Night Call is a action thriller that takes place on a fateful night in the life of a locksmith who opens the wrong door. Writer/Director Michiel Blanchart sat down at this years Fantastic Fest with The Cine-Men’s Brian Taylor to discuss his first feature length film.
Brian: So, the first thing I want to ask you is, obviously, Night Call takes place in one night.
So tell me, how did you come about that story?
Michiel Blanchart: I don’t know. I wanted to do a one night movie for so long, I had this
obsession. I don’t know why exactly I wanted my first movie to take place in one night in
Brussels, I think because I wanted my first movie to make a statement, to be a bold choice,
something with a clear concept. And I don’t know, I love my city at night. I was thinking about
[Steven] Spielberg’s first movie, Duel, and it takes place in only one day with a simple concept;
I wanted that kind of first movie. I’m a big fan of Collateral or Training Day, all the movies that
take place in a small amount of time.The part of movie making where I get the most anxiety is
writing and and it’s where I’m less comfortable and for some reason it worked out really good for
me to have this really clear box to play in. And like, it’s only one night, and so I can get lost, I can’t
write, like, okay, and then two weeks later, he meets his friends, who says that, and then he
goes to his mom, and then this and that, and I have just a few hours to get him from point A to
point B. It made it very playful to write it that way. So, it was less daunting to me.
Brian: I read somewhere that you picked this particular night. Am I correct on this? I guess
it takes place in 2020; maybe I read wrong.
Michiel: No, but it was probably misquoted. So, to make things clear, I started writing it in 2020
when we also had BLM [Black Lives Matter] riots, not riots, but marches, gatherings and so I
was very inspired by that. I tried to make it clear in the story that it’s happening today. First of all,
it’s not during covid or anything, nobody’s wearing masks and it felt disrespectful to me to set it
in a real specific event and I’d rather invent an event that was similar. So, my movie is more
about police brutality than about black lives matter. Our march, or gathering in Brussels, took
place during the day, not during the night. So, here I invented this, in French, we call it a nuit
blanche, the idea of staying up all night to pay homage to something or someone. And here it’s
a protest against police brutality, but it’s also an homage to a victim of politicality, that we totally
invented for the movie, because I didn’t want to put a real victim in the center of the movie,
which was distasteful to me. It was very inspired by those events but we totally invented this
night for the movie.
Brian: I’m glad you cleared that up.
Michiel: But it’s normal that you took it that way because I’ve read some articles where it
seemed that it was like that, taking place in 2020.
Brian: I really loved your cast, especially Jonathan Feltre as Mady; he really stood out. And I
want to know kind of how you casted him and really actually cast all your actors because they
actually all were really good and it brought something to the movie, so talk about the casting.
Michiel: To me, it was very important, and I don’t know if that’s because in Europe I’m
considered to have very American taste in my movie making. But maybe that’s the most
European part of me, is my work with the actors or my casting choices. I really wanted to make
a genre movie that wasn’t ashamed of what it was like to be bold with the camera, work with the
style, with all of that, making a real genre piece that is not afraid of being big and cool and all
that. But I think the characters cannot be aware of that. They cannot act like they’re gangster,
they just should act normal. And I wanted that contrast. I wanted to work with people that
weren’t cliched, that weren’t like the obvious bad guy. Like, for the main bad guy we didn’t take
someone who was like a ugly face or a muscular guy or or scary person. I wanted all the
actors to be released, to allow themselves to be really sensitive and fragile. For Mady, it was a
big, big search. We started the casting process even before we had financing for the movie. We
searched for a year, more or less, and saw almost a hundred people between Belgium and
France and we ended up finding Jonathan, who’s from Paris. There’s just more actors in France
than Belgium, so the math made it. I would have preferred a Belgium actor, because the movie
is originally from Belgium, but it’s a co-production. But we really needed someone who was able
to, like I said, allow himself to be vulnerable, to be really close to his emotion, to be generous, to
instantly create empathy, because there’s not a lot of backstory, there’s not a lot of room to
create empathy; we have to feel it immediately for this young guy and we want to root for him,
and also someone who has that, but also can bring a lot of strength and anger. And like, if he
looks at you with an angry eye, it can be really intense and scary. So, he was the only one that
really had all of that. The first tests that he did, we tested him a lot afterwards to be sure, but
already the first test I was reassured because most of the time when you hear your lines read
for the first time, acted for, you’re like,” oh, fuck, this isn’t really working, I need to rework all that
or find a solution, or it’s gonna be complicated.” And here he was, I think the only one where the
first scene in the test, I was like, “okay, no, this is actually working, he gets it and he can do it.”
