The synopsis for the Norwegian feature project Lights, directed by Gunnar Hall Jensen, is tantalising. In the film, “we meet an eclectic group of people in the remote Norwegian valley of Hessdalen. They are in different ways influenced, mesmerized and shaped, by the mysterious light phenomena in the sky above them,” it reads.
Producer Christian Falch (UpNorth Film, Norway) elaborates. “In these days of horror in the world we need documentaries that not only portray the darkness of human behaviour but also shows us worthy qualities to identify with and be inspired by. We envision Lights will be such a film in that it portrays people like ourselves. Because, what got us into the film was not whether the lights were aliens or whatever, it was the passion and warmth of the people. That they spent all their free time watching the sky and speculating around something that could not be explained. They did something very human. Something representative of the universal in an extreme form. They filled their life with meaning. As we all need to do in one way or another.”
Director Gunnar Hall Jensen will be approaching the subject in his own highly distinctive and personal way, Falch promises.
“In his award-winning breakthrough film Gunnar Goes Comfortable (2003) he [Jensen] dissects his own dysfunctional personality in an overly subjective playful form that makes his little story relevant for a wider audience. In Gunnar Goes God (2011) he uses his own consumer middle-class life as a contrast to the lives of Coptic monks that have nothing material, but a spiritual life that is richer. In the experimental A Cup of Tea (2014) Gunnar lives alone high up in the mountains and there gets the trust of some local farmers who show him how life is not, and will never be, perfect. Again [it is] a film that uses the little stories of the normal human to tell us something relevant about life for most of us, like Lights will do.”
The film will be an ensemble character-driven feature documentary, shot as cinema verité (Falch cites the works of Jacques Tati and Aki Kaurismäki for reference), but with a sporadic yet important (meta-) layer of director involvement on camera, he says. “Through a creatively composed structure of observational tableaus and artful cinematography we will let the audience be immersed in the lives of the people in Hessdalen, a compelling location with a strong allure of mystery.”
“Through this observational form, we invite the audience to more actively discover details and immerse themselves in the unfolding scenes, always aware of some ominous unknown presence looming, like the feeling found in the films of David Lynch or Michael Haneke,” he adds. Falch further references the works of The Coen Bros and Roy Andersson in the film’s honest and loving depiction of the “mundane authenticity” of both its characters and location.
Nordisk Panorama represents the project’s first public outing, and so Falch is both excited and apprehensive. That said, he is “proud” of the co-pro collaboration so far agreed with NapaFilms in Finland and AutoImages in Sweden, “and this pitch gives us the possibility to give the Finnish and Swedish broadcasters and film funds a heartfelt introduction to the film, the topic and the crew before the official co-production applications arrive in their inboxes.” Sales are handled by Syndicado.
“It will be a minimalistic film in the sense that we will rely on key sequences that are played out with a beginning, middle and end in long takes,” Falch stresses of its style. “The method to capture our scenes will be a meticulous focus on setting up and composing shots that both capture the situation but also has a mesmerizing photographic quality of the shot itself.”
“It is a poetic film for anyone looking for an antidote to the easily digested digital overload of today,” the producer signs off.
