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‘Invention’ Filmmakers Courtney Stephens, Callie Hernandez Talk Dead Dads, American Mythology and Innovative Filmmaking from Locarno
Director Courtney Stephens and screenwriter Callie Hernandez discuss the real-life influences behind their Locarno player, 'Invention.'
Los Angeles-based director Courtney Stephens, speaking with Variety about her Locarno-premiering film “Invention,” describes the machine as “the mystery at the center of the film.” Unsure of what to make of it—or of her father’s death—Carrie struggles to process the loss of a larger-than-life figure: a doctor turned “spiritual healer,” and a man whose trustworthiness was always in question. Stephens describes “Invention” as a “diary of its own making.” Created during the writers’ strike and shortly after the COVID-19 pandemic, the film’s format reflects both the freedom with which the co-writer/producers wanted to explore the story and the external circumstances that shaped its production. Along with cinematographer Rafael Palacio Illingworth and a handful of actors, Stephens and Hernandez embarked on a “shoestring” mission to demystify inscrutable emotional truths about unconventional modes of grieving and the house of cards that is the system of beliefs undergirding American life.
Or read this on Variety