SHORTS AND TO THE POINT: Alexandre Dostie’s I’LL END UP IN JAIL gives us a woman discovering her inner badass

Alexandre Dostie’s I’LL END UP IN JAIL (JE FINIRAI EN PRISON), which just made it’s world premiere at the Sundance Film Festival, begins with Maureen, the film’s lead character delivering an affirmation to her reflection in the mirror that “day by day, in every way, you are getting better and better.”

But what starts as an affirmation, increasingly becomes a challenge and then a defiant primal cry for help. Soon, we learn her confrontational gay son has hit a neighbor’s dog with their car the night before, the neighbor wants money, her husband won’t help, and to make matters worse, he tells her she needs to take the car in for inspection. In other words, she is on her own.

So she sets off in the truck screaming into the winter air, until she careens into a parked car…with seriously tragic implications.

As Maureen attempts to solve her dilemma with one of the car’s inhabitants, she is forced to improvise and find that something inside of her she was hoping to locate in the mirror during her morning affirmation. And with each complication and moral dilemma she may indeed find that she is getting better and better – while her family and everyone else is left behind.

It’s difficult to tell in Dostie’s film which is harsher: the winter climate or the family/social environment or Maureen’s self-identity.

But the humanity and the heart is there and that is why Maureen quickly becomes a character worthy of our concern and vey quickly, our admiration. It isn’t easy to give characters a defined arc in a short film, but not only does she have one in I’LL END UP IN JAIL, but our journey with her ultimately is an affirmation in and of itself.

1. Would you characterize I’LL END UP IN JAIL as “punk”?

I really was driven by a sense of urgency to make this film. And the whole process felt like a do or die moment. Nobody would get in my way of doing this film. So in that regard, I guess you could say that.

2. As Maureen says in the film, Day by day, in every way, are you, in fact getting better and better?

Getting better at this writing and directing stuff? I’d say yes. But while I’m improving at that, all my social skills start to suffer. Friends fall out of sight. Girlfriend dumps you. So when I’m done with the film I have to attend to all this mess, and while I’m doing that I’m not writing the next film. It’s really 3 steps forward and 2 steps back. Didn’t manage to blend the “in every way” factor of Coué’s mantra yet. It’s quite a fucking slow process!

3. I will enthusiastically declare that Maureen is my hero. Is her character modeled after someone in particular?

Yeah. isn’t she badass? Writing this film, my dream was to build that character from hopeless mom to kickass take-no-prisoner woman. The model was based on my mother with hints of Geena Davis’s ‘Thelma’ from THELMA AND LOUISE. It felt right on paper, but you never know how it will translate to screen. Maureen really came alive with Martine Francke’s performance. She is Maureen. She is a genuine badass.

4. Shooting in the snow offers its own set of challenges. What was (or were) the most difficult on this particular film?

Staying warm, managing a snow covered set, keeping everyone safe were daily challenges. But the real underlying true pain in the ass was the short daylight hours. Sun was up at 7:00AM and down at 4:00PM. It left us with only 9 hours of light to work with.

Since the film is essentially shot outside, we had to work super-fast. If you add to that some stunts, car crash and FX, the overall challenge just goes off the roof. My average number of takes per shot was something like 4. It’s a miracle that we managed to shoot this film and that it works! That would never have been possible without the team of warriors that was working with me though. So I have to give a shout out to them!

5. This is your second short film. In your opinion, why is it worth the time, energy, expense, etc., for a filmmaker to make a short film (or multiple short films) as opposed to focusing all of that into making a feature?

For me, making a short film was a good way to prove to myself that I belonged in cinema. It’s so hard and long to make a film, the competition is insane and life is too fucking short. If I’m not cut out for the job, I want to know so I can move on with my life. Cause cinema will take it all. It’s a vocation. And in order to be sure it was worth it for me, I needed to risk it all.

I made my first short film without knowing if I would ever make another one. I did the same with I’LL END UP IN JAIL, but this time I raised the bar even higher. I told myself that if I still had the trust of my crew at the end of process, if the movie was good and could find its audience, if I survived all this and came out a better person, then I could make a feature. And now, that’s what I’ll do. And this one might just be my last film.

6. Popcorn or Candy?

Beer.

Alexandre Dostie’s I’LL END UP IN JAIL gives us a woman discovering her inner badass