“What kind of journalist are you,” Francesca (Maria Bakalova) is finally compelled to ask of her guest Dylan (Daryl Wein) in “Electra,” well after her boyfriend Milo (Jack Farthing) has opened the doors to their Italian palazzo for a magazine profile that is starting to go sideways. Dylan has trouble keeping his facts straight, not helped much by Lucy (Abigail Cowan), who is tagging along as a photographer for an accompanying photo spread though her knowledge of aperture is a bit suspect as well, and although their hosts are used to a little weirdness when it comes with the territory of Milo’s life as a rockstar and Francesca entertains as her own as a performance artist, there is a level of oddness about Dylan and Lucy that starts to be impossible to ignore.
Then again eccentricities are a feature, not a bug of Hala Matar’s enjoyably mischievous feature debut in which it can feel as if the director is infiltrating a fortress of her own with formal experimentation as Dylan and Lucy sneak into Milo and Francesca’s palatial estate under false pretenses with mysterious aims. The fact that Francesca introduces herself to the couple as a rabid fan of Milo on the streets, begging for a picture, rather than his girlfriend at first sets the tone for the dark comic thriller where appearances are constantly deceiving. While Milo is apt to put up with the pair of supposed journalists as their behavior appears increasingly odd when some media attention might be nice during a lull in his career, it’s clearly for the best that not too much comes to light with a penchant for philandering and although his guests may not be real muckrakers, they’re certainly capable of doing some digging.
Matar, who got her start in the commercial and music video world, also starts to question everything, throwing in interstitials of Francesca’s adventures as she starts to lose sleep over the situation, hearkening back to the silent era-esque slapstick for some comic sequences and tagging an initial walk with the two couples together with the familiar font of MTV credits in the lower left corner of the frame as if the line between reality and fantasy have started to blur. The haute couture of Milo and Francesca’s world suggest a high-flying lifestyle that the director, along with co-writers Wein and Paul Sado, joyfully bring to the ground when the messiness of mundane domestic squabbles start to rear their ugly head between both couples and for all the disguises they put on, “Electra” offers a kind of striptease, playfully pulling all involved down to earth. With the film now headed to theaters and VOD following a premiere at the Santa Barbara Film Festival, Matar spoke about offering audiences a fun-filled trip to the Italian countryside, finding the characters’ fine threads and allowing herself and the actors to go wild on set.
How’d this crazy thing come about?
I was traveling in Sicily, and my friend wanted me to shoot a short film in her godmother’s palazzo. It was so beautiful, and it’s not where we ended up shooting the movie, but I [thought], “Oh, can I make a feature instead?” And she said yes, and then I was talking to Daryl [Wein], who’s been a mentor to me and I was trying to get a feature off the ground for year that was also set in Italy, and it was more like a $5 to $10 million feature. And it was close [to a greenlight]. I had great producers, but I was stuck. I was like, I have to make this one movie. And he’s like, “Why don’t you just make a simpler movie? One location, a few actors, I’ll be in it, I’ll produce it.” So he actually got me out of my depression.
We came up with a story based on this location being available. And that location fell through [laughs] and then we were a little screwed, because we didn’t account for a location in the budget, but it all worked out at the end. [Daryl] was the one moving it along because I was not believing that I’m going to make a movie. I was [thinking], “Okay, we’re vacationing. I’m not going to go shoot a movie next month.” And at first he’s [said], “Oh, maybe you’ll just improv off an outline.” And I [said], I will die if I improv off of an outline,” but at the end, we ended up doing the script together with Paul Sado and scenes changed, and some maybe were in a different setting, but then we’re like, “Actually, this makes sense for this setting more.”
Daryl has been known to will things into existence. What was it like to bring the cast into this?
It was fun, but we had so many people attach and drop [out] and we were going crazy. At first, I tried two friends, but it didn’t work out and then we just went through agents. Jack [Farthing] was someone I’ve always wanted to work with, and Maria [Bakalova] was someone that I had in mind for something else, but it just worked out so beautifully. When you’re casting, I think you have to be really open and I have this very firm belief that the person that ends up being in the movie at the end is the person that is best for the role, so when someone drops out, I don’t get really depressed. I just think that means they’re not the right person for this and now looking back, if we had the original cast, I don’t think it would have worked as well. This ensemble of those four [actors] together work perfectly, not only performance-wise, but also visually, they really complemented each other and once you see them together, thankfully they all had great chemistry.
