I Think We’re Alone Now: A Sci-Fi Tale

By Christine Westwood

Beautiful, strong and super-talented, Reed Morano may be the new Wonder Woman of filmmaking. Her credits include an Emmy for directing hit drama The Handmaid’s Tale, and a string of cinematography achievements including The Skeleton Twins, Kill Your Darlings and Beyonce’s Lemonade. Morano was at the Sundance Film Festival with her latest directorial effort, I Think We’re Alone Now, starring Peter Dinklage and Elle Fanning. Frank and funny, she spoke to the audience after a Park City screening.

“Well, I read the script and I thought, ‘wow, this is really fucking weird!’ You see so many of the same things over and over again and the same formula, but I find I’m tired of the same thing all the time. It’s more fun to do something where you go, ‘this is really challenging for me.’ That’s what’s interesting, when you’re not sure and it’s not a guarantee. But ultimately what’s interesting to me is the psychology of the character, that’s always what I’m looking for. People often need words to tell them what’s happening in a movie, but Peter and Elle are so good, I thought it would be fun to try to get across what they’re feeling without words.”

The film’s premise is that Del (Dinklage) is the lone survivor after an apocalypse. He lives in the library of a small, empty town, methodically going from house to house, collecting batteries and other useful items, and burying the dead. He reads, watches movies, and shelves books, to all intents and purposes content with his lone existence. Enter Grace (Fanning), she seeks connection and breaks open Del’s world. Writer and co-producer Mike Makowsky told a Sundance press panel that he set out to explore themes of human connection and whether or not we can live without companionship.

“I wanted to make a kind of anti-apocalypse film, the people are front and foremost. I wanted to deal with the emotions, what it is like to be the last two people on the earth. Did they feel guilty or responsible in some way and how did they deal with it together? That’s what was interesting to me in telling an apocalypse story.”

“What I liked about the script is there’s not an exposition in it and it’s not really the point,” Morano says. “Did you hear the loud noise at the beginning? That was it – the apocalypse! I talked to Peter about it and we said we wanted a really intimate movie. He was attached to the film as actor and co-producer when I came on board. I just think he’s amazing. Apart from the script, he was the reason I wanted to do it. He has an amazing presence on screen. To cast Grace, Elle always felt really magical to me and Peter had worked with her before on a movie (Low Down). I thought there was something about her visually and she looks like so much fun. She was exactly what a lot of this character is. She brought a lot of Elle to the role of Grace.”

For an indie film, I Think We’re Alone Now is a sophisticated piece of filmmaking that uses striking set designs and clear, confident direction to immediately immerse us in a world that is both prosaic and eerie.

“We shot in five different towns in upstate New York,” Morano explains. “We could only shoot a couple of days in each town before we got kicked out. We had to block off areas (to create the sense of being deserted). We did have to do a bit in effects when we caught people walking on screen, we had to get rid of that.”

The rituals of Del’s character as he structures his lone existence are mirrored in stylish, repeated visual motifs. The sci-fi theme is naturalistic, a muted backdrop for exploration of the characters’ emotions while they confront loss and need in varying measure.

Dinklage turns in a strong performance. His actions, expressions and held-in emotions tell us everything in the early scenes without need of voice over. The last part of the film introduces an extra sci-fi element. No plot spoiler but it introduces two new characters, played by a creepy Paul Giamatti and Charlotte Gainsbourg.

“We shot basically chronologically,” Morano says. “At the end, when Paul and Charlotte came in, they already had these dynamics between them which was great.”

Morano, who is credited on the film as both cinematographer and director, kept the crew to a minimum to suit the small scale, intimate production, and drew on her experience to achieve the effects she wanted in a limited time.

“I brought my operator and a steadicam guy (Michael Heathcote). I knew I wanted to shoot a lot of scenes at magic hour and I knew I only had about five dusks in the library, so I would shoot Pete and Mike would shoot Elle and we’d cross-shoot a scene. I watched Pete’s performance on my camera and Elle on the seven inch monitor at the left side of me. We had to do it that way because we didn’t have time to watch a playback.

“I’ve been doing it (cinematography) for about 20 years so you can kind of do it with your eyes closed,” she admits. “I’m always going to put the characters, the actors and the story first and not really pay attention to the lighting. I do a lot of prepping, I know what I want, I know what I like, and I plan it very carefully. When I do something larger I like to have a DP because there’s just a lot of people to manage.”

Morano’s repeated insistence that for her, characters are primary, perhaps comes from her early start filming her family. Her ability to create trust and safety on set was spoken of by both her lead actors.

“This was a very special film to the three of us,” Morano adds. “It really bonded us together, it was a very intimate experience. When the film was over, it was really, really hard for us. We didn’t want to go to our next jobs!”

 

Red Carpet images courtesy of the Sundance Institute.