One of the most exciting pandemic-themed movies to hit the cinematic landscape is WILL WERNICK’s terrifying SAFER AT HOME. With a horde of friends safely socially distanced from each other in their respective homes, with plenty of water, toilet paper, and accouterment (as evidenced by some clever production design), within 15-minutes, the handwriting is on the wall that we are in for the night of our lives.
Directed by WILL WERNICK and co-written by Wernick and Lia Bozonelis, with a cast that includes Jocelyn Hudon, Emma Lahana, Alisa Allapach, Adwin Brown, Dan J. Johnson, Michael Kupisk, and Daniel Robaire, SAFER AT HOME finds us two years into the pandemic with a group of friends throwing an online party (in lieu of a birthday trip to Vegas) complete with a night of games, drinking, and drugs. After taking ecstasy pills, everything that can go wrong does go wrong and the safety of their homes becomes more terrifying than the militarized raging chaos of the darkened mask-laden streets outside.
Wernick, already a proven writer/director thanks to lauded indie features like Escape Room and No Escape, with SAFER AT HOME, Wernick ups the ante starting with a story that is not only compelling but interesting, tapping into the unspoken fears undoubtedly shared the world over with a “what if” scenario during the pandemic lockdown. And while we have seen several films already which were shot via Zoom and other virtual formats during the lockdown (and even more films hitting the marketplace where post-production was all done virtually), what sets Wernick and SAFER AT HOME apart from the pack and elevates the entire film is that it is very cinematic and quite honestly, a damn good film. There is a polish and crispness to the film that comes not only from Wernick’s talented cinematographer Jason Goodell and some outstanding use of the camera with both shifting eyelines and POV as well as defining and dynamic lighting, but thanks to a score by Genevieve Vincent that provides continuity and serves as the connective tissue among the different homes and couples throughout the course of the night’s events.
I spoke with writer/director WILL WERNICK in this exclusive conversation as we delved deep into the “making of” SAFER AT HOME covering every aspect of this filmmaking process, including:
- story – finding the “bones” of the story and exploring different story options for a throughline that involves multiple people at multiple locations only interacting via a Zoom party chat; incorporating some of Wernick’s own pandemic experiences into the storyline
- casting and chemistry
- cinematography and the challenges of lighting and lensing during pre-production and during actual shooting
- setting up each house with a cinema camera with computer with a technological assist as the signal from each camera was piped into the computers which then allowed all of the actors to see each other and act via Zoom
- adherence to PPE protocols (including full body suit-up and masking for the lighting and camera crews who did set up in each residence location)
- working with editor Sean Aylward in assimilating the “mountain of footage” as there are essentially four and five events on four and five different camera feeds happening concurrently, and finding not only the pacing and rhythm but the fear and nail-biting tension while making things visually appealing and energetic
- production design and residence locations
- scoring
- lessons learned
Take a listen, see the film, and ask yourself, are you truly SAFER AT HOME?
by debbie elias, exclusive interview 02/12/2021