They bring such personality, but the clothes do as well and I understand your sister Hind Matar was the costume designer. What was she like to work with on this?
A nightmare. [laughs] No, I’m joking. I work with her on a lot of my stuff and this was both of our first feature, so it was a little crazy. It’s funny because this film came together so fast and it was all a big mystery. But I also feel like it was just all a gift. Even with the clothes, I show up one day and I think “Oh, look at these amazing costumes.” [My sister] and I just used both of our networks of the designers we know and friends we know who are in fashion and pulled the craziest pieces. It was also nice having someone of having family on set and I’m so grateful that I got to work with her. When it’s your first time, you ideally want to work with people who’ve done this before, but it was a no brainer that she would have been the best person for [this]. Also it was also the the feature for my editor, Matt Berardi, who I love to death, and I’m really happy that that I that I ended up going with him because it’s just the chemistry that you have with someone. If you can both be aligned on the same vision, that’s more important than anything else.
It seems like there wasn’t the attachment to how films are generally made that could be exciting. You can see a little bit of Godard’s influence in how you use titles. Was it exciting to be to allow yourself to play as much as you do in the film and have everyone else onboard?
Yes, I’m so glad I was able to do that. I love Godard, and I just love all the liberties he takes. He was definitely a big inspiration, especially in the edit. And the reason I was able to take these liberties was also the cast that I had. They were all really fun and wanted to try new things. That’s what what made it all work out. I’ve worked with some actors in the past that have a wall, so you don’t feel like you could you could play as much and it’s so important because that’s where the magic is.
Something like the dinner scene that ends up playing out largely with sound effects as the actors simulate a silent comedy, what’s the conversation like before you do that scene? It seems like that takes a lot of trust.
Actually, we all came up with it together and if you are directing a scene that has no words, those are actually the hardest ones. That was my biggest lesson, actually, were those scenes, and thankfully we all figured it out and I think they worked out beautifully. But if I were to go back, I would have planned them more to know exactly what the moves are and maybe had a choreographer. The scene that the actors maybe thought I was crazy was actually more when it was Jack and Maria wearing the animal costumes in bed. Now they were like they were like they had to look at the screen and be like, “Are we looking like idiots?”
Those are some of the great costumes. There are also those more elaborate outfits in the “Becoming a Goddess” sequence that had to be quite something to see on the day of filming. What was it like to have those come out as they did?
There’s this young designer who just got out of school in London and she’s really talented and one day as we were looking for costumes, I found her on Instagram and saw these crazy costumes that she creates and I was like, “We need some of your costumes,” so she sent those to us. And I remember when when we first tried them on, Hind, my sister, was wearing the hat and we laughed so much over these costumes and we didn’t know at first like which scene they belonged in or if they would even end up in the movie, but the actors just had so much fun.
It looks like it. You draw on the Italian locale for the film’s score as well, which bounces from more modern playful music to classical. What was it like to put music on this?
That’s something that was definitely fun to play with in the edit, and mixing the two [tones] is something I’ll always do. I think as a person. I’m very attracted to tradition and formalities and why I love Rome is because it has because of the feel that it creates, but also at the same time, I also love like contemporary music. It’s hard to find good bands these days, but when you want to do something, you want it to be current, so I’m very much immersed in what’s happening in the arts.
You said how eager you were to make a feature before. What’s it like having one under your belt?
I’m so excited, and I just hope that the audience will have fun watching it. As directors, we try so hard to make a feature and I think without a feature, you don’t feel complete, which I know is ridiculous but we attach so much importance to it. That’s what I felt, so I I definitely feel lighter, and I’m dying to get my next movie off the ground and all my other movies. But I think I don’t think I’ll ever be as desperate as I as I was. It’s like when you want to have a boyfriend and you’re like, “No one wants you. They just want to run away.” So I feel like I can be myself more now. I was hiding behind a mask like all these characters.
“Electra” opens May 2nd in limited release, including the Laemmle Glendale in Los Angeles and the Roxy Cinema in New York, and available on VOD.