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| Room Taken |
A homeless man with nowhere else to go surreptitiously takes refuge in the home of a blind stranger in Oscar-shortlisted short film Room Taken, but this is less the thriller that it might sound like and more a taste of something magical. Stars Gabriel Adewusi and Brid Brennan bring deep sensitivity to a story which flips stereotypes on their heads and finds strength and vulnerability in unexpected places.
Director TJ O’Grady Peyton was not available to talk about the film because he’s been in Los Angeles to organise a screening which, in the end, he had to ask people to stay away from because the wildfires made moving around the city too dangerous. Writer Michael Whelan and producer Colman Mac Cionnaith were able to meet, however, both understandably excited about the progress of their work.
It was influenced in large part by one of his family members, Michael tells me – a blind Frenchwoman with whom, not having a shared language, he learned to communicate in different ways. Spending time with her also led to the realisation that sometimes they could be in the same room without her being aware of his presence. Later, something he happened to see cemented the story is his mind.
“I was cycling to work and I saw an elderly man walking on the street, and there was a homeless person walking behind him. I have quite a strong imagination, so if I'm idle in traffic, I just daydream. And I was just like, ‘What if this happened?’ You know? So I guess a lot of those things came together and informed what became the foundation for the story.”
From the outset, he was determined to do justice to Victoria, the blind character.
“From my perspective, in terms of writing it, I was very conscious to not make her into some kind of bumbling blind character with the jokes being at her expense,” says Michael. “She’s quite an independent person. She might be visually impaired, but that doesn't mean she can't live on her own. But in terms of the actual practical qualities of the authenticity, there was Dolores.”
“Dolores Cullen is an amateur actor with a drama group called Sightless Cinema,” says Colman. “It's all blind actors. And we were working with her a lot. We were doing some rehearsals with her and she's an amazing, amazing character. She's so funny and she really is larger than life. And there was one day when we arrived at her house before she got back from her errands. A car pulled her up at the house. Nobody got out of the car with her. She just got out of the car, walked around the car, into her gate, up the driveway, key in the door, and it was just easy. She was obviously blind and she was finding a way, but there was no clumsiness about it.
“When we were in her house, she knows where everything is, so there was no fumbling about the place. It's her domain. And I think that's really what we were looking for. When Isaac trespasses into Victoria's space, it's him that's different. So we wanted to show that when she's walking around, this is an independent woman who is living alone, but is not isolated or struggling with anything. She's just living alone, and she's able to live alone.
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| Room Taken |
“Brid Brennan, who plays Victoria, spent a day. First, she spent the day with Dolores, just talking to her, watching her how she moves and getting to know more about living with blindness. And then the next day, we brought Brid to the house that we shot in, and she spent the day walking around the house and with TJ and with Gabriel, and choreographing how she might move about the house.”
We talk about the techniques through which they sought to balance the tension in the story. Isaac, the intruder, is a big guy, and traditionally, in a situation like this, we would be concerned about Victoria’s safety – but here we see and understand both her strength and his vulnerability.
“When you have characters and you're writing a story, you want there obviously to be an element of tension, but you want there to be an element of believability,” says Michael. “I wouldn't have written it if I didn't think that this could be potentially something that somebody could do. Obviously, what he does is not something that you should do. There's a lot of grey areas. I think in terms of his actually going into the house, I think it's him knowing that he's not a threat to her. He’s obviously taking advantage and doing something wrong, but he also knows that he can repay her in some way. All he wants is shelter and some peace and quiet and a warm home to be in, but in terms of bringing that to life with the casting of the characters, Colman, you might want to talk about this – that idea of striking that balance between the selfishness but also the kindness that Isaac brings out through his experience living in her home and growing closer to her.”
“In the script that really comes across, that Isaac is extremely vulnerable and in a very dangerous place himself,” says Colman. “He's almost more isolated than Victoria is. When we originally auditioned Gabriel, when we got him in the room, it was amazing how, as you said, he's not a small guy. He's very broad. He's got muscles, he's got big arms – but he was able to immediately become so small and timid and empathetic, just with small looks and small movements in his eyes. So it was so easy to decide this is our Isaac.
