Q&A with Milena Czernovsky & Lilith Kraxner
Milena Czernovsky and Lilith Kraxner have quickly established themselves as an exciting new cinematic duo with back-to-back features that showcase a clear understanding of their cinematic practice and a keen eye for depicting small social interactions. Their debut film, Beatrix, earned its lead actress an Acting Award at FIDMarseille 2021 for her remarkably nuanced and hypnotic performance. Their follow-up, bluish, won the Grand Prix at FIDMarseille this year, continuing their close examination of everyday moments and emotions.
bluish screens at the 62nd New York Film Festival this weekend as part of Currents, a program reserved for innovative new voices in filmmaking.
Q. Both of your films feature a heightened awareness of gestures and glances. How do you go about building a film around such small moments?
A. We talk a lot about situations and share small moments of the everyday that we observe or experience ourselves. There’s always an atmosphere that we’re trying to grasp, to try and find this feeling that exists in-between all of the small moments of things that are not so easy to capture or pinpoint.
We are also not interested in spoken-language all that much. We like to tell our stories with gestures and body language so that we can make space for the audience to feel their own feelings and emotions.
Q. This film, much like Beatrix, features a moment that involves the audience. What is it about breaking the fourth wall that interests you as filmmakers?
A. We are interested in the concept of the frame: in the ends of the frame, what is outside and inside the frame, and how in mainstream filmmaking everyone takes the frame so seriously. There’s this thing where action is only allowed to take place inside the frame when we all know there is always an around, below, and left-and-right to the frame — it’s just this rectangle that someone thought some day should be a rectangle. We like to experiment with these borders that are not actually borders in order to see what happens to the audience. Addressing the audience through the meditation was one way to blur this line.
In bluish we wanted to create different layers. We wanted to tell the everyday life of our characters in a very realistic way, but with these other layers, we had the possibility to create more drama and not stick to realistic storytelling. So it was possible to include other stories within our story, to open up new worlds where there are more possibilities.
Q. When did you realize that you wanted to start working together?
A. We were always supporting each other in our studies and smaller projects. At some point, about a year before we started working on Beatrix, we were working on a commercial film set and were super annoyed by how much money is going into shallow films. We were frustrated after that, so we thought: “Why not write a script and try out what happens if we get the money and realize it?” We kind of stumbled into this work. It wasn’t a huge decision, but more like, “Let’s give it a try,” and then it happened quite fast.
Q. Are there any filmmakers working today you admire and would like to see develop a greater following?
A. There are so many great filmmakers that inspire us. We are excited to follow up on Jessica Dunn Rovinelli’s work. We got to know her at Art of the Real 2022 and love So Pretty. Also, we are very impressed by Miryam Charles’ first feature Cette Maison and hope to see more soon! Recently, we discovered Naked Acts by Bridgett M. Davis. We couldn’t believe that we haven’t even heard of it before. As far as we know, it’s the only film she made and we were really struck by it.
Q. What’s a project you’d like to make someday, however impossible it might seem now?
A. We’ve talked a lot about making a series. Our first film, Beatrix, already should have been a series. That’s something we are really interested in right now because it’s great how you can tell a story that way. You can take much more time to develop characters.
We are interested in the everyday and with the way that we are writing and approaching filmmaking, it makes a lot of sense for us to have a series where you can tell small stories in bits and bits and bits — like a T.V. show. Instead, with a film you have this peak and within 90 minutes you’ve got to build everything up and have it dissolve.
Q. Is it important for you to have a creative routine, or do you prefer spontaneity?
A. This is something we were recently talking about because we don’t have a studio yet. We are always moving around a lot — it’s kind of annoying but also refreshing because we get to know a lot of people at different offices and spaces where we edit or write. It’s nice to not stick to one place. But for each place, we’re always making new small routines. When we’re at a studio for one month, we always have a routine — snacks are very important and so are breakfast routines.
Q. What image would you like to end this interview with?
