MM: Were the three complete takes spread out over three nights?
SS: No, the first and the second were spread out over 10 days, so we could look at the footage and make changes. That’s the beautiful thing about working in a system like this. We all know that you can work on a script forever. Every solution and every answer is on paper, so you reenact what you see on paper, while always looking at your watch, and then you just film.
MM: Did you re-rehearse with the actors during those 10 days?
SS: We didn’t really rehearse. By then, they were very close to owning these roles. I didn’t have to teach them. For example, in the first take, the characters didn’t go to the roof [in a scene from the first half of the film]. But we realized that when Sonne and Victoria say goodbye in front of the café, it has to feel like, “Wow! This was a wonderful night, and it was truly great to meet you!” Without going to the roof, there was not enough there for that kind of vibe. Normally, you can go into the editing room and pretend that there was some big thing between them, but we weren’t able to do that.
MM: Tell me about the scene near the end, with Victoria and Sonne in the hotel room.
SS: When Victoria and Sonne come into the hotel room, Victoria puts Sonne on the bed and starts to examine his wound [too early], as the blood was still hidden under the covers in the bed. Laia walked off screen, then Freddy grabbed the blood to pour over him and his side in the bed. It was a lot of blood. For a long time I wanted to go back and CGI it. Whenever I showed the film I was like, “That’s a lot of blood, right?” And people said “Where? No, it’s good!”
There were other times the actors fucked up. For example, when Freddy was driving away from the bank, he had this crazy idea to yell back at Franz, “Throw away your jacket!” But Franz’s mic was sewn into that jacket and he actually had a thermal shirt on that wasn’t even part of the costume. So for the rest of the film he wears that thermal that is supposed to be keeping him warm, but what he doesn’t wear is that goddamned microphone.
MM: That’s hilarious. It seems like a lot of logistics for the actors to keep in mind. Of course they were going to make choices that were unexpected.
SS: I was empowering them, and I could not make them feel like they were idiots. I always told them that their jobs were not to just do what I said. “Don’t be afraid to forget these things I told you and if you forget it, it’s not important.”
MM: That’s a lot like theater.
SS: Yeah, but I’m telling you, man, there is nothing farther away from theater than this film. Regular filming has so much more to do with theater, because it’s all about a certain kind of artificial reproduction. The stage is an artificial room, and it takes care of you. It shelters you. Think of all the great stage actors and understand that a stage is a room where they are safe. But I’m telling you that a camera for me is like a weapon. A camera smells if you lie and that is the difference.
The pair finds temporary respite in the apartment of a terrified couple, before being forced to escape again
MM: How many times were your prepared to shoot the whole thing?
SS: Three times, and I know that sounds fabricated.
MM: No—that’s a big leap of faith.
SS: Right, and I trusted my actors, but I’m telling you, in the last 48 hours—what do you call that, where the coach at halftime yells at the players? I did that. Franz pretty much hated me after that. He called the casting director to complain. But it needed the extra energy of us not being friends. I blew up and said, “We have nothing!” And I think we needed that. I was scared of myself. It was 48 hours of fear, aggression and anger. And just before the last take, we got back together and we knew that we were a great group, and that it would be great.
MM: What else went on in those 48 hours, besides them getting some sleep?
SS: We rehearsed two scenes once more—mainly the scene in the café where they can’t get the driver. They never got that scene right.
MM: That’s a wonderful scene! I love the way Freddie keeps giving Victoria a way out, before she even knows what he’s asking her to do. It feels so real. It feels like they have conflicting agendas, and he wants her to say no.
SS: Yes! There was also animosity between Boxer and Freddie. There was a bit of a conflict between the characters and actors, but they were never sabotaging each other, because they knew they needed each other. [Franz] was really mad, and he was loaded and ready to go off at everything. We needed all of that. I know it sounds very hippie-ish, but it was needed. I’m never going to shoot a one-take film again, but it taught me that sometimes, in this world of micromanaging, you can feel a way to make everything better. I think we underestimate how much a film comes from feelings. Filmmakers forget that audiences understand their projects as a whole.
MM: There is a kind of double-edged sword to digital filmmaking. Even though on the one hand we can go off and do anything, most people are using the technology in a very controlled way, not very daring.
SS: Yeah, we want to keep our hands clean. I’ve never directed a comedy, but I watch a lot of these great American comedies and I think they are all about shooting on set, ad-libbing. They are shooting and shooting and shooting. That’s the right way.
It was almost like Victoria is a child that has two sisters who are not very beautiful and not very talented. One is named Erica and one is Mary or something, and they are very common girls. Then there is Victoria and she has everything. I never thought that would happen. I thought that there were going to be three sisters and that I was going to have to decide between the three, but that was not the case. It was an easy decision.
MM: What was the biggest challenge in post?
SS: We worked on the sound. This film has a lot of cuts—just not in the picture. In sound, I think we had something like 180 tracks, because it is digital and it is limitless. Don’t ask me what was on these tracks, though. MM
Victoria opens in theaters October 9, 2015, courtesy of Adopt Films. An abbreviated version of this interview appears in MovieMaker‘s Fall 2015 issue.
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