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A sick elderly man, who's been living in reclusion since his family was brutally murdered 15 years ago, is paid a visit by a hired hit man, who discovers that the old man has one final and unexpected request.
Missive was a script that Daniel Bernardi originally began writing in mid 2005. His aim was to first of all construct the core of the story by using many autobiographical elements that were present throughout his childhood and adolescence. The themes of guilt, emotional blackmail, and redemption were a driving force behind the creation of this story.
“I wanted to combine elements of my past with some good original storytelling and the best way to do that was to pick a character type (i.e. hit man) that is least likely to be affected by emotional blackmail and guilt and make it my challenge to create a journey for that stern and detached character where he goes from no emotional involvement to being completely overtaken by it. I wanted a role reversal in the film, where all the seemingly weak characters are emotionally in charge of the stronger ones. The key to achieving that is to make the character vulnerable by giving him a conscience which is something he has never had before.”
Bernardi’s challenge was to get the character of Darius Satch to organically evolve into a whole new character within 15 minutes.
“It was a huge challenge. Not a lot of time to play with so I had to get right to the point. I wanted it to have the resonance of a feature film only in a shorter time span.”
Bernardi completed the script and then decided to look for a talented young director to helm the would-be film. Bernardi had met filmmaker/actor Gregory Pakis at the 2005 Melbourne Underground Film Festival which he was covering for Film Threat.
“It was the closing night after party and only a few minutes before I was about to leave this guy comes up to me wearing his face on a T-shirt asking if I can review his film.”
He reviewed the film and also interviewed Gregory and his alter-ego Garth and from then on Daniel and Gregory kept in touch. A couple of months after meeting Gregory, Daniel emailed him a copy of the script for Missive asking if he knew any young directors who might be interested in short film projects. Gregory told Daniel about Adam Stolfo who had just made the short film Alaina.
Adam and Daniel emailed each other back and forth but nothing seemed to come of it initially. Early in 2006, Adam and Daniel finally organized to meet each other. “I remember not really knowing what to expect from the meeting. We chatted for something like seven hours and after that I had a director. My voice was worn-out after seven hours of talking which is hard for anyone to inflict on me, so I figured if Adam could bring that energy to the direction he’ll be perfect. Adam was looking for the right follow-up film and I convinced him that Missive was the logical next film project for him as director as both films shared themes of solitude only in different ways. Adam impressed me a lot and he is the type of up and coming director that I was looking for who takes his craft very seriously. I also thought it would be an interesting collaboration as Adam’s influences and mine are totally different, his being James Cameron and Robert Zemeckis and mine being Martin Scorsese and Abel Ferrara to name but a few. Adam wanted the chance to just concentrate on directing and I gave him that opportunity. He’s great at what he does and he brought a lot to the table.”
The next thing on the list was for Daniel to raise the money for the film. “I had a couple of bites but in the end most people just seemed to be looking for coming of age or slice of life type stuff. All that did was motivate me to do everything I could to bring this vision to fruition. I didn’t want to wait for an interminable amount of time for someone to possibly put up the money and I also wasn’t totally sold on the idea of putting my own money into the project because I couldn’t really afford to part with it. I was between a rock and a hard place so to speak.”
Around March 2006, Gregory told Daniel about Paul Dowie, who produced his feature film as well as directed two other films. Daniel got in touch with Paul and the two then met at Café Sienna in Chapel St. “Paul basically said to me that either I can keep looking for financing or I could put my own money into the project and produce it myself which is what I really wanted in order to maintain complete control. From that moment on I hit the ground running and decided to dip into my life savings to finance the film.” Paul agreed to be script editor for the film as well as co-producing. Finally the film was beginning to take shape.
Adam went off to work diligently on the storyboards with Michael Hadjion while Paul and Daniel began to meet once a week to refine the script and make it as perfect as possible. “What a long process this was. We went through each word of the script and made numerous decisions, some which we used others which we didn’t.” This process took a couple of months until the pair felt that it needed no more work. “Paul is a real pro. We worked really well together. He sure knows his stuff and is a mentor to me. Paul went above and beyond and was my right-hand.” Now that the script was ready it was time for Daniel to make it all happen, he had decided the film had to be shot in Winter.
