About The Director:
Frederik von Lüttichau was born on the 3. April 1988 in Augsburg, Germany
to Bernhard von Lüttichau and Florence Krafft von Dellmensingen.
After his parents’ divorce at the age of seven, he moved to the
countryside of the north of Germany with his mother and brother. He took
up horse riding and enjoyed playing guitar, dancing and cooking. Every time
he visited his father at his grandparents’ house, he and his brother would go
hunting boars. After practicing professional rowing and Kung Fu, Frederik
went to Ireland at the age of 17 to finish his education at the Franciscan
College Gormanston where he also played in a Rock band.
Inspired to become a professional actor, he attended The Kogan Academy of
Dramatic Arts in London, where the Russian work ethic of Sam Kogan
(trained at the Moscow Academy of Dramatic Art) and the unwavering commitment and
belief of his Tutors of ‘The Science of Acting’ gave Frederik a profound
understanding of the subconscious and a productive outlet for his
profession. Upon graduation, Frederik was determined and aspired to begin
his acting career. His discipline and conscientious preparation, unique
life experience and agility has led to many demanding and intense acting
roles across stage and screen.
After several short films and a part in ALLIES directed by Dominic Burns
and RANCOUR directed by Devanand Shanmugam , he landed the lead role in
the feature horror HUSET directed by Reinert Kiil which was premiered at
Tromsø Film Festival January 2016 in Norway:http://www.tiff.no/en/program/2016/house and is currently running in cinemas in Norway and is planned to go to various film festivals around
the world.
Late summer ’15 Frederik moved from London to Berlin to also get projects
going on his own soil. He is currently developing a dark thriller feature film with director Sam
Mardon from One Man Film http://www.onemanfilm.co.uk and plays a role in
TLMEA directed by rising talent Kevin Kopacka, whose previous film HADES
was shown in Cannes last year.
Frederik just came back from Vienna where he played PAX in the theater
performance WIR HUNDE/US DOGS (Wiener Festwochen) from the famous SIGNA
collective http://signa.dk
Q&A Interview:
1) How did you come up with the concept?
I have always been a big fan of surreal films and psychological thrillers and psychological horror. When it came to the point for me to make my debut short film, I wanted to do something very simple, but also very strong. That’s when BEFORE YOU GO TO BED was born. I always liked the idea of one character who is alone at home and something happens to him (in this case it is about a man not knowing anymore what is real and what is not real.) I
wanted to make a classic horror film, which has a similar style of the old
Polanski films.
2) How long did it take to film?
We had the main shooting day 2pm – 7am. Then I did some small reshoots the
following day, just me and the cinematographer Sasha Bajac. And then the
two of us met once more to do some exterior shots of the house.
3) How did you decide on the location?
The location is my own flat. I needed to keep the costs to a minimum but
also my flat was perfect for it plus I had the freedom to do whatever I
wanted there 😉
4) What was the highlight of making the film?
The highlight of the film was shooting a scary sequence, which I can’t
tell you about, because I would be spoiling the film for you.
5) What was the most difficult moment of shooting the film?
Since I wrote the film, directed it, am the only actor in it and produced
and edited it, there was a lot on my shoulder, but I prepared really well
so when we got to the shoot, we all knew what we were doing and what shots
we needed to get. But it was very difficult at times for me to call it a
shot and move on, sometimes relying on my cinematographer. ME: ” Sasha,
You are happy? Focus good? Movement ok?” SASHA: “Yep, all good.” ME: ” OK,
next!!!” I did this here and there without watching back the take, cause
we didn’t have time for it always. That was difficult. Also when it was 5am
in the morning the crew and myself were at their limit, was difficult to push
through but we did it.
6) Any specific movies or stories that influenced the script?
YESS! I’m a big Roman Polanski fan. His movies for me are one of the best.
Especially his older ones: Rosemary’s Baby, Chinatown, The Tenant,
Repulsion. I particular love the style of The Tenant and Repulsion,
because there is also only one main character. I very much like the simplicity of
that. In this way you focus completely on that character, there are not
many words spoken (my film is completely without a word). The nice thing
about The Tenant is that you get to a point where you don’t know anymore
what to believe, or what’s real and what is not real, thus you pull the
audience in quite strongly.
7) What makes this film stand out among others?
A lot of shortfalls nowadays want to say too much. There is too much
information scrambled into a short amount of time. Martin Scorsese said
once that a shortfall really should have no dialogue, cause you should be
able to tell your story without words with such a time frame. I agree with
that.
This film is completely unique, mainly because it has this rough Polanski
style and feeling to it. It has no dialogue. Most of the shots are very
long, without cutting so it sucks you in really well. And it will be by
far one of the most shocking short horror films that people have seen for a
long time. Sometimes you watch a short horror film and its’ good and then
the end comes and you are like:” Oh ok, that was it, not really scary.” My
film pulls you in from the beginning but also gives you something at the
end you were not prepared for 🙂
8) Looking back, is there anything you would change about the film?
No, not really. Maybe here and there some editing choices and a couple of
camera moves, but on the whole I’m very happy how it is now.
9) Any other horror projects currently in the works?
YES there are 🙂 I’m working on a feature film project with a friend of
mine Sam Mardon. He is a director from London. He will be directing it and
I will be acting and partly producing it. It’s a twisted psychological
horror film with a surreal element to it. Cat and mouse game between
detective and serial killer.
Jogger women start to disappear in the forest. A young detective get’s the
case, the first time he is in charge by himself. He is very good in
putting himself in the shoes of the killer. The more he researches the deeper he
is drawn into the fangs of the psychopath…but does he really know who the
psychopath is? We will be working again very much with the surreal
Element, playing with the audiences head 😉
Final Thoughts With Frederik:
For me it is always quality over quantity. There are so many horror films
being produced that are very bad. And often the directing and acting is
not good. I think it is very important to keep things very simple and get
actors that don’t force their emotions, but just let them be there. If the
actor is not allowing himself to really feel pain or suffering or sadness
the audience won’t believe him or her and leave the fiction immediately.
Also I strongly believe that most of the times if you show the evil
(monster or devil…) the fear is gone. I love it when you leave it up to
the audience’s imagination. And what every human imagines in their own head
will always be the most frightening for that person.
Well, I hope we reach our goal on our Kickstarter campaign to finish the
post production. Mamiko Motto will create the original score for it. Any
help is so much appreciated. We want the film to be shown everywhere
around the whole world.
CHECK IT OUT and join us on this ride to put classic Polanski horror back
on the map!!!
Kickstarter: https://www.kickstarter.com/