And so, that’s why we picked him. He was great.
Brian: He was really great. Speaking of Mady, the character,I love the path that his character
took. So, can you talk about that character’s trajectory? Because, you know, he starts off as just
a guy doing a job and by the end of the movie it’s totally different but you really never know what
way he’s going, you kind of think, oh, like, this is what he’s gonna do or he’s gonna do that and
his character always surprises you around every corner. So, I’m curious, when you were writing
him as a character, if you can talk about that trajectory of him.
Michiel: That’s the entire reason the movie happened. Because, like I said, I wanted to do this
movie in one night, and I also wanted to talk about the locksmith, I thought it was such a great
starting point for a movie like what happens the night he opened the wrong door and then the
police brutality and all of this came together to form the movie, but it’s really this character that
made me want to to write it. I felt he was the kind of character we haven’t seen a lot of in
Belgium cinema, at least, and, and especially not in a genre action movie usually. If we have a
black locksmith that works night shifts, that has a problem with the police, or stuff like that, then
it’s probably gonna be a very realistic social drama. That’s our specialty in Belgium. And I love
those; those are great. But, I wanted to, for once, have that typology of character be a hero in
an action movie, you know. I think that’s all people also need, that kind of representation in our
country. That’s also why I love movies that are taking place in such a short amount of time as
how one night can change someone’s life and here the entire movie is a very accelerated
coming of age story. I wanted this very innocent guy who is just trying to make it work in this
very harsh and unfair world. And he’s just playing the game, you know, he doesn’t want to make
waves, he doesn’t want to attract attention; he’s studying during the day, he is working during
the night. He’s really playing the game, this ruthless game that he’s in, and he’s just doing what
everybody expects of him and at some point the female character says, “when are you gonna
stop doing what people tell you to do? Like, oh, open my door. Stay here. Wait for me to come
back, go get the money.” He’s always trying to please someone else or to find a way to play the
game and to get out of the situation without really deciding for himself what he wants to do. The
whole movie was structured around that idea of, I wanted this character to, throughout his
adventure in a very unfair and cruel world, finally find the courage to do what he seems to be fair.
And by the end, he finally makes a choice for himself, which is a very dangerous choice with
heavy consequences, but it feels like at the end, he finally finds himself.
Brian: It was a great moment. I love the moment. You obviously wrote the script, and you
actually kind of talked about the difficulties of writing, and I wanted to know, what’s your process
of writing?
Michiel: I only did shorts before that, so it’s hard for me to talk about a process, but I know that
I’m not comfortable in front of a blank page like most people and I’m not having so much fun
when I’m writing unless I’m already excited and I’m just putting it down on paper. But I can’t
stand just being in front of my computer at home and here, especially, because the movie takes
place in my own city. I actually had a process, and it was during my writing period. I just got out
of my apartment every morning, took my computer, and I walked to my producer’s office that
was on the other side of the city. I didn’t take my bike or any public transportation, I just walked
through the city. And so, the movie really came from the city of Brussel and that’s why I think we
used it so well in the movie, because it was really written in the city for the city, I was inspired by
the locations. And so my idea was, I took my time, I got lost a little, I walked to the office just
dreaming about the movie, about sequences I wanted to see, about emotions that I was feeling,
and getting inspired by the city itself. The big set piece with the elevator and in front of the
courthouse, all of that was very inspired by the city, and allowing myself to fantasize my city as
the arena for an action movie, which again, we don’t do a lot, I think we’re like a little shy, like,
“no, we can’t do that, it’s not allowed for us little Belgian people.” And so I really did that. And
once I arrived at the office, I wrote everything I imagined or if I was excited. And then as soon as
I wasn’t inspired anymore I wouldn’t force it, I would put the computer back in my bag, and start
walking again, going back home. And then once home, if I got inspired again, I wrote something
else, and I did that every day.
Brian: Just how long did it take you to write this script?
Michiel: Not that long, I don’t know, to get the first draft, I’d say, three months.
Brian: That’s not bad. And, what was the hardest scene to write?
Michiel: I guess it’s weird, it’s not gonna really answer your question, but it makes me think
about it. In the writing process, everybody really liked the first half of the movie in the script, like
the introduction of the character, and it was way longer than it is in the movie and everybody felt
it was such a strong beginning and then, when it becomes more of an action movie, everybody
was like, “wow, we’re not sure about this. It’s too much fighting and running around, and it’s
confusing, and it’s less strong than the start.” So, I reworked it a lot in my draft, but still we had
that complaint. And then when we had the first version of the editing, people were like, “ah, once
the movie gets going, it’s so great. But the introduction of the movie, it’s a little fast.” So, it was
really the opposite. So really, how on the paper, it’s not the same in the movie. What I rewrote
the most was probably the action bits, to make it clear that those were actually narrative
moments, and that there was emotion involved and that the character was making hard choices
and all of that. But probably it does seem that I reworked the most, I guess it was around the
nightclub, all of that thing and in the basement and getting all the information out. The character
of Claire [Natacha Krief] is so important, and the hero has only two scenes with her in the entire
movie, like at the start and that scene; and maybe those are the two scenes that I rewrote the
most, because the heart of the movie is between them, and they only have those two big
scenes. So, it was a lot of work to get some, not romanticism, it’s like you have the idea of a
romantic encounter, but it’s not a love story; it’s more two strangers that meet and that
something happens between them. They’re similar, they’re both like trying to get out of their day
to day shitty lives. It was so important to feel their connection because they’re enemies most of
the time, so we needed to still feel for both of them. And there were so many things to do in so
little time in this basement where he is torturing her, and then they’re trusting each other, and
then by the end, they’re kind of helping each other out without ever really saying it. It was really
difficult to get all of that right.
Brian: That scene you mentioned in the basement of the club; that scene is just another
example of surprises that your movie does, things that happen that you don’t expect to happen.
That’s hard because as you watch movies, and you realize, oh, this is what’s gonna happen, it’s
gonna go to Point A, it’s gonna come to Point B. But when things change and things happen
that you’re not expecting, you know, there was a really good moment that, in the audience I was
with, kind of shrieked, because no one expected what happened. You’re like, “oh, okay, this is
where we’re going.” As I mentioned before, that Mady’s character, you can see based on his
face, you’re thinking, this is what he’s doing and based on some of his actions; but then he
might do something all of a sudden like, okay, what are we at? And he walked a line that kept
you guessing the whole time, which I think is really hard as a character.
Michiel: That was one of the fun parts of the movie. I really love that kind of movie. You hit the
ground running and you don’t have much information on anybody. And I love to have a
backstory for everybody and all of that and I wanted you to feel it. I don’t want to be as extreme
as Christopher Nolan, who just doesn’t give anything anymore about his character; I think he’s
great, by the way. But I love to get more emotional with my characters, but just doing a lot with a
little, like the song he listens to, we listen to this CD of his mother at some point. We understand
his mother is dead, so we understand he’s probably very alone and, and we understand that she
has a complicated relationship with her brother, and that he tries to get him out of there. We
don’t know much, but we know enough to get our imagination started. And I think that was fun
with the character of Mady, is that we’re discovering him throughout the entire movie, because
we know so little about him. So, he’s only defined by his actions, and sometimes his actions are,
like, you say, surprising. We know he has kind of also a dark path, that he did do robbery once,
but probably just some youth mistake with bad influence or something. But you’re never quite
sure what he is capable of. And, so in that moment in the movie, before he attacks Claire, I
wanted the audience to be like, “oh shit. This guy seemed nice, he seemed honest.” We see at
the start of the movie he says, “no, it’s not 250, it’s €200 for the girl.” He seems to be alright, but
now we’re like, okay, I actually don’t know that guy, maybe he is capable of the worst, and he is
in this anti-hero in the sense that he is actually a good guy trying to be a bad guy to survive in this
horrible world. And in the end, I think we’re relieved as an audience, because we’re like, “oh no,
he’s not able to be that person. He’s trying to be tough, but he actually is a sweet guy, and he’s
just trying his best.” And I think it’s exciting to them, until the end, because we’re still discovering
him, and he’s also discovering himself. The entire movie he is trying to be someone, and at the
end, I think he found who he is.
Brian: No, I agree. I loved his path. So, the movie’s full of action, especially in the second half,
including a great car chase, what was the hardest scene to shoot?
Michiel: Everything was very hard, just because shooting at night with such a tight budget, we
had to run around everywhere because there’s so many locations. The two hardest were the
chase through the crowd, we only had less than 200 people, so it was very difficult to make it
seem like there were more people with the smoke and sounds. That day was very difficult,
because, again, we had those people for only one night. And we had only one day where we
had three cameras and a drone and a steady cam and to coordinate all of that was very different
from the other days where it’s much more intimate; we have a very small crew. So, here I was,
more of a captain of armies and orchestrating all of that and they’re shooting something there,
and don’t know exactly what they’re doing, so that’s stressful to me. Everything was very
prepared, but then at the end, you have to let go a little and that was kind of chaotic. But the
people around me, my collaborators, were amazing. And that day, the main actor, he had pain in
his stomach. We didn’t identify quite what it was, maybe stress. Also, he’s pretty young, it was a
pretty big deal for him, this movie. And so that day he was three hours late because he had to
go to the hospital. So, I was so nervous; it was the most expensive day and he came three
hours late. So, we were shooting like other stuff without him, hoping that he would finally show
up, and if he didn’t show up, my movie would be ruined. That day, and the other day was less
stressful and more fun, but really complex, was the subway scene with the bike. It was the last
day of shooting, because when we started shooting we weren’t sure we would get all the
permits, because we needed the permits from the subway company, from the city, from the
district, from the security guys, from the police that was nearby, because it’s not the best
neighborhood, where the subway is, but it’s the only one where that shot could work. We
needed to find solutions because the drone couldn’t do exactly the path we wanted; the bike
couldn’t go on the escalators and so you had to go on the other stairs. And suddenly, right
before shooting, they installed windows that would prevent the drone from going through, so we
had to get the permit to get rid of one of the windows and put it back afterwards and they’re not
used to doing that kind of stuff in Brussels. So everyone is like, “wait, what? You wanna do
what?” We really have to prove that we are prepared and safe. I did an animatic in 3D myself
to show exactly the move and be really precise. So,it’s two different shots. It’s one drone shot
with a stunt guy, and then at the end there’s a hidden cut, and it’s the real actor, and a steadicam
when he goes into the train. We finally did have all the permits, so I was so relieved. But then it’s
the last day of shooting, we can’t do it another day, we have to do it today. We only have four
hours because it’s between the last subway and the first subway in the morning. And so we
have to get in, rehearse, shoot, get out, all that in less than four hours, something that we
prepared a lot, but never could try out. It was very stressful. And once the train starts, it takes an
hour to get back in place so we could only do it in its entirety once. So once he starts, we don’t
have time to do it again. And so each time, if there is a little problem, I was like, get, get, get, get
before the train leaves. And then at some point the guy from the subway came and said, “okay,
in fifteen minutes the subway will start again. So this is your last shot. Whatever happens, you
can’t say cut before the end.” And this is the shot that was in the movie.
Brian: I was gonna say it all worked out, because it’s a great sequence. I loved going down the
stairs and going through the turnstile that happened. That was just perfect. And it was a great
sequence, so it worked all out. So, you get all stressed about it and in the end, you’re like, that’s
exactly how I saw it in my head.
Michiel: I mean, we did a few tweaks. It’s not perfect, but it’s close enough.
Brian: So this was your first feature. I know you said you worked on some shorts. So what are
some things that you will take away from this that will help you on your next film?