“Gregory hooked me up with well-known veteran actor Sean Scully. I sent him the script and two days later there’s a message on my phone from Sean saying he’ll do the film. Paul and I met with Sean the following week and I officially cast him on that day.” Adam was yet to meet Sean (in fact Adam only first met Sean a week before the shoot), but Daniel assured him that he cast the right actor for the part of Walter Boyle. On the same day as casting Sean Scully, Paul asked his friend and director of photography Anders Olson along to the café to meet Daniel. “Not bad, I walked into the café with nothing and left with an actor and cinematographer for the film.”
Daniel found it hard to find an actress to play the very personal character of June Fenton. One night while searching for an actress to play the character of June, Daniel had an edifying moment while watching an episode of Neighbours where he saw an actress playing a bit part on the show. He liked the look of her so he taped the end credits and looked her up. That actress turned out to be Michelle Cele. “I didn’t feel there was any actress in the country that fitted this part. That is until I found Michelle. I found her headshot online and realised that this was the face I envisioned while writing the June character. She was the one and after seeing her I knew I couldn’t settle for anyone else.” Daniel tracked Michelle down through a filmmaker who Michelle did some work for and he forwarded Daniel’s email to Michelle and then the next day Michelle contacted Daniel. “I was delighted to get an email back from Michelle. The next step was to hope that she liked the script. She did.”
The character of June is one of the more personal elements of Missive as she is based on Daniel’s half sister whom he has to this day never met. The final scene in the film is based on the day when Daniel was 17 and he received an anonymous phone call telling him that his father had another daughter. “I combined that experience with the curiosity of not having ever met my half sister and that is what formed the character of June and where she fits into the story.”
Daniel set-up a meeting with Michelle and he along with Adam and Paul all met with her. “I knew she was right for the part. In my mind I’d already cast her when we first shook hands. Adam and Paul agreed that she was a great choice.”
The grueling next step was to find an actor to play Darius Satch. The task proved to be difficult as there didn’t seem to be any actors who Daniel thought resembled this character. “I went hunting, looking at agents’ websites for faces that matched my vision of the character. I went to an agent’s website and looked through the actors and finally found our Darius.” Daniel liked the look of Paul Reichstein. “I thought he had this star quality about him, kind of reminded me of a cross between Christian Bale and Daniel Craig. In any case I wanted him to play this part.”
Daniel didn’t want to contact Paul through his agent so he took the back road and contacted a theatre company who he had worked with. “Loaded Productions I think it was. I contacted a guy there and he passed Paul’s contact details on to me.” Daniel sent Paul the script but didn’t hear back from him for a few days. Then he received a text message from Paul telling him he loved the script and asking if the part is still available. They had organized to meet the following week.
“Paul later told me that in the same week I sent him my script, he received a few other scripts for zombie movies that he didn’t like. He was reluctant to read Missive because he thought it was another zombie movie so he put it aside for a few days. He read it and then quickly contacted me to see if the part was still available. I’d have waited for as long as it took for him to make up his mind, that is how bad I wanted him.”
Daniel and Adam met with Paul and they hit if off and without even having seen Paul act, Daniel offered him the part of Darius Satch, perhaps one of the most complicated roles an actor could play. “I knew he was Darius and I didn’t need to go through that clichéd process of making him audition for us. I have had a lot of people who disagree with my method of casting without holding auditions, but hey when I know what I’m looking for I don’t need to see all and sundry. Plus I don’t believe you get a true indication of an actor’s talent through auditions. I’ve never liked it when I’ve auditioned for things. It’s ok for smaller parts but not the bigger roles. Actors weren’t used to being offered parts without auditioning. That’s the way I do things. Also being the writer you get an intangible gut feeling when you’ve hit a jackpot.”
