Lenses chosen because they are dirty

Jason Bock is unusually specific about why he picked the glass he picked:

We shot on the Alexa Mini paired with Kowa Anamorphics with cranes and Steadicam. I was drawn to the Kowas because they carry such a raw, grungy quality that felt perfectly in tune with the emotional world of the film. Some of the lenses were so imperfect, dirty, textured, almost unruly and those flaws became strengths.

And on what those flaws do once you stop fighting them:

For me, it was never about pristine sharpness but about embracing lenses that breathe, that distort, that almost feel alive. With practical lighting, those imperfections came to life even more, bending highlights, blooming flares, and giving the imagery a haunted, visceral texture.

The whole thing was shot in a single night in a derelict industrial factory in Romania, on Halloween, with the closing image catching the real sunrise as it arrived.

I didn't approach the shoot with a rigid shot list — it was more about following instinct… And all of it was captured in a single night, racing against the clock before the sun came up. By some miracle, the very last scene — the dancer caught by daylight — was filmed just as the real sunrise broke through.

Dancer Strauss Serpent; sound design Abby Sie.