The Attic Door

In this final installment of BEHIND THE ATTIC DOOR, the filmmakers reflect their personal journeys as production comes to an end.

Behind the Attic Door - Episode 7 - End in Sight from The Attic Door on Vimeo.

Erica Harrell
Producer

In THE ATTIC DOOR, we use the desolate and epic Western landscape, iconic John Ford country, to echo the terrifying loneliness of our two young characters. Though the landscape was at times harsh for our crew with high temperatures, dust storms, and the occasional flooding (seen in Episode 5 of “Behind the Attic Door“), we were certainly not the first filmmakers to face these conditions in Utah.

I found this great excerpt from John A. Murray’s Cinema Southwest: An Illustrated Guide to the Movies and their Locations.

“As early as 1925 director John Ford traveled to Promontory, Utah, to film part of his twelve-reel epic film The Iron Horse, shooting at the very place where the historic golden spike was driven, connecting the East Coast with the West Coast for the first time by rail line (which, in a larger sense, signaled the birth of modern America). During the 1930s the area around Kanab in southwestern Utah became known as “Little Hollywood” for the many pictures made there. Later, in the 1950s, the center of gravity shifted to the east, as Moab became the state’s major center for filmmaking. Virtually every American director and actor of note has worked in Utah, from Cecil B. DeMille (Union Pacific, 1939) to John Ford (Rio Grande, 1950) to Steven Spielberg (Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, 1989); from Henry Fonda (My Darling Clementine, 1946) to Clint Eastwood (The Outlaw Josey Wales, 1976) to Jodie Foster (One Little Indian, 1973). If a film has red slickrock and prickly pear cactus desert, cloudless blue skies, and distant mountain ranges, there’s a good chance it was shot in Utah.”

This article talks about shooting in Paria(h) as well as Kanab, Zion and the Coral Pink Sand Dunes. Theres also a mention of Jackie Hamblin-Rife, our ultimate production supporter, and mentor for shooting in the west.
Check out the entire article here.

Imagine giant film cameras and huge lighting trucks trying to maneuver down into Paria where it was difficult for us to go with our lightweight equipment, smaller vehicles and sparse crew. The advances in film technology really allow for modern indie filmakers to go to places where previously only huge Hollywood productions could afford to go. It is so humbling to think back on our shooting and all of the famous films that came to that area before us and the many more that will come after.

As production nears an end, the filmmakers discover the magic in between the takes.

Behind the Attic Door - Episode 6 - Something Amazing Happens from The Attic Door on Vimeo.

A sudden flood destroys the roads leading to the exterior shooting location. In this episode of BEHIND THE ATTIC DOOR production is at it’s darkest and the filmmakers must rely on faith alone.

Behind the Attic Door - Episode 5 - Monsoon Season from The Attic Door on Vimeo.

Kristin Øhrn Dyrud
Composer

Second Part in a Series. Read Part 1.

Danny was very clear early in the process that he felt it was important to make this a silent score. We kept removing elements and stripping down the cues until only what was needed remained. There are cues in this movie that have 15 seconds of rests in them. There is something very uneasy with music not coming in when you expect it to. We also had extreme dynamic ranges so that when the loud and scary moments happen in the film they seem even more powerful because of the contrasts to all the silence. Danny talked about having the music reflect the terrifying loneliness the characters are faced with. Scott Uhlfelder’s cinematography especially in the landscape scenes already reflects this and I tried to underline this by playing with open intervals, long rests, sliding strings and so on.

All the preparations that I did on beforehand allowed me to do the actual scoring very quickly. From the time I received the final cut until we had recorded the score, there had only been 4 weeks. But this would have been much harder if I hadn’t had the chance to let the movie and the ideas mature gradually over time. The fact that I had a fantastic team, including violist Hillary Thomas who recorded string effects for demo purposes, copyist Matt Novack, conductor Susie Bench, engineers Alex Levin and Paul Apelgren, and of course the fantastic musicians (Nancy Roth, viola, Armen Ksajikian, cello and Karl Vincent, contrabass) made this not only much smoother, but also possible. I feel so fortunate to have had the opportunity to work with Danny, who is an incredibly talented filmmaker, and his wonderful team. I hope to get a chance to do it again very soon!

Learn more about Kristin by visiting her website: www.kristindyrud.com

A look into the production design of THE ATTIC DOOR and the friendship at it’s center.

Behind the Attic Door - Episode 4 - A Tale of Two Friends from The Attic Door on Vimeo.

You can follow along with Alex’s design journey by visiting his six part series: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6

Erica Harrell
Producer

The economy in the last few weeks has been on a wild roller coaster ride and no one is sure when it will end. Many of us are facing cutbacks and job loss. An independent filmmakers we have a lot at stake in the future films. We have our investors to think about as well as being able to provide for ourselves. Of course we are really excited and thankful to have the films that we have, but many of us are wondering what the future of indie filmaking and indie film distributing will be like.

I found this article on IndieWire today that talks a bit about film financing during these hard times. The article points out that some producers are still able to find funding through private investors who have not been too affected by the stock market crashes. However budgets are getting smaller and production is slowing down. The more dismal news in this article for films like “The Attic Door” may be that buyers are way more limited. Gone are the indie powerhouse distributors like ThinkFilm and Warner Independent. Hopefully change will be coming for filmmakers like us and many others around the world.