Anareta

A woman walks across a ravaged, post apocalyptic, infected wasteland in search of the final remnants of civilization

Daniel Boocock – producer, writer, director

cast
Jessica Olim – Enola
Kevin Glynn
Dan Boie Kratfeldt
Nicola Cleary
Emma Wilkinson
Fred Carlsen
Mie Gren
Lukas Miklik Stolar
Jacob Skyggebjerg
Dan Gittens
Thea Wilkinson

Anareta

Main Cast
Jessica Olim, Kevin Glynn

One of the main things i wanted to portray with Anareta was to provide a big film feel & visual feast with the imagery. Particularly by using a dystopian / post apocalyptic aesthetic. Whilst underneath those visuals there is the main concept which suggests how would one deal with their own psyche & internal conflicts given all the dangers & risks involved that happen within the world of the story. Do the characters somehow manage to keep a spark of their own semblance no matter what may happen to them? Or do they completely fall apart or slip into destructive behaviour out of fear & desperation? Ultimately it’s up to the viewer to ponder what they themselves may or may not do but hopefully there is a bit of an aftertaste left as the credits roll. It’s definitely not the usual kind of short. It’s an intentional mini odyssey. The cast were very committed as were the majority of the crew. I always try to push the means of what may be possible within the medium & experiment with several different motifs & ways of doing things. Anareta does have a lyrical feel to it. Other times the ante is upped as things become more dramatic.

Shooting was very much touch & go given what was available in terms of time, money, circumstances etc. It was one hell of a tightrope to walk in more ways than one. I was constantly thinking on my feet & having to figure things out & adapt on the fly as so many different things occurred. I learnt a lot. Most of the film was shot in different parts of Wales during winter though some scenes happened elsewhere. Some of those locations were phenomenal in terms of bringing to life what I was aiming to portray. Not just visually but subliminally too. I spread the shoot out over different periods but when the camera was actually rolling things were shot really quickly.

Around the time of the edit I happened to be coincidentally listening some grunge music from the 90’s. Bits of Nirvana, Alice in Chains etc. What I really like about some of that music is the stop start kind of feel to it. You’re hit with these big ferocious inspiring crescendos of sound, sometimes instantly, then a few moments later the brakes can be slammed on so sonically it goes down a level or two, then bang the crescendos come back & hit you again after building you back up. It’s a very effective method of engaging someones attention. Subliminally I was doing a part similar process with the flow of the edit in Anareta. To refine specific parts of the narrative & also enhance different atmospheres that occur throughout. For the actual sound design & scores we avoided standard sounding instrumentals and kept things more dark and atmospheric but not necessarily in a frightening way. More so to refelect the main characters journey & the perils that come with it, along with a tiny flicker of hope which comes around at the very end.

I do think that if an opportunity can be carved out someday then this type of film upscaled could be very effective & successful. Thats certainly the aim in the long run with most of my work. There’s lots of projects I’d love to do. It just comes down to dynamics & what’s possible. Though in the right circles, I believe that this kind of stuff could go right to the top when compared to what is currently being made for the most part at the highest level today.