Obsession' Interviews with Curry Barker, Inde Navarrette and Michael Johnston

It was really just me in my bedroom chipping away at this thing. Really? To a certain extent. I just want to emphasize that. I had already had this idea about obsession and kind of exploring that as a theme because I think that there's something about human behavior when you're obsessed with something that's to be studied. Imagine a person being obsessed with another person and how crazy that could get. And so that was actually an idea that I had had for a while. And then the Simpsons episode kind of just sparked that my way in to break into that story was through a wish. And then it kind of all clicked into place. Like, oh, I see, I could do this obsession idea by making it like a wish-gone-wrong type of film. I mean, the undertaking of editing a feature film was something I'd only done one time. I've been editing my whole life, so I've kind of been preparing for it my whole life, but I've never edited a movie of this scale. So technically speaking, that was a pretty big undertaking for sure. And especially pretty much by myself. For example, in this next one, I have an assistant editor. I have a post supervisor. A lot of that stuff didn't come to me for this movie until it got picked up at TIFF and then the ball started rolling a little quicker. But it was really just me in my bedroom chipping away at this thing, the scene where they're driving and she's talking about romance and love. And she's saying like, hey, you know, you're the only person I can talk to about this stuff. That scene changed so much. There's probably like 10 different versions of that scene. One that's a little longer, one that's shorter, one where she doesn't even say that line, one where he goes into a longer thing. Like, I don't know why, but that scene just has so many different versions of it. I can't speak for Nikki, but I, you know, I thought about that. And I'm thinking, you know, Bear's not like the ugliest guy. He said. You know, but I think confidence is key. And I think maybe he could have had a shot or at least, you know, maybe he could have, I mean, the outcome would have been a lot better for him. Let's just put it that way. I mean, I don't know. Well, I can tell you what wouldn't have happened is this movie, so. Exactly. Yeah, that's just not the film, you know, so. But that's a great way. I don't know. What do you think? What would have Nikki, how she would have responded to that? Seems like she wasn't into it. Well, long story short, because everything's from Bear's perspective is Bear doesn't really know how Nikki feels. So me and Curry played with the idea of whenever we did certain takes, we played one where like she is super interested. We did another where he, she wasn't. And so in the editing process, kind of marrying those together to also see it from Bear's perspective of like, how does she feel? So ultimately, because it is from Bear's perspective, we don't really know. But speaking as Nikki, I think that there's a little inclination of like, you would treat me right. Really? To a certain extent. I just want to emphasize that. But like in the beginning, like he's a good guy. What she really brought that I really appreciated was she brought a personality trait to the real Nikki that I did not anticipate. I mean, I had written Nikki as this really sweet girl next door, you know, kind of like the dream girl of any guy that's kind of like, she's so sweet. She's got a heart of armor and just, you know, she gives money to the homeless person. And, you know, you can see that she's really got empathy. But what Indy brought was this like bro-y type of, like sassiness to Nikki that I didn't anticipate, but ended up working really well for the movie because it kind of emphasizes that Bear is totally in the friend zone. And so it really like she kind of brought this sassiness that surprised me and I was like, oh, I love this. But then with the horror stuff, it was just a lot of conversations about what this movie is and what this movie is not. And really trying to show, we watched films together, like certain references. Sometimes we would just watch clips of certain films, but I also showed her things that it wasn't. Like I would purposely go out of my way to look up films and be like, this is not what we're doing. Because it's very specific what we were trying to do. You know, we didn't want it to feel so demon possessed. We wanted it to feel like kind of a realistic situation, right? I think that that might be why this movie resonates so much with people because you can see yourself or like elements of people you know, or just society through the relationships, the complicated relational dynamics in this movie. So I think not focusing on the lore of the One Wish Willow was really smart. And I like to tell Curry, it's like, now you have sequels you can explore it with. But you know, I do love, I'm reading some comments and things. Some of the things people are coming up with are crazy and it really gets your mind going. Like, is it a demon from hell coming up? It's not demonic. I don't want to emphasize that. But yeah. It's actually not. I didn't think about it when we were shooting, but you must have thought about it more, right? No, because Curry really nipped that in the butt in the very beginning of the process. It was not demonic. It wasn't a possession. It was a wish. And it was kind of like, for her, it was almost like this draw to him. I have this, like, veil that's over everything while the other Nikki is inside, kind of peeping through that sheer material. But yeah, it was never anything of that sort. But I'd love to hear where people are going with it. When you're writing a story like this, you have to kind of come up with, like, what's the craziest thing that could happen right now that still could, like, make sense for the story and not feel like it goes so far that, like, it doesn't feel silly. And the cat sandwich was the perfect meal. There was only, like, one thing that I had to take out because it was too far. But other than that, they really let me do whatever I wanted. And I was kind of, like, shocked. Like, this movie really felt like a bunch of kids getting together and making something and, like, hoping that the parents don't come home. And, like, they never did. Like, nobody ever stopped us. And we just kept making the thing we wanted to make. Like, even the way we shot it, we thought someone was going to tell us we got to turn the lights on or that we... Like, I was waiting for someone to tell us we have to move the camera more, like, get more coverage. And nobody did. They let me do what I want. And we were really happy about that. Well, Michael's a phenomenal voice actor. So I got a lot of tips and tricks from him about how to, like, preserve my voice and how to not lose it. Because obviously, hitting octaves and warm-ups and, like, different things like that. I mean, we only did it, like, once or twice. But just kind of... He would see that my voice is getting hoarse and he's so kind. He'd be like, hey, this tea's really great and this is really wonderful. And, like, you should try this. So that really allowed me to kind of maintain not losing my voice with everything that I do in the film. But also, we just kind of went there. My goal for the film was kind of just... I have an opportunity and I'm going to do everything humanly possible that I can that's within my wheelhouse and just have fun doing it. Have you decided, like, who was on the other line? Well, that was me. I don't know if you know that. It was you? Yeah, that's my voice, yeah. Oh, that's crazy. Yeah, I know. But what is he doing there? I mean, he works for the One Wish Willow company. He kind of answers their phone calls. He handles the complaints of all the wishes. But there's no... I mean, I like to keep it pretty vague. You could think of it as some sort of purgatory that she's being kept in, right? But, like, who knows? I think, personally, I think my personal interpretation was that she saw a lot of different things after a while. And so she kind of knows what's going on and she's just grieving. And obviously, grieving is different for everybody. But I think it's just starting her journey of grief. So she's like, she has seen a lot of what's going... She's not just coming from not knowing anything. Yeah. Oof, that sucks. Like, almost she saw it, but she didn't have any control over it. Like, she just had to watch it. Yeah, I had the idea that she gained strength over time. Like, she can fight with him. Or not him, she can fight with herself. And so in my interpretation of it, she starts to see through the veil later on versus in the beginning. It's more of a popping in and out of like, wait, where was she? We played with the idea of the last place that she was as Nikki was the last place that she saw. So that's why she goes, wait, where are we? She probably goes to jail. She's probably going to prison for a very long time. There's also like a billion dollars in Ian's house and Ian's dead on the floor. So she's connected to that money in some way. Who knows what the cops are gonna kind of put together as the story. But she's not gonna have a very good life, I don't think. I mean, there's definitely movies that I wanna do before moving on to another idea. But I really do. I think there's so much to be explored with The One Wish Will Owe. And I think I would be excited to do it again, yeah. I wish Nikki Freeman loved me more than anyone in the entire world.