Eagle's View Report

One of the things you notice about the languid, mysterious Mary Marie — part sisterly coming-of-age film, part erotic drama — is how careful it is. Every element of the image falls exactly in place so that you hardly have to be following the story [two grown sisters spend time at their childhood home after the death of their mother; one of them attracts the attention and affection of a local handyman] in order to glean a kind of fragile narrative from the pictures on hand. The sequences of gorgeously colored and composed images bring to mind a carefully curated photography exhibit. They also convey a pointed intimacy that gives the film its urgency.

Cinematographer Magela Crosignani [The Imperialists Are Still Alive!] tackled the microbudgeted project with a Panasonic HVX-200, a Redrock Micro 35mm lens adapter, and a set of Zeiss Distagon lenses. Working closely with director/writer/actress Alexandra Roxo and her co-writer/co-star Alana Kearns-Green, Crosignani teased out a story that is by turns heartwarming, unsettling, arousing, innocent, and maybe just a little weird — a reviewer at Cinespect.com calls it "perhaps the most, or maybe the only, positive and dreamy film about extreme codependence that I've ever seen." That's close to the mark. Film & Video interviewed Crosignani [pictured above] by email about the challenge. Watch the trailer, below, then read the Q&A.

Film & Video: How did you get involved with Mary Marie?

Magela Crosignani: I met Alexandra Roxo 10 years ago while shooting an experimental NYU short film in which she was the lead actress. We reconnected a few years back in LA and began talking about working together on a different script she had at the time. That film didn't happen, but a half year later, she called me for Mary Marie and this time the film did come to fruition.

When developing the look, where did you take inspiration? Were you thinking of other erotic films?

Alexandra had many film references in mind by the time I joined the film, films like Elvira Madigan, The Virgin Suicides and The Dreamers. They all communicated a certain romanticism and tone that I tried to interpret for our film. I wasn't always sure it was possible to achieve such romanticism on a shoe-string budget, but Alexandra's vision was so specific that there was no way she was going to let this film look like a documentary.