors and Julian to our friend Josh Mallerman,
and we ended up doing a documentary with him that's
(30:30):
going to be premiering at a festival soon because of
that night, because we did that note session, so it
was like, oh, this is another new project. I know.
We definitely got some great feedback out of that, and
then I think we watched it a lot with our
producer Bill Sturtz. He was very helpful of the post
notes in process. He was like super fucking healthfully great ideas.
He was around for some of the earlier passes. What else,
(30:51):
Chris Well.
Speaker 7 (30:53):
Then we premiered at the Charlotte Film Festival, which is
like a really great film festival, and it's in a
recently updated art house theater, so I mean like projection
and seating and sound was like actually one of the
best places. I think it sounded amazing and it looked amazing,
and it actually hasn't looked or sounded as good since then.
(31:15):
But so that was kind of our first experience having
it in front of an audience of people who didn't
know us at all, which is maybe one of the
more nerve wracking things because getting friends and family feedback
is like one thing because it's a lot of other
filmmakers and you're able to make changes from that. Like
people who don't know you, though they could walk out
(31:35):
during they could just you know, ask you some of
the gnarliest questions, like why do you think you could
make this movie? But no one did but you just
always have that in the back of your head. So
that's kind of the most nerve wracking thing, I think
is playing it in a different stay with no one
you know in the theater.
Speaker 1 (31:53):
Then Charlotte. Also, there was one dude to the audience
who asked us a question that we was something we
really wanted to come across, very subtle performance, and he
was like, is this what you were doing with that?
And I was like, yes. It felt so good that
he got that. I was like, we did a thing
that's really fucking hard to do and someone got it,
because like a lot of times, I think when you
talk with filmmakers about intent that they can see it
(32:14):
and not the audience can. So I was really proud
to like get past that hurdle and have somebody like
recognize a very intense like moment and of intent and
be like, yeah, that's awesome.
Speaker 6 (32:25):
I don't usually praise the poster art for films when
I talk about the filmmakers, but the poster art with
the bullets so beautiful, absolutely stunning and such an eye
catching image.
Speaker 7 (32:38):
I was in a filmmaker group on Facebook for one
of the festivals that a short of Arts had played
back and someone else just posted the question like, hey,
I need art any recommendations, And so I looked at
kind of followed that thread and you know, found his
website and he actually did the Dinner in America artwork
and oh Jeeves full Circle. He did twenty four exposures
(33:01):
to Joe Swanberg posters, so just like two things that
I really liked, and then we sent him the movie.
He really dug it and like pitched us so many
ideas and it was hard to narrow down. But you know,
we came down to that one and it was I
don't know, he was ridiculously fast, had so many different ideas.
(33:23):
It was just a great experience to do that. And
also he had a pre existing relationship with our distributor, so.
Speaker 8 (33:29):
That made it even easier.
Speaker 1 (33:31):
Yeah, he actually made us two posters and we went
with our favorite. But Chris Davidson is his name, and
everybody who's doing any film should reach out to Chris
David's to the Robot I because he worked with our
budget and he did amazing work. He really gave a shit.
You could tell he really poured himself into it, and
he's like an honest to God, like true artist. His
process was great. He gave us so many options to
(33:51):
pick from before he did the finish one. He was
amazing to work with. And yeah, that poster, Like, when
I see it, I get fired up. Actually just found out.
I'm so dumb about my own stuff. But I just
found that there's physical copies you can get from Amazon,
and I was like, oh shit, I gotta get a
blue ray this. This is so cool.
Speaker 6 (34:05):
Well, that kind of answers my next question as to
where can people see this movie?
Speaker 1 (34:09):
As far as I know right now, it's just Amazon
where you can stream it or watch or get the
physical media, or Apple TV Plus And is that it, Chris,
of those the two spots.
Speaker 8 (34:18):
I think Fandango Home and then.
Speaker 7 (34:21):
It's going to kind of like trickle out to just
every other streaming service after that. But I know right
now the two big ones are Amazon Prime and Apple
TV or iTunes, whatever you want to call it.
Speaker 1 (34:35):
It came out on the twenty fourth, available on Amazon
and iTunes.
Speaker 6 (34:40):
And is there a good place for people to keep
up with you guys?
Speaker 1 (34:43):
There's the Sofate's Light Film Instagram if you're curious about
the film. And then Chris kind of runs our company Instagram,
which is just gets super Red on Instagram and if
anybody wants to follow me, I don't ever use social
media outside of promoting new projects. But it's just Rob
Kuzina on Instagram. And also if you're a filmmaker, follow
me on Facebook and message me here whatever. I love
(35:06):
to meet you know, anyone but Michigan filmmakers especially. I
love talking to people and it's probably like my second
full time job is just trying to connect every filmmaker
I meet with people that can help them make stuffs.
Speaker 6 (35:18):
Chris and Rob, thank you so much for your time, guys.
This is great friendly being able to have a proper conversation.
I really appreciate it, and great work on the movie.
Speaker 7 (35:25):
Congratulations, thank you, and thank you very much for like
having us on something like this. It's really hard to
get in front of people in front of eyes, so
I really appreciate you taking the time to chat with us.
Speaker 1 (35:36):
Yeah, I also will say too, like you doing this
with us does lend a lot of your credibility to
us as far as you know, your reputation in the
film world, and we really appreciate that and you taking
the time means a lot to us. Thank you.
Speaker 6 (35:48):
Thanks guys, I really appreciate it. I know it's other
things you'd probably be rather doing on a Monday night, but.
Speaker 1 (35:54):
Yeah, it was great. This is it.
Speaker 6 (35:56):
It was nice connecting.
Speaker 5 (35:57):
So thank you so much, guys.
Speaker 9 (36:12):
See see see see see see see see set.
Speaker 4 (37:06):
Into until in question.
Speaker 2 (37:59):
Estcrash fish.
Speaker 9 (38:08):
Scrap the.
Speaker 10 (40:16):
Name, bring.
Speaker 2 (40:31):
Up it's she
Speaker 4 (43:00):
First school, stood St.
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