Immerse yourself in the vision and creative process of the Chilean director and producer, who will have a considerable participation in festivals during this 2022. Undoubtedly, one of the great voices of independent Chilean cinema.

We are happy to see how Roberto Doveris’ career has grown, his productions have led the way for independent Chilean cinema internationally. After directing two feature films: The Plants (2015) and The Phantom Project (2022) and producing three successful feature films, among them: The Im(pa)tient (2021); The Prince (2019) and Potential Victim (2018) His career has no way to stop!

During this year, Phantom Project -directed by Doveris- and The Im(pa)tient -directed by Constanza Fernández and produced by Doveris- continue their journey and promise a great presence in international festivals, starting in the 23rd edition of BAFICI.

Phantom Project had its world premiere at the Official Competition of the Rotterdam International Film Festival. At the same time, The Im(pa)tient had its world premiere at the Busan International Film Festival and won the Colón de Plata Audience Award at the Huelva Festival of Ibero-American Cinema.

After founding in 2010 the production company Niña-niño films, he has produced more than 30 videoclips -in Chile and Argentina- including: Cuarto Oscuro (2010) by Sofía Oportot ; Venir (2011) by (Me llamo) Sebastián ; Perderme a mi (2011) by Denisse Malebrán and Cambio de piel (2017) by Denise Rosenthal, among others.

After consolidating his production company his outstanding career as a director intensified, directing the short films Ana interrumpe el día (2010) and Actriz de reparto (2015) and the feature film The Plants (Best Feature Film Award given by the International Jury, Berlinale Generation 14+, 2016). As a producer, he holds titles such as The Prince, directed by Sebastián Muñoz (Queer Lion Award, Associazione di Promozione Sociale Queer Lion, Venice Film Festival, 2019) and Potential Victim, directed by Nicolás Guzmán (Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival, 2018).

Exclusively, the director and producer told us how was the brainstorming of his new feature film Phantom Project, which over the coming months will continue its international tour in festivals such as Seattle, IndieLisboa and Off Camera: “It’s what I know and what I get when I write fiction, I think that is the cool thing about it, to be able to inject fantasy and layers of meaning into reality, which is so boring”

 Your “I” in Director

“My films are who I am. I’m like that, I connect with the people around me from their interests in music, in comics, in reading and watching fiction, anime, board games, they are called frikis or geeks in Spain. Also because with my friends we laugh at our half-pathetic lives, we are a generation that tried out the limits of the genre, very open and where friendship plays a highly-gravitational role”

How are your two feature films linked?

Both are super different journeys, but I think they relate generationally, in that they have pop culture as a macro-reference, and in how that lands in local reality and in human relationships. There is also an exploration of the sexual aspect of the characters in both films, although in “Phantom Project” it seems to me that friendship ended up being more important, the connections between friends, neighbors, colleagues. It was a movie that we produced right after being a year apart from the pandemic, so I guess that’s why I ended up giving importance to that aspect.

How was the premiere of Phantom Project in Rotterdam?

The doors that Rotterdam opened up for us and for the project were many, more than we expected! We will have commercial distribution in North America, and many festivals invited us to participate during the days we were in Rotterdam, so I think it was a success.

Susan (the little dog) plays a relevant role in the first scenes of the film. What was it like to shoot with her? Where did the idea of treating her as a co-protagonist of what happens in the film’s environment come from?

Susan was a puppy from an ex-roommate, and now she’s my parents’ dog, so her role in the movie isn’t that far from reality either. I love that a pet has a certain protagonism, the plants of the house also have it, and the phantom without a doubt. I think unfocusing on human characters allows me to explore unusual areas with cinematic language. It also felt very liberating to make a more choral film, to be able to play with the performances, the wardrobe. The comedy allows many interesting things, I loved the experience of leaving a little bit of the dark-emo-sordid aesthetic hahaha.

The narrative of the film along with the soundtrack are key elements to understand it and internalize with the protagonist and what happens around him. How did you manage to integrate both things?

I love music! With Sylvana Squicciarini, the editor, and with Aura Sinclair, the producer, we did a lot of brainstorming regarding the style, and ended up being super eclectic. I was sure I wanted to include classical music, sometimes as an ironic counterpoint and sometimes taking advantage of its solemnity. I also thought about jazz, but in the end we ruled it out, it felt very straight!