The only role Bernardi auditioned was for John the Funeral Director and that was only because he didn’t have anyone picked for the part and two actors wanted it. “I put so much energy into finding Sean, Michelle and Paul that I overlooked the Funeral Director. I got an email from Andy McPhee who I knew by name from many films as he is one of my favourite Aussie actors. Seeing his name in my inbox forced me to get serious about this character. I wanted him for the part and we were close to starting production so I invited him along to one of our rehearsals where he read the scene with Paul. He blew us all away and got the part doing it.”
Missive began production on July 31, 2006 and wrapped on August 3, 2006 with an estimated budget of around $8,000. The shoot was short and intense and there were many set backs in pre and post-production. “Pre-production was a lot of hard work which saw me going through a huge emotional rollercoaster and frequent ephemeral bursts of extreme anger. The schedule I made was tight due to the small budget, but basically shooting the script with little deviation and all our hard work in pre-production made for a smooth fast shoot. Not to mention a good team of workers who helped make it all possible.”
“There are plenty of interesting stories behind the making of this film. I commend everyone's hard work and commitment to this special little film. It was a fun shoot and all involved fit right in. We were like a small vulgar dysfunctional family. I referred to us as a mafia family ...I was the Capo and they were my crew. I’ve met plenty of great friends through this film mainly because I tried to pick the best people for the jobs who were also cool people as well.”
A nihilistic film that is unlike many other contemporary Australian short films. The subject matter is about as disturbing as any film can get. The world Bernardi has created has every character forlorn of all hope where there is no happy ending. “There is a resolution but no happy ending. I threw in a glimmer of hope only to strip it away in an instant. My aim was to make the film delicately lurid. Adam, Paul and Anders understood this perfectly.”
“I hope you enjoy this tale from a very dark place in my mind. Some people will find it hard to deal with some of the themes in the film but ultimately it will stick with you. The reason the root of the film is so powerful and disturbing is because it all comes from a real place. I constructed a fictional wall around a non-fictional foundation. There is so much plot and back story to this piece that it will find life beyond its short running time and most importantly what we wanted to do is tell a good story which most filmmakers don’t do these days. I fought very hard to bring this vision to the screen but I did because I had a lot of faith in the project. I encountered hundreds of sleepless nights and poured blood, sweat and tears into this project and had a lot to prove. Also the risk of financing the film forces you to make all the best decisions within the budgetary restraints. It feels amazing to have all these great people working on something that originated in my head. What began as my baby has now become everyone’s baby. It was all made possible thanks to a small group of amazing individuals. I think it was all worth it. Hopefully you feel the same”
“I would like to first of all thank Adam Stolfo and Paul Dowie for dedicating lots of time and effort to the project and helping it become a good film - they were my wingmen and it wouldn’t have been half the film without them, our DOP Anders Olson for his expertise and providing the brilliant look of the film, Paul Houseman for an amazing score, Greg for introducing me to Adam and Paul, Nick Godkin for the great sound, Tamara Harris for her subtle makeup effects, John Fox for the great squib hits and for blowing me off my feet, Raelene for putting up with me and Richard W. Haines for his guidance and mentoring over the past few years which helped directly with this film and my career overall.
And a final thanks goes out to the entire cast: Paul Reichstein for being the nicest guy under the sun and a dream to work with, Sean Scully for his complete professionalism, Michelle Cele for her vivaciousness and hard work, Andy McPhee for his enthusiasm and huge input on our small film, Fr. Peter Edwards OSJ for giving the film plenty of authenticity and being a true sport, Zina Petridis and her daughter Lola for accepting the offer to act in a film even though they are non-actors, Tom Vogel for his ebullient dedication to up and coming filmmakers, Gregory Pakis once again, Michael Hadjion for rushing to the set straight from work for his role and late addition Heidy Medloby for showing up on a cold windy night and still giving it her all.
And to everyone else who helped out along the way. Thankyou so much for being a part of this film.”
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