“We really wanted, in the moment where he decides he's going to stay and closes the door, that the audience is rooting for him, because it'd be very easy to mess that up. Within the space of a minute, Gabriel is able to come across in such a delicate and empathetic way that when he makes that decision, any audience that I've sat in a screening with has rooted for him in that moment, which is really, I think, a testament to Gabriel's acting.”
I ask if I’m right in thinking that it's his first ever film as well.
“It's his first lead role. I think he's done a handful of things before, but yeah, I mean, we struck gold.”
How did they approach doing justice to a homeless character?
“I haven't done any volunteering about homeless people, but I've always been very conscious to make time for homeless people,” says Michael. “I think a lot of people have a tendency to see homeless people as people who maybe are in that situation because of choices they've made in their life, not realizing that sometimes circumstances are out of our control. I think it's important to remember that they’re still people at the end of the day and they deserve respect and a bit of empathy.
“I think that's one of the main messages of the film. This film is essentially about two strangers unknowingly helping each other in life in small ways. I like the idea of the film getting across that even just being kind to a stranger on the street, or whatever it is – we've all got stuff going on in our lives and we might not be homeless, we might not be visually impaired, but at the same time, just being kind to each other makes it easier for everyone, you know what I mean?”
Colman explains that TJ used to volunteer at a charity providing services for homeless people.
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| Room Taken |
“He got to know a few of the characters and a few of the people around Dublin who he would have interacted with while he was working there. So while I'm not sure he did any specific research to the film, he said from the experiences of volunteering with the homeless charities, he had an idea of the world and the characters that he dealt with. And then in research leading up to the film, he spoke to a few professionals who deal with asylum seekers, so there was some research done there specifically, rather than with homelessness.”
“RADE as well,” says Michael. “RADE is a theatre group for recovering people with substance abuse disorders and people who've experienced homelessness as well, so we actually cast some of those people in the film. They were extras in the social workers scene near the start. There are people who are in recovery and who are homeless as well.
“I think one of the trickiest things to achieve with shorter form storytelling is getting that balance of drama. This film has a nice balance of tension and levity in it as well, but I guess the really tricky thing is getting some kind of emotional payoff that wraps everything together at the end. I think it's mainly that instead of having a big dramatic thing where somebody saves the day, it comes down to realism and also just like, what is the message our film is trying to get across and what is the most effective way of doing that? I think in short films especially, having some kind of twist at the end is a way to make them really memorable and have a nice payoff as well because, you don't have the time like you do in a longer form film to develop the characters and have them go through this massive arc.”
Finally, how do they feel about being on the Oscar shortlist? Another Irish film, Clodagh, has also been nominated, and it’s an exciting time generally for Irish cinema.
“Absolutely,” says Colman. “Absolutely. It's still kind of surreal to think that we're on the shortlist. It really hasn't been long since we got the news and then it was Christmas and then New Year and it was just kind of non-stop, and now they're voting for the nominees. We did a screening with Clodagh, with Portia [A Buckley], leading up to the shortlist vote, and that was actually my first time seeing it and it is such a terrific short as well. And I think what is really nice is that our film and Clodagh lean towards lightness and hope. Theirs is a little bit more comic than ours, but I think both films are quite grounded in reality and have a little bit of hope and lightness to them, which is maybe why they're both doing so well.
“More broadly, the Irish film industry is really at a big point, especially in recent years, and you've got Colin Farrell just winning Best Actor [in a Limited/Anthology Series] at the Golden Globes. We're getting real recognition globally, which is amazing.”
“I'm all new to this,” says Michael. “This is my first production. I don't know the industry in the way TJ or Colman do, but just the support you get from something like having the funding that you get from Screen Ireland – we funded this film through their Focus Short scheme, which is on the higher bracket of budget for short films – they're really good at finding new voices and taking chances on things and having a broad portfolio of different genres and things that touch on different themes. And I think it's just that taking those risks with people is starting to pay off.”
“Yeah. Screen Ireland really are creative led rather than anything else,” says Colman. “I think that's why they were able to take a chance with a first time writer who had a great script. They were fantastic to work with and they're definitely central to the success of Irish film at the moment. Not just with Room Taken, but with film in general.”
