I don't know about you, but ticks give me the creeps. Tiny little secret vampires that carry potentially life-threatening diseases? No thanks! Ickiness of ticks aside, I was pleasantly delighted to find their beauty as a plot device in Pete Oh's (co-writer, director, editor, and cinematographer) latest feature, The True Beauty of Being Bitten by a Tick. Oh's unsettling, darkly comic SXSW entry follows Yvonne (Zoë Chao) shortly after the tragic death of her dog. Looking for an escape to process the grief, she reaches out to her old pal Camille (Callie Hernandez) to spend some time in her secluded, woodland cabin. Upon Yvonne's arrival—much to her initial dismay—she is greeted by not only Yvonne, but also her unsettling, peculiar friends and house guests, A.J. (James Cusati-Moyer) and Isaac (Jeremy O. Harris). What transpires next is a series of unappetizing spaghetti, overbearing camaraderie, made-up literary games, and, you guessed it, ticks. Without spoiling too much, it gets really weird. Really, delightfully weird. In honor of its SXSW premiere, we caught up with Ohs and Hernandez to chat about the intimate filmmaking process that brought The True Beauty of Being Bitten by a Tick to life. Please do enjoy, and hopefully, you too can find within you the true beauty of being bitten by a tick (ick). Editor's note: the following interview is edited for length and clarity. NFS Interviews Writer Pete Ohs and Actress Callie HernandezNo Film School: What’s the original genesis of using tick bites as the central connectivity of...
Published By: NoFilmSchool - 4 days ago