DEMON
by Enea Colombi
Director
Enea Colombi
Produced by
Section80, BOROTALCO.TV
Filmed in Piacenza & Brescia, Italy.
How did the project come about?
One of my trusted partners met the brand owner at an event and introduced me to him. I immediately fell in love with the brand's storytelling and the aesthetic created behind it.
Tell us more about your personal idea behind it?
I've always been a fan of a dark, fairy-tale aesthetic, and this brand combined the world of fashion with a dark world that resonated with fantastic and natural images. It perfectly married the aesthetic and the world that I have long portrayed in my films, this time in a darker and more visionary key. The idea was to create a metaphorical narrative, made of images that evoke the spirit of the brand, a story that is not consumed but felt.
I wanted to create a film made of sensations, sounds, and breaths, an immersive film that could transport you to different dimensions, past dimensions intersecting with present ones. It is a continuous dialogue between space and time. A fundamental aspect was to deconstruct the shoes, starting from the concept behind them, researching materials and shapes that could evoke them. The film is a large mosaic of images that connect in the final frame, where we find all the elements that have accompanied us throughout the film.
I worked side by side with Luca Degani, the project's producer, who together with me curated the creative idea through constant brainstorming. In addition to this technical interpretation, there is also an underlying story, "In a land etched with scars, a loyal steed eternally awaits the impossible return of its knight" (Logline of the film), so it is a film that is melancholic but extremely raw and material at the same time, almost surgical.
I wanted to create a film made of sensations, sounds, and breaths, an immersive film that could transport you to different dimensions, past dimensions intersecting with present ones. It is a continuous dialogue between space and time. A fundamental aspect was to deconstruct the shoes, starting from the concept behind them, researching materials and shapes that could evoke them. The film is a large mosaic of images that connect in the final frame, where we find all the elements that have accompanied us throughout the film.
I worked side by side with Luca Degani, the project's producer, who together with me curated the creative idea through constant brainstorming. In addition to this technical interpretation, there is also an underlying story, "In a land etched with scars, a loyal steed eternally awaits the impossible return of its knight" (Logline of the film), so it is a film that is melancholic but extremely raw and material at the same time, almost surgical.
Where did you find the inspiration for this piece?
To be honest, I didn't include any references to other artists in the treatment to try not to be influenced in any way. The only reference we took was that of the final scene; we wanted the environment to remind us of the world of the Backrooms, a liminal space that could unite past, present, and future.
What had been the biggest struggles/hurdles on this one?
The biggest obstacle was dealing with a really small budget. As a result, we filmed with a very reduced crew all the outdoor scenes while waiting for perfect weather conditions. The shooting actually started in March and ended in April, totaling 6 days of shooting spread over several weeks. All areas required extreme caution, for example, for the swamp scenes it was complex to predict the water level changing daily, for the scene of the ruin with the horse instead the field was cultivated and we had to wait for the right moment to avoid having too mature vegetation.
Anything you especially learned from making the film?
To wait for the right moment.