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Director Gloria Mercer and Actresses Bethany Brown & Tandia Mercedes talk to Fest Track about preparation, collaboration and character development in regards to their genre film "A Safe Distance" playing the Septentrion Shadows section of the 2026 Fantasia Film Festival in Montreal, Quebec.

#ASafeDistance #FilmMaking #IndieFilm #FantasiaFest
Transcript
00:25I want to lead in because Gloria was she was so
00:29conscious and so aware and she had so many references so we had a month leading up to
00:35and she had movie references and you know just just things so she did have these anchor points
00:41so go ahead glow now as you nail like yeah well you just dine horn
00:49you oh stop um it's yeah i think it's like this funny combination of which i'm still like trying
00:55to get the hang of but like of you go in with a lot i like to be very prepped
01:01so like for example
01:02with the cinematographer like we talked a ton about how like the color treatment of the film
01:06because he was very he did a very involved like film emulation technique so we talked about how
01:10that would reflect the different moods throughout the film and how they like they're all sort of
01:14going on these journeys um and we and i tried to be really prepared probably in a different way
01:21from altman because i i just watched thieves like us and it feels like the camera is so improvisational
01:25at times and he's just very like following so he'll like just follow performance with with his
01:31camera it feels like um though i don't know the inner workings but yeah so we like we went in
01:36and we had a like i had shot listed the whole film and had drawn up very mixed quality storyboards
01:43and then we went in with that plan but then also i like to before every scene we would do
01:49probably a
01:51very slow blocking rehearsal where basically i i tried to get these guys to tell me like
01:57oh i want you to hear in here but like what feel like does that the idea behind this is
02:01this and
02:02does that make sense so then they would you know so it's because i try like working with such
02:07professionals pardon my language like such talented people like it's it's just it's the joy of like as
02:15you make more and more films and people come on board and they bring their levels of talent and
02:19expertise is they are just constantly offering you things so i i try to go in with a plan and
02:25really
02:25know what i want but then also constantly we're being surprised by just like these great ideas of
02:30people around you
02:52what do we do now
03:02you know there's so much going on in her and there's so much going on that she's experienced
03:07that we haven't seen uh versus say something that that how bethany was interpreting could you talk
03:12about your interpretation and finding those sort of those points those points of light or points of
03:19darkness if you will within her yeah for sure honestly i think the number one thing that i
03:24liked a lot is the script was honestly really well written so like that helped a lot because
03:31even just sometimes if the writing isn't good you have to really like bring it out of yourself but if
03:38the writing is good and you're just saying the words it kind of just like naturally happens for me
03:43where i just i'm able to feel the feels and and get what's supposed to be off the page which
03:52is
03:52really nice and and like bethany was saying we had a whole essentially a whole month before shooting
03:57which really helped so me and bethany and even cody we would meet up in a coffee shop and go
04:03over
04:03our lines together and we would discuss our feelings in the scene and what we think should happen
04:09um and and even i think on the day like i remember i think we were shooting one of our
04:16intimate scenes
04:17me and bethany and during shooting bethany asked me like what are you feeling like right now as like
04:23the character i tell her and she's like oh i didn't even like i didn't think that so it was
04:28really nice
04:28being able to collaborate with each other and just discuss how we were feeling in the moment and stuff
04:33um and like honestly in the intimacy i think what i told bethany was like as kiana i was just
04:39feeling
04:39love whether or not that was what was intended on the page or not that was what i was kind
04:44of like
04:45making my character like feel in that moment with bethany's character and bethany's like oh okay yeah
04:50like i like she liked that idea and hadn't been like thinking of it in that way yet um but
04:57honestly
04:58just because like this is my first feature film and being able to work with such talented people
05:04once again it's just very very helpful it was an extremely welcoming set and everyone was super fun
05:10and light and i think that ultimately also just helped me a lot be able to bring what kiana is
05:17supposed to be off the page i often do check-ins because i want to anchor in truth like the
05:23truth of
05:23what am i actually feeling right now even if it's not what's written on the page what am i actually
05:26feeling and how do we anchor that back in so we get one truthful moment in each scene um and
05:33yeah
05:33we spend a lot of time doing script breakdown together but not so that we end up going through
05:38the script you know beat by beat plot by plot like we know exactly what each other's going through
05:42but actually more so we can go in opposition so we have opposite objectives and you know we know that
05:48my character is going to go from here to here and kiana's is going to go from here to here