Then we added more atmospheric songs as the film asked, a piano here, a half shoegaze guitar over there. And the narrative line of Sofía del Valle, the Argentine singer, required two powerful songs, to see the musical evolution that stuck after the phantom had decided to follow her for a while.

How does it relate musically to your previous film?

In “The Plants” there is also a moment when an absurdly powerful rock song enters, created by Violeta Castillo, who now plays Sofía del Valle. I think it is a permanent collaboration that we have sustained in time. I’m very inspired to work with people I admire.

Why do you decide to represent the figure of the “Phantom” in an animated and minimalist way?

There were several options, and even though I wanted to try them, I finally decided on a more artisanal thing that I could do at home. I made the model, and finally my new roommate, Erika Pacheco, ended up animating the phantom scenes with her wacom. She has more experience and I think we understood perfectly what we wanted to achieve, and that animation dialogues nicely with a low-budget film, a world where DIYS and self-management is paramount.

Your “I” in Producer at BAFICI

“That’s Bafici, an encounter that celebrates cinema as art, cinema as a way of thinking fiction, and new ways of producing. I am very excited to attend and watch the films of the competition, I have several friends that have been selected and it is very exciting”

How do you live the experience of participating in Bafici fulfilling both director and producer roles (in two different films) simultaneously?

It feels really good. What I like most is that if I’m not mistaken, the first time we went to a laboratory outside of Chile was for BAL; I’m talking about the time when applying meant printing the script of the film and going to the post office. Violeta Bava, for some magical and mysterious reason, selected “The Plants” and we went with Niña Niño Films to do the project lab, and it was a fierce reality slap.

 Also it was the moment we said, this we love!!! Here the films of the future have a space to share, to enter into crisis, to meet new friends and allies. Then we went back with the film to the Work in Progress section and then with the finished film, so the relationship with BAFICI is super important. Coming back now with these two specific films is super significant, because they are just two projects that also propose a different production model and a way of understanding cinema from independent creativity.

How has it been working with Constanza Fernandez on your second feature film (as an actress) and also as a producer filming The Im(pa)tient?

I think I still don’t sit down to reflect on the jump we hit with “Costy” to do The Im(pa)tient.

We had been working on the project for many years, and we were sure that the film was necessary, that there was a director with something to say and a vision to contribute; I think that conviction is what led us to start producing without an audiovisual background. I am already looking forward to producing her third feature film, but she is a restless mind and is always trying new things. I find it very inspiring to those people who are always learning something new.

What do you think is Constanza’s main strength as a director? What leads you to produce her film?

Constance is a mental director. She turns things around, whether it’s screenplay or in scene, she reflects on and digests them little by little, and once she makes the final decision, she becomes a woman of steel. She is very strong and seems hard on the outside, but she has an enormous sensitivity and fragility. I find that mixture fascinating, I would let her lead anything: a film, a company, a ship, a ministry, a country.

 Originally Andres Waissbluth was with her producing this, and I was asked to produce the film’s teaser. There I had to read everything and set up the shooting, but later I was invited to be part of the project. Finally it premiered in Busan (Korea), an ideal place for the type of film that is The Im(pa)tient, which has a lot of audience vocation. This came to light later when it won the audience award at the Huelva Film Festival in Spain. I have never been chasing success in commercial theatres, because we all know that it is difficult or almost impossible, but with this film I have that feeling, thinking it will be very well received.

What was the main challenge of shooting this film? What was the hardest and most rewarding thing you had to face (as a producer)?

I think the difficulty of the shooting was how delicate the locations were, in fact we filmed just before the pandemic had exploded, and surely it would have been impossible to do so under those conditions.

Generously hospitals and clinics opened their doors to us, and we could build this space of hospital fiction very well, but it was difficult! Also the number of characters was a crucial element, it was necessary to perceive the staff, doctors, and to give life to a hospital is not easy. The second most difficult thing was that the social outbreak occurred during production, which generated a lot of uncertainties and anguish.

Do you have future projects together? Which ones?

For now, to commercially release the film in cinemas in Chile, this will happen on May 12, and during the same month several screenings will be happening throughout Chile, so we are super eager to share it as soon as possible.