Setting Up the World

Location 01, Anwar Al-Sabah Complex

The location was selected to present the story’s city ground atmosphere and how dirty and dark it is. We wanted to show how some people are searching and calling for the VOICE while vandalizing the streets. The scene composition and lighting, camera movement, and the way these actors moved in the scene were all decisions made to add up to the mystery and theme of the story.

Location 02, Kuwait City

The scene started with a pan shot, revealing the wanting and warning papers on the wall. It was our answer to how to show to the audience the government’s point of view in the story. The protagonist takes one of these posters and reveals what’s written on it. “Do not follow the VOICE and run away if you hear the VOICE”. This message is what later the protagonist will face to choose between following the VOICE or not.

Location 03, Abandoned Building

The end of the maze, the key room is the portal to the other world. It is where the protagonist finally trusted the VOICE, and she will get rewarded for that.

This scene was the first thing we imagined in the story. We imagined the wind, the sound, VFX, and the candles to capture this magical feeling. The challenging part was the need to set up all lighting: filling, back, and key light. It was the most enjoyable setup we did in the film.

Location 04, Subiya

The ending scene can be interpreted differently. Is it another world? Or is it your own creation? Is it a world for everyone or just you? It is the liberating part of following the VOICE. It is the trust regardless of where it takes you. Somehow this location has always given me the feeling of being in another world, so I knew it should be the ending of my film. The scene has been photo-shopped and colored intentionally to evoke a visual feeling of a world differ from the protagonist’s world.

Location 05, Abandoned Warehouse

The maze, the fun and games part, is the core element of the story. It is where the VOICE challenges the protagonist to find the truth hidden between the maze’s walls. The use of symbolism was to create depth and navigation in the story. The book was a diary found in the maze to represent another character’s existence in the story. It was a hint that she was not the only one chosen by the VOICE .

The maze was the hardest yet the most enjoyable thing in the production process. It took us lots of trial and error and preparation. The main challenge was to create a maze out of one corridor and a few rooms and plan each shot perfectly to match the one before and after it. Also, shooting in pitch dark corridor and trying to light it up with low-budget light was another challenge that needed to be solved.

Editing & Sound Design

After editing the film’s first draft, we had the spotting meeting, where we wrote down every single sound idea and feeling that needed to be captured in every scene. We had to research and understand how other filmmakers have dealt with sounds and uplifted their films emotionally and connected the audience with them. We started to add sounds separately from environment/ background sounds, Foley SFX, music, and voice overs to later layering them and notice how all these sounds will respond to each other.