What happens when Melbourne’s biggest commitment-phobe meets it’s most emotionally unavailable bachelor, who also happens to be a literal demon? I Fell in Love with My Sleep Paralysis Demon follows Sarah, a woman who is so scared of commitment that she decides to pursue the most emotionally unavailable guy she can find - her sleep paralysis demon.
Earlier this year, the film was selected as a Finalist in the Melbourne International Comedy Festival’s Funny Shorts program at ACMI, where it took home the Audience Choice Award. It has since launched on the Melbourne International Comedy Festival’s YouTube Channel, you can watch it here.
Writer-Director, Matthew J Thompson, sat down to discuss the audience favourite.
We wrote I Fell in Love with My Sleep Paralysis Demon in a very untraditional sense. For this, the first thing that came to me was the title. That’s it, and we built it from there. I liked the idea of presenting the film to an audience as a conventional horror, until it clearly isn’t. It starts by luring viewers in with this familiar horror genre before quickly spiralling into this ridiculous comedy packed with horny fan art and demonic HR.
After writing the film, we moved pretty quickly into production. Gathering our small crew together and enlisting our talented cast comprised of the wickedly talented Matt Jenner as the titular demon, co-writer and producer Gabrielle Angelone as Sarah, and Hot Department’s own Honor Wolff as Frances the Demon Lord.
Being a no-budget film, we kept costs down by opting for simple costumes and shooting most of the film in our apartment. We were also super lucky to have extremely talented friends and family members who were willing to contribute in-kind to the set and production design. We fortunately did not have to draw mass horny demon art by ourselves.
The film shoot was short and sweet. It was only a two-and-a-half-day production across two locations. Three of the four scenes are set in Sarah’s bedroom, so we needed to make each visit to the bedroom feel distinct. Alongside our fantastic Director of Photography, William Qoro, we put a lot of planning and thought into the visual identity and tone of each scene to mirror Sarah’s journey and emotional state to the audience.
The first scene was distinctly inspired by Jarin Blaschke’s work on the most recent Nosferatu. Our goal was to lure the audience into thinking this is going to be a full-fledged horror and capture Sarah’s initial fear. The second scene is then a a complete juxtaposition to the first scene, where the dark shadows of the demon’s world are replaced with candlelit romance in Sarah’s world. The demon is stripped of his menacing power and Sarah holds all the cards, despite LITERALLY being paralysed.
The final scene in the bedroom is designed to evoke Sarah’s strong feelings of desire. The red-blue neon lighting matches Sarah’s red slip dress and rose petal covered room, but also serves the tone shift of the second turning point where the Demon confesses his emotions to Sarah’s horror. As her perspective shifts, we see the blues start feeling colder and the reds are bit more sinister. This emotional change is all aided by a wonderfully composed soundtrack by Tom Godbert.
For our second location, the Hell office, it was important for us to make it as distinct as possible. We wanted to keep the mundanity of a People and Culture workspace but avoid any trace of old tired white-walls that we are so used to seeing.. A few months before filming, my improv-comedy troupe had started training at Balam Balam Place in Brunswick. The venue has distinct orange walls with retro printed orange and white carpeting. The visual was strong enough that we chose not to add any set dressing.
Despite largely sticking to the script, our lead, Matt Jenner, is a naturally hilarious and seasoned improvisor, so we were able to have a lot of fun with going off book and improvising that final monologue. We’ve been getting a lot of credit for writing the line “You ever been to Machu Picchu?” which was entirely his own improvisation, so a big thank you to Matt for making us seem way funnier than we are. Knowing we had such talented actors who are adept at improv comedy, we also intentionally shot Matt and Honor’s office scene with a two-camera setup, just so we could really capture all of their brilliance.
From writing to screening the film, the entire process was a blast. We’re so thrilled to have screened our film at ACMI, to have won the Audience Choice Award and now be featured on the Melbourne International Comedy Festival’s YouTube Channel.
We hope you enjoy our chaotic horror-comedy film.
Check out I Fell In Love With My Sleep Paralysis Demon on YouTube: