Movies You Made: “The Morning After”
Movies You Made is an ongoing Go Into The Story series to spotlight filmmakers and promote their storytelling. Today: The Morning After…
Movies You Made is an ongoing Go Into The Story series to spotlight filmmakers and promote their storytelling. Today: The Morning After, written and directed by Leanne Mangan.
Story Description: A young backpacker wakes up in a rice paddy field with no idea how he got there, what happened the night before — or where his girlfriend is.
Written and Directed by Leanne Mangan
Lead Cast:
Dave — Luke Middlebrook
Mr Samorn — Tep Rindaro
Kate — Hilde Marie Kvaløsæter
Director Mentor — Sean Cousins
Director of Photography — Rocco Fasano
Assistant Camera — Ben Friesen
Sound Recordist — Felix Parnell
Production Manager — Sean Cousins
Make-up, costume, production design — Leanne Mangan
Editor — Lucy Paplinska
Consultant Editor — Mark Atkin
Sound Design & Mix — Tristan Meredith
Colour & Titles — Phillip Dixon
Music from: Julien Poulson and Cambodia Space Project
This film was created under the Filmmaker Abroad mentored-filmmaking program.
Background on the project from its writer-director:
Funnily enough, the story was inspired by my honeymoon! My husband and I were on our first night in Pub St, Siem Reap, and went out drinking. A french bar owner took a liking to us and when he closed, took us to some of his fave bars, where we were given free food and drink and generally got really drunk! (My husband is now 6 months sober).
We woke up in a dark room and had no idea where we were. We had blacked out, with no recollection of getting back to the hotel, and as we’d been asking around about certain illegals, feared we’d been caught in a white slavery ring and were done for! But I managed to get up and turn a light on, and voila, we were indeed in our hotel room.
That feeling of regret, that I’d made one wrong decision, and the fear that the one who was meant to protect me, had not been able to, was the emotional impetus for the story. Oh, and the relief, when we were wrong! I wanted to keep people guessing in the script, whether everything was indeed all right, or whether it was all wrong, and the protagonist just didn’t know it.
I wrote the script as an exercise in my Screenwriting course at AFTRS (the Australian Film, Television & Radio School), and ended up travelling to Cambodia some months later to film it.
The premise of the story: a young backpacker wakes up in a rice paddy field with no idea how he got there, what happened the night before — or where his girlfriend is.
Yes, a little Memento-esque — but I absolutely adore the Nolan brothers’ writing, so I’ll wear that.
As a writer, I had few production contacts, and I started searching for a way to get the film made. I discovered a company called Filmmaker Abroad, which takes documentary filmmakers to various exotic locations round the world and teaches them to make docos. Guess where they were going this particular year? You guessed it — not only Cambodia, but Siem Reap!!!
I persuaded them to take me and do a narrative short instead. What I got was a fantastic producer/mentor in Sean Cousins, an extremely talented DP in Rocco Fasano, and the top students at Melbourne’s SAE Film school for my crew, in Felix Parnell and Ben Friesen. In doing this, I got crew and equipment hire for heavily discounted rates (and yes, I funded the film entirely myself, so this stuff matters!)
I nabbed an aussie actor for the anglo lead, Luke Middlebrook, tracked down Cambodia’s most loved TV and film actor Tep Rindaro for the Khmer lead role, and got various locals and expats in Siem Reap to round out the cast (notably the beautiful Marie Kvaløsæter, who plays Kate). We used some Cambodian film fixers to help with locations and travel.
It’s like, if you believe you can do it (or somehow trust that life/the universe will go with you), you can make it happen!
Here is the short film The Morning After:
The Morning After did its festival circuit last year, getting into many festivals worldwide, notably the Cambodian International Film Festival, Cambodia Town Film Festival (seen by Angelina Jolie), Los Angeles Film Awards, LAIFFA, Short+Sweet Film Festival, Sydney Indie Film Festival…. and just recently got to the top 4 of the AACTA Social Shorts awards here in Australia.
I’ve now written a feature script expanding on the short, and including other Siem Reap stories, called Amok. Daniel Jones, who played my bartender in the film, got thrown in jail in Siem Reap last year (unjustly, might I add, and at the hands of another person who helped with my film), so I had to incorporate that story too.
It’s starting to get into the quarters, semis and finals of some screenwriting competitions, but I’m on draft 3 and have SOOOOO much to work on that it’s daunting. I recently attended the Cinestory Feature Retreat on the strength of it, and have a lot of great mentor notes to work through. I’m about to apply for funding here in Australia, and after that, will be looking to make my first feature. Let’s see where I am in a year.
Facebook @TheMorningAfterSiemReap
Website: http://themorningaftersiemreap.com/
Filmmaker Abroad: https://filmmakerabroad.com/
If you have a short film which may have already had a festival run, email me (GITSblog at gmail dot com) and I will consider featuring it in the Movies You Made series.