director´s comments

Working with this complicated yet catching plot I will keep an atmosphere of anxiety and fear throughout the film without ever really showing the fright factor. The audience should feel tense from the first minute.

I will use suggestion and psychological manipulation to achieve the tense mood, an old and known trick; it is not what the viewers see that makes them tense; it is what they can’;t see. I will push the viewers to the edge by making them imagine what is happening.

At the beginning of the film, before the girl dies, we see more people, different locations and stronger colours. After she dies, the colours become subtle, sets will be decorated sparingly, and streets are empty in order to awaken the feeling of the main character’;s loneliness and isolation.

Cinematographically, we intend to work with strong contrasts and gloomy daylight, keeping away from such clichés as keeping everything dark. The main purpose for the camera is to tell the story. I will use long controlled takes and takes with breathing motion to create suspense as if the camera is one of the characters. Handheld cameras will be used to increase the tension of action scenes.

Inherent in the script, ?She’;s Not There’; is a wide range of moods. The music score will support the film’;s thrilling sequences and melancholic moments. Brass and piano will be the main instruments and orchestrated strings will be used to awaken feelings of sadness and suspense.

The quality of acting is the key to the believability of all films. Therefore my main focus during the pre-production will be to rehearse the actors, especially the actors playing the inmates of the nursing home. In order to get them into the daily life of mentally disturbed people, I will do research with the actors at a nursing home. I want to use a person with Down’;s syndrome for that part to create the right ambience for the nursing home.