Neon Spring by MatÄ«ss Kaža (© Aija MelbÄrde)
Young Latvian director
Matīss Kaža is now finalising post-production on his second fiction feature, a drama entitled
Neon Spring. The story of this new film, penned by the director himself in tandem with
Marija LuÄ«ze Meļķe, centres on a 20-year-old woman called Laine. Following her parentsâ separation, her father becomes emotionally estranged and her ten-year-old brother Bruno starts having trouble at school; furthermore, she isnât ready to take up her motherâs duties. At a drugged-up rave, Laine befriends seasoned partygoer Gunda. Their relationship suddenly â and unexpectedly â becomes intimate. The neon spring of Rigaâs techno scene blossoms, and Laine begins to question her sexuality and identity at a time when her family is falling apart. She finds an escape in the drugs, clubs, festivals and afterparties as she struggles to hold together her fast-dissolving relationship
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Jaagup Metsalu, animation and VFX art designer
Albert Kerstna, and sound designer
Saulius UrbanaviÄius. The filmâs score is courtesy of
Zigmantas Butautis and the director himself, who also recorded vocals for the songs.
Speaking about his sources of inspiration, VildžiÅ«nas told Cineuropa: âI started experimenting with lucid dreaming a long time ago and, since then, have been nurturing the idea of making a film out of it. Since ancient times, sleep has been compared to death, and death to a dream. When I changed the word underworld to dreamworld in my mind, the myth of Orpheus opened up before my eyes with a new, fascinating meaning⦠Imagery from Lithuanian folklore and from artists such as Pieter Bruegel, wildlife photography and 3D animation were used to capture the right atmosphere in order to convey to the audience the expansive nature of this story and the main characterâs journey through a dream world in search of his dead loved one.â�
Robi Urs play other significant characters in the feature.
Producer Gabriela Suciu tells Cineuropa that it was lucky that the shoot had almost wrapped before the pandemic struck, as “the budget for COVID-related safety measures for a feature with a small team can easily exceed €10,000 [in Romania]. [Romanian] producers faced difficulties in meeting budget requirements even before the pandemic, and now, besides not having access to support in this regard, we have no idea when a new project competition will be organised by the National Film Center.”
Alina Grigore says that she started researching the topic more than a decade ago, when she wrote short stories exploring the challenges faced by young Romanian women in rural areas. She quotes statistics showing that less than 2% of these women succeed in graduating from university. As for her directorial approach, she says that she “strongly believes in collaborative art”, meaning that the entire team, including the DoP and the