Michiel: There are two things I wanna say. Most important is that you have to be with the right
people. I couldn’t have done this movie with people that I didn’t trust that much; I’m talking about
the cast, I’m not gonna say names, but the people. You feel people where you’re not really
connecting, and then you have to pay that afterwards. And here, in this movie, I was so blessed
to have people who wanted to be there for the right reason. There is one famous actor in the
movie, Romain Duris. And he’s pretty famous in France. He was so great to work with, he didn’t
need to do that movie, he just wanted to, he loved the script. My crew, the DP [Director of
Photography], is like my closest friend, and I’m really hoping that we can have him with us for
the American project that I’m gonna do, hopefully. So, be sure to have the right person because
it’s gonna be fucking hard. And the other thing, naively, I thought that making a feature film was
just ten times more work and longer than doing a short, but that it was basically the same thing,
but just more of it. And what I didn’t realize, that was very disturbing to me, because I’m not
used to that, is that a short film is one or two weeks max shooting. And so when you start
shooting, everything’s ready. You’ve seen every set, you’ve seen every costume, you’ve
validated everything and you know exactly what you’re going to do for the next ten days. Here,
it’s eight weeks. And when you start shooting, two thirds of the things that you need for the
movie you haven’t seen yet, they’re not ready. Most of the sets are not ready, most of everything
isn’t ready. And so, and like I said, for the subway scene, we weren’t even sure if we would have
the permits at the end, but just at some point you have to start shooting, and because it’s so
long and you have your crew, the crew is so big, and so you have people working everyday
in the office or the set department is making stuff. I mean, I knew all of that, but I wasn’t
aware how stressful it would be for me to start something. It felt like nothing was ready, you
know, and you jump from the cliff hoping that your wings will grow during the fall.
Brian: And I guess you’ll say they did.
Michiel: Yeah, we landed okay.
Brian: I would say so. I would love to know the kind of people, the writers and directors, that
kind of influenced you and obviously some of your favorite movies that you liked growing up.
Michiel: Well, this is really not original, but I’m pretty sure Spielberg was the one who made me
want to do movies. I know for a fact that Jurassic Park is the first movie I saw in my life. I was
born the same year that it came out and I think I saw it on VHS when I was three years old. So,
Spielberg’s Duel was a big influence here. Obviously, De Palma, I mean, there are a lot of Carilto’s Way in this. I think maybe that in a weird way it doesn’t look at all like it’s inspired by George
Miller, but maybe the one who influenced me the most in this idea is that you can really tell the
story in a kinetic way and have the emotions come from the action scenes and really tell the
story through action, and not have like he says, the talking bits and the action bits, and really
mix it all together and that an action scene can be beautiful and emotional. And I mean, he’s not
the only one who does that, but he’s the one who taught me that. Like I said, Michael Mann
Collateral, obviously, probably, without that movie, this one wouldn’t exist. I think some of
[Martin] Scorsese’s, obviously, After Hours, but even more, Bringing Out The Dead; I really love
that movie. We were inspired a lot by the atmosphere of that movie, the night and the city. The
Safdie brothers also. Good Times, obviously, or even Uncut Gems, the energy that they bring to
it is very different from my style. I’m more classical in my blocking and all of that, but I really try
to bring some of that kind of energy to the characters and to the situations.
Brian: Those are all great. You can see those influences. The other movie that just reminded
me of was, I think it’s like six, seven years old now, Victoria, you remember that film?
Michiel: Yeah.
Brian: Because it’s also kind of a one night film about a person just kind of put into a situation,
not necessarily like, you know, it’s like, “all right, this is what we’re gonna do.” It’s like, “oh well,
now I’m in this. How am I gonna get out?”
Michiel: We also rewatched that. We had a cinema club with the crew, and for months
before shooting, we watched one movie every week all together, to just get on the same page,
have the same DNA. And I love doing that. I love creating that emotion with the crew. And
everybody wants to make the same movie, everybody gets excited.
Brian: Actually, I’m curious about that. When you have your next idea, you already have your
next film that you’re gonna do, are you gonna create a so-called playlist? And be like, this is
what we are going for.”
Michiel: I hope so. It’s very weird because I’m really jumping into the unknown here. I’m used to
making movies with my friends in Brussels, so everything makes sense, we hang out together
all the time, we watch movies together, we create. So, here, I hope I’ll be able to create that
same and I think I have to even more, because I will not know most of the crew to get them into
it. But, I don’t know where it’s gonna be but probably. When I did the short, I remember, and it’s
kind of funny because now we’re working on the adaptation with Sam Raimi as a producer, but
at the time, I didn’t know anybody in the US, and when I pitched that project, the short film, I
said, “okay, imagine if we did Ghost but it was written by Charlie Kaufman and directed by Sam
Raimi.” I mean, that was kind of the weird thing that I was going for. And now to actually be
working with Sam Raimi on this project feels so, so great.
Brian: That’s pretty crazy. Thank you for your time and I look forward to seeing your next movie.
