With its stunning visuals, heart-wrenching performances, and pulsing score by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross, Waves has been winning glowing reviews while making the rounds on the film festival circuit this fall.
I caught up with writer/director/director Trey Edward Shults and stars Taylor Russell and Kelvin Harrison Jr. at Middleburg Film Festival to talk about what having their work on the big screen means to them as well as their views on the future of the industry.
As filmmakers, how important is having your movie on the big screen so that you can see how an audience reacts to it?
Trey Edward Shults: For me, it’s everything. The movie was always meant to be a subjective, immersive experience and it doesn’t get more immersive than in a cinema with all the tools we have at our disposal: a big screen you can lose yourself in, a Dolby Atmos mix, and a 5.1 mix.
Growing up, the most cathartic experiences for me were in a movie theater. It was communal … it was like religion at times because of how powerfully impacted I was by movies. From the festival screenings [of Waves], I’ve heard about people crying together with strangers and it becomes this communal, cathartic experience. At big moments there’s been full gasps in the theater, and it’s a beautiful thing to have that. I pray that people see this in the theater.
Taylor Russell: We had a screening and a Q&A the other night that was really mind blowing because it was a lot of young people telling their experiences: how they related to the story and how it mirrors their own lives and their relationships with their parents. While watching it they felt the movie made them want to mend relationships in their own lives. To hear that a piece of art that you’re in has an impact on another life is so simple but it’s so huge. That’s the reason we do this. It’s the biggest gift. You can connect with other people.
formerly Mad Cornish Projectionist.