05:52but then we're actually nuanced and and you know having more fun and intricacy
05:56throughout and playful dance throughout i think you kind of talked about that dance piece um and
06:02yeah tandia you were so fun to play with it was
06:21okay uh here this is good enough
06:40there's a thin line between love and hate you know there's between brutality and intimacy and
06:45you know there's within the genre i mean this is a thriller but there's also violence there's love
06:51there's so many different emotions can you talk about finding that balance finding that tonality
06:56not just in the script but on the day because things have to be played at a certain pitch
07:01or brought down brought up i i'm sure you guys have stuff to say on this too i it was
07:05like i mean
07:06it's hard our film in some ways is kind of eluding categorization um like it's playing
07:13fantasia it's a genre film um but in a lot of ways it's a little i don't know it's it's
07:18not
07:18a traditional thriller um i think like working i remember talking to cody a lot because he was
07:24really wanting cody who plays matt in the film um because i find a lot of the time thrillers i
07:32don't
07:32want to dunk on a genre but like you know they cut the like actors come in and they're told
07:39to
07:39like bring these really big sort of emotions right away i i don't i'm not trying to dunk at all
07:46but
07:46it's like you know it's like it's a heightened genre and sometimes so it was fun working with
07:49him in particular because there's so much like male violence in this film at least like you know
07:54at points that we talked a lot about nuance and why he for example would be feeling those things and
08:00and this applies to everybody but i think i it was just what i really wanted to go in
08:05in terms of tone was finding ways to subvert the sort of the way the violence presents itself even
08:11though it's still there and and then like and so like what you know he's not just an angry person
08:17like there is like there are layers to like to to the the male characters the male violence just like
08:22there are layers to the to the women and and i think that there's also like every character sort
08:26of has a secret at different points so i i kind of went in taking huge inspiration from altman just
08:31going like how do we subvert the expectations of this genre and then also and so totally it was a
08:36balance and there were things that emerged from that like for example i thought like the screening
08:40so far there has been a lot of like levity like like response to the levity of the film which
08:46i'm
08:46glad because i when we were cutting it i was like i want this to exist that brings the pressure
08:50off
08:50that takes the pressure off so much so you know well and i think it's just like i i think
08:54the best
08:55dramas and the best thrillers like they have those moments that like cut the tension because that like
09:00because there is tension and then when there's levity it's almost like it's it's almost more so i don't
09:04know so it was yeah it was totally a balance of just like there is this like tension but also
09:09how
09:09can we like hide it so it's there but we don't see it immediately and then how can we kind
09:14of like
09:14dance around it and
09:22so
09:31so
09:31so
09:31so
09:31so
09:31so
09:46because it's exciting for the characters involved too yeah yeah totally and and why would
09:51and alex is smart you know and and why would she fall for something if it wasn't immediate like a
09:56little bit you know hidden in plain sight basically bethany or did you want to did you
10:02want to add to that bethany always likes to add to everything oh there you go okay really to put
10:07you know candles on the cake because gloria is incredible but um gloria really was clear about
10:12the calibration um how hot each scene was going to be or giving us options you know so we could
10:18kind
10:18of increase the heat and decrease the heat but um a lot of times you know as an actor i
10:22think we
10:22like to go to 11 just to show that we can and glow was really clear about okay now let's
10:27try it at a
10:28three and i think what happens when you recalibrate it to a three is the audience gets to feel a
10:33lot of
10:33the feelings that the character didn't fully express i think there's this term of like sometimes your
10:38performance ends up on your shirt um when you give all the big tears and did it right and then
10:43the
10:43audience can just sort of sit back and watch but when you recalibrate to a three the audience is
10:47really pulled in and then they kind of complete the feelings and and glow also left this space
10:53the like okay so now what space because so often in in the genre or other genres i'd say action
11:00you get
11:00bang bang bang bang bang bang and then you're cut into the next scene or like from t i come
11:04from tv and
11:04we we work so quickly and there isn't this like now let's watch a river go by and feel what
11:11we might
11:11feel at the end of that scene um and so i think there is this space like glow saying where
11:17there's
11:17there's levity and there's the audience kind of contemplating or i i talked to one gentleman in an
11:23interview and he was just relating his own lived experience all over the film and i thought it was
11:27so beautiful because it touched him in a way to be reflexive of his own relationships and the complexity
11:32of his own relationships so yeah another i'm just loving it thanks
12:02so
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