5 Questions with Jacqueline Xerri ("Monkey Bars")

1) Can you talk briefly about your background, and how you first got interested in filmmaking?

I grew up in Oceanside, Long Island, a town where there’s not much to do. I made my first movie when I was about nine years old and I never really stopped. It mostly started with music videos, covering songs from Eminem to Taylor Swift, Katy Perry, etc. I would try to recreate the videos shot for shot, which gave me a pretty good understanding about how coverage worked at a young age. Then, I got a green screen for my birthday and it was pretty ridiculously huge. My friends and I would set it up and just put on different costumes and dance. I had the most fun editing. I didn’t really know what I was doing but every shot would have about 5+ effects on it. When I got to high school, I mostly made PSA’s. I don’t know, I guess that’s a high school thing. I didn’t really start diving into narrative work until I got to film school. That’s when all the dots slowly started to connect.

2) What was the initial idea for this project and how did it evolve from there?

I’m a lucid dreamer. There are some periods of time where I lucid dream every night. So that really interested me, playing with the viewer’s perception of reality. We even shot a distorted window with streaks of sunlight blazing through, to capture the perspective of Maggie waking up momentarily. As we got into production, I started to realize that these moments were not really a dream, but more of a highly romanticized perspective of a naive girl. So during post, it was solidified the film wasn’t about dreaming, because we ended up cutting the window shot and steering away from that idea almost entirely. But I’d say that sentiment inevitably still impacted the movie as  a whole, in a way that I really love. 

3) What was the biggest challenge in making this film? And the easiest part?

The challenge was our inexperience, for sure. We had made many short films in school, but doing it on our own on such a large scale was a whole different story. And I guess inexperience leaks into everything, the scheduling, the budget, and it was freezing most nights. The crew were real troopers and I am forever grateful for each and every one of them. The set was a tough one and I definitely learned a lot the hard way. 

The easiest part, it’s a bit hard to think of the easiest part. I would say casting came the most naturally. It was challenging of course, but thrilling. Each cast member really brought their character to life in such a genuine and special way and working with all of them was so fun. I kind of felt like a teenager again. 

 4) What’s a film you’ve seen recently, new or old, that you really loved and why?

‘Children of Men’ has stuck with me over the past couple of weeks. I usually don’t watch too much science fiction or action/adventure but it really blew me away. The movie takes place in 2027 and it was honestly too close to comfort (in the best way). The performances were so grounded and the cinematography was a feat. 

5) What’s next for you?

Well, we just wrapped production on a micro-budget short horror film, Shed,  so I’ll be in post-production for the next couple of months. Along with doing some freelance editing, I plan to finish up my feature script. I’ve been writing it for about two years now, on and off. I’ve been growing with it, which is nice. My partner, Stephen, and I are also working on a comedy series. I really just want to create as much as possible. 

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www.jacquelinexerri.com, www.bigbluepictures.com | IG: @jacquelinexerri @bigbluepictures