The Art of Not Appearing
By Pernille Rivedal Hellevik
In the summer of 2015 I wrote and directed a short film as my thesis project in order to graduate from the film program at Columbia University. The production required a very special prop and luckily 2K/DENMARK offered to not only create this prop for us but to make it more authentic and special than we could ever have hoped for.
To give some context I will say a few words about the film: “The Art of Not Appearing” is the story of two ghosts who are forced to reconsider their reasons for haunting. Laurits Oscar Bue, the male protagonist, is a writer who died in 1886 due to longterm drug abuse. While still alive he didn’t manage to finish his big novel. And so it happens that even now that he’s dead he spends all his time in eternity still trying to construct the perfect ending. While searching for the right words, Laurits is still sitting on his old writing desk which is now for sale in an Oslo antique shop. When a young couple buys the desk, Laurits is involuntarily taken along to the couple’s new holiday home on the west coast. This is where he meets Karen, the ghost of a woman who drowned in the 1960s. She is haunting her old fiancé, who is by now an old man, hoping that he will also die soon so that they both can be reunited.
The special prop that we needed for this film is in fact a big twist in the story, but I will let you in on it: What Laurits doesn’t know yet is that his novel was in fact published after his death and that he posthumously became a famous author. The book became popular due to its incoherent narrative and abrupt ending, which was thought to be genius. Karen shows him the published book in the paperback print of her own school edition. The book is complete with footnotes, a short biography on the back and the price printed on the front (it is a cheap edition, of course).
The prop book needed to look like a paperback which a school could buy in larger quantities, while at the same time looking cinematic. Since it was Karen’s edition it had to be in a typical 1960s style. I was asking quite a lot, because in addition to all of this, the last page of the book had to be the last page that Lauris Oscar Bue had written, so that the character in the film could compare it with his own notes.
This was important for the narrative. To my great excitement, 2K/ was not only able to help me with all of this, but they even provided me with several designs to pick from; a director’s dream! They had also added some fading to the book, making it look like it had a long life on a bookshelf. The result was so convincing that several people who watched the film thought the story was based on a real author and that we had simply used a real school book. It was also awarded the most beautiful prop on set by cast and crew. Now the book is on display for guests on our mantel piece!
The Art of Not Appearing is having a festival run and has been screened at several international film festivals. The world premiere was at the Austin Film Festival where it won “Best Student Short”. It also screened at the Nordic International Film Festival in New York City, where it was awarded “Best Nordic Short Film”. In the upcoming months it will screen in Nashville, New York City and Sacramento. I’m hoping for a European premiere soon. Perhaps in Denmark?
Pernille Rivedal Hellevik
Born 1989 in Oslo. Grew up in Sogn og Fjordane, on the west coast of Norway.
Studied Film and TV production at the University of Bergen as well as animation and experimental filmmaking at the University of Waikato New Zealand. Afterwards she attended Columbia University in New York where she received her MFA in Film Directing and Screenwriting.
Currently she lives in Norway again where she is in the early stages of developing a feature film project.
