Why ‘Drowning Dry’ Director Laurynas Bareisa Told Actors Not to Land Jokes and Has Hope for Cinema as a “Place of Freedom”
To say that Lithuanian filmmaker Laurynas Barei?a’s debut feature Pilgrims was a success is an understatement. First, the crime drama won the Horizons section award for best film at the Venice Film Festival 2021. Then, it became Lithuania’s entry for the best international feature film race.
The set-up for the film is simple: A woman travels to a small town with the brother of her ex-boyfriend who was killed there in a violent tragedy. The two retrace his steps to try and unravel the circumstances of his death. But there is more going on than first meets the eye.
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On Saturday afternoon, Barei?a world premiered his sophomore feature in the Locarno Film Festival‘s international competition lineup, for which a jury led by Jessica Hausner will decide the awards. He handled writing, directing, and cinematography duties on the movie, which was also produced by his production firm Afterschool.
Seses (Drowning Dry) is about “a group of people dealing with an almost tragic event,” Barei?a says in a note on the website for the 77th edition of Locarno. While the Lithuanian title means “sisters,” the English one refers to a nonmedical term used to refer to acute lung injury resulting from underwater accidents. “I used the irregular repetition of the dry drowning condition as a structural element of the story to highlight the various ways of dealing with trauma,” explains the filmmaker.
Check out a trailer for the film, which is part of a strong presence of Lithuanian films at Locarno, below.
Before the world premiere of Drowning Dry, Barei?a talked to THR‘s Georg Szalai about how he approaches dialogue, why he asked his cast members not to land jokes, and possible future projects.
People often say that the second feature can be such a challenge for filmmakers. How did you decide on your topic and did you experience any challenges or doubts after the big success of your first feature film?
No. For this film, the process was really connected to the first film. When that showed it, and because of the prize it won and everything, it was very hard psychologically to be in that moment. And this film, I just started writing because I had great advice: if you have problems, you just write through them. I kept myself busy. Developing the second film is difficult because people have different expectations. But it just came out.
For me, it’s like a companion to the first film. Because the first film was about the after and way after, and this film is more about being in this psychological state. The first film was a little bit more detached. In this film, I wanted to go into the most difficult moments. And it was very straightforward for me, I just kept working.
Your dialogue sounds very natural. What’s your secret for making sure dialogue is authentic?
For this film, I wanted the scenes to feel like you have maybe seen them before to move closer. There is repetition and you can kind of guess a psychological profile: “Oh, this guy is like this, that guy is like that.” And I think it disarms you. You see it as a spectator, and then these moments strike, and it becomes a tactic to get closer, to make it feel a bit cozier and more lifelike.
Because the film deals with certain topics, it becomes less expected. In these kinds of scenes, I want the viewer not to feel that these are overanalyzed caricatures. When people talk, they repeat things. And through this repetition, you can get to know and analyze certain topics in a different way. There are these emotions, but they are not too obvious.
Sometimes that was the most difficult part for me because I kept working with actors who had really good comedic timing, and I sometimes wanted them to not land the joke. This is very difficult. You can be serious or you can be funny. But if you are joking, but not landing it, there is a very strange emotion and strange feeling because you [as the viewer] also get that it’s not funny.
You should have me on set. I also often don’t land jokes.
This is very natural and very human. Sometimes if people are funny, they are funny. If people are scared, they are scared. But there’s some middle ground that makes you think about our relationships with each other but not in the sense of results but in the sense of a process of being together.
How much did you know or have to read up about the concept of dry drowning?
For that, I had consultations with doctors and paramedics. For me, it was also important metaphorically – like a symbol of our relationships that we sometimes get stuck in. We kind of feel that we are in a marriage, and it has to be loving and somewhere where we can breathe. But some relationships are like this: you are not underwater but drowning. So that was important for me.
Also, dry drowning is an urban myth. There are some stories going around among parents: a kid went to the pool and then he slept and he died while sleeping. This is medically incorrect. This is impossible medically. But this kind of urban myth tells me a lot about the psychology of the parent – you are always scared. You don’t have a kid, and you are free. And then somehow your whole life changes and you always see dangers. And you overcompensate, you are very protective. It keeps popping into your mind: “Oh, I need to check on it.”
Dry drowning is a symbol of this overprotection of kids because the real medical condition is very rare. I had conversations with maybe 10 paramedics, and no one has dealt with it in real life. What happens is very gradual, and it happens mostly after these kinds of almost-drowning events. After such events, as a procedure, you take a child to the ER. In the ER, they watch them, and the condition doesn’t develop as much.
I unfortunately don’t speak any Lithuanian. Can you please tell me a bit about the original Lithuanian title?
It means “sisters” because it was a very original name, and at the beginning of the film was this relationship between sisters. I kept it in Lithuanian because there is no other film with that title in Lithuania. We are a really small nation. But I decided that it would be useless to put a film called Sisters into the English sphere of films. So I decided to come back to the concept of the film and what ideas are in it, and I thought that Drowning Dry was a good and unique name that is also a good representation of what the film is about. It works literally and also [as a reference to the] themes of the film.
Are there any new projects you are developing?
Yes, I am writing a new film. I have two projects, and they are different. I’m now trying to write both first drafts, and then see where it takes me. But I think I will just start applying in autumn and just go on working.
Can you maybe also share what topics or themes you’ll explore?
I have one film about a fast-food delivery guy that is like a sci-fi film. It’s about a pair of people living in a car and working as food delivery people. The other is about this feeling of dread that hangs over the region – there is a war close by. It’s still very early but I am trying to catch something that hangs in the air and everybody can feel it but it’s hard to communicate about it.
Anything else you would like to highlight or mention?
I think we keep losing the feeling of cinema being surprising sometimes. It feels sometimes that what a film gives you in the beginning is also what you will receive in the end. There is always talk about what’s the danger of television for cinema, but I think film has to be released from the shackles of being logical. You can just bring an emotionally charged viewing experience. You don’t have to be super narrative. Cinema has an opportunity to reestablish itself because we are kind of at this crossroads.
Being surprised is a form of freeing your mind because if there’s too much structure, we have few places of mental freedom. Nowadays in media and culture, there is a lot of having to decide. Cinema could be a place of freedom.
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