SONIA BECKWITH, THE BATHERS (2019)

Nara: Would you like to introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about your film?

Sonia: Sure! Hi, my name is Sonia Beckwith and I just graduated from OCAD University. My film is called The Bathers. It’s a short little glimpse into an alternate reality that I made up where these three friends are bathing themselves in nature, taking care of each other, doing weird things with their bodies and just don’t have a care in the world. They’re like my ideal version of friendship, so they’re just super comfortable with each other, they know what each other wants and they’re kind of performing their own rituals that only they know what they’re for. They sort of just like, offer the viewer a glimpse into that. 

Adam: What’s the importance for you in making a film about relaxation and comfort with the people around you?

Sonia: It didn’t start off that way - it sort of evolved into that as I played around with the animation itself and getting to know the characters as I developed them. What it started out as was just like a commentary on those bathers paintings by Picasso or Cezanne or whatever that are like “oh look at these beautiful women bathing themselves in nature”. I was just kind of making fun of those paintings and being like “women don’t always look that beautiful - we pick our boogers and we smell each others’ belly button lint”. But I think what happened is, I got to know [the characters] and I just started feeling really comfortable with them. I’m glad other people felt comfortable [too].

Nara: It seems like in this world these figures are super isolated, but then they’re also completely happy with each other. Was there a reason why you didn’t include any other outside forces besides what they were immediately interacting with?

Sonia: In my mind I had developed other characters and other outside elements, but this was a very specific moment where they were just doing their thing, and it could kind of leave room for people to interpret the world however they wanted. I think bringing animals in or bringing other concrete elements in would make you [think] “oh, this is the type of world they’re in”. It just left it a little bit more open to be like “anything can happen in this world. Who knows what kind of world this is”.

Adam: How did you decide what of the world that you imagined to actually put into the movie?

Sonia: I took a whole year of making this at school so it really evolved through like, tests and playing with ideas and stuff. [When] it started out... the world was a lot more surreal. The characters could like, rip their heads off. One girl pulled her eyeballs out and washed them in the water. I wanted it to be this really surreal world where - like I said - anything can happen. But then my advisors were wondering if that takes away from our ability to really relate to them as bodies and humans. So I brought it down a little bit to where they were still doing kind of surreal and strange things but it was within the realm of us being able to relate to that.

My original design was a very realistic background. Kind of cartoony. And then, again, I felt like it was way too specific. I really wanted people to be able to enter in and interpret all kinds of things. So even if I just did like a chunk of paint for the background, someone could interpret that as a hill, or someone could interpret it as something else. I wanted to keep it - not vague, but just open.

Nara: One strange thing in the film was the sniffing of the belly button lint. Were there any particular rituals that are personal to you, or universal rituals, that you felt were important to include?

Sonia: I feel like the belly button lint sniffing… people do that, don’t they?

[Everyone laughs]

Adam: I definitely sniff my belly button lint. 

Sonia: Come on, don’t we all secretly? As I was making [the film], I almost felt like it had to happen as part of the blessing for that lint to turn into flowers. Once I laid it all out and watched it a million times I was like “oh yeah, that’s a step in the process”. And that ritual itself, like the lint turning into flowers, I don’t remember in what step of the process that came out, but I really liked it. There was something about that image of the flower that I tried to include in a lot of my backgrounds.

Adam: Speaking of the backgrounds - what was your process in bringing those, and the film in general, to life?

Sonia: I did a lot of conceptual research on feminist theory in relation to the male gaze, and all these old paintings and how these male artists would portray the female figure. And then I did a lot of research into a lot more serious and somber feminist artworks. Like Marina Abramovic - I utilized a lot of their physical, free body expressions and then I painted it in my own lens. And I definitely recognize in my research the importance of that step - in [researching] the artwork that came before me by other female or non-binary artist who’ve put in a lot of work into creating these much more heavy [artworks] that have shown these problems. I’m thankful for them and I recognize that I’m able to make this more celebratory, silly and personal work because of that. So I think, yeah, it was a heavily research-based process in the beginning. 

A lot of research went into how I wanted to make the characters and the backgrounds, so I just did this big fat sketchbook of iterations. Then animation tests - a lot of that. I did some animations with those other weird surreal elements. A lot of back and forth with my profs just being like “no, yes, no”. I did storyboards… I did so much prep before I could actually do the animation.

Then the animation itself I just did it all in photoshop frame by frame, coloured it in there. The backgrounds were all paintings that I did with watercolours at my house. Then I scanned everything and made digital collages out of all these elements. The background was my fun, play around, like whatever I want kind of thing. Everything else was more planned.

Nara: You talked about acknowledging heavier feminist work. Was there ever a struggle, or did you ever have reservations about making a piece that wasn’t quite so serious?

Sonia: Yeah, I think because my original plan for the piece was for it to be more serious. At the end, I was going to have the characters confront the viewer. There were these different ideas that I had to make it more like that - like subverting the male gaze. But as I kept making, one of my female advisors was drawing all of the really playful stuff out of it and she was saying “I think this is the really powerful stuff as well”. She was talking about how it’s important for women to support and take care of each other, and that this is like a step forward that we’re taking. So she just felt, and I felt, like this piece sits well in that. It’s more hopeful for the future - even for myself and my own female friendships.

Adam: It’s fun to see The Bathers in pairing with Wet [Sonia’s film from Insomniac 2018]. Both films acknowledge the male gaze and representations of women in popular Western art, and both stare back in this playful and hilarious way. Not a question. Just a statement.

Nara: We’ve sort of throughout this conversation been referring to the characters as female, but I found that in their calmness towards the situation, the characters become genderless. Is that something that you had in your mind while you were making the film? Have there been similar reactions?

Sonia: Yeah, I’ve had friends have similar reactions and I was very glad to hear that. One of the characters specifically, I just wanted to subvert any stereotypical female body types that we see in cartoons or in these paintings. So I really played with a lot of different bodies, and even from a technical standpoint, different shapes. I didn’t focus on whether or not they were gendered. They’re just here and they’re loving each other and they’re feeling completely comfortable in their bodies. I’m glad to hear that that’s seen in the work. Thank you.

Adam: When Nara and I first saw The Bathers, it was as an installation. The way that you laid it out with astroturf leading from a bench to the screen felt like it was inviting the viewer to sit there for a while, watch this a bunch of times and let the relaxation wash over us. What was the idea of presenting it in this way and what changes in the different ways that you screen it?

Sonia: I’m actually really curious to see what the difference is because I’ve never seen it on a big screen. I’m definitely curious to see what people’s reactions are to this versus the installation. With the installation, I definitely had a lot of people who were just like, totally zoning into the space, laying down, relaxing and just watching. Bringing their friends over, laying together for multiple views and laughing at it. It felt really good. 

I lined up the rug so that it lined up perfectly with the edge of the screen. I did that so it would be like a window into the world. I also made the screen so that the characters would be the same size as the people watching, so it was just a very back and forth kind of exchange. I wanted it to be like “hey, you’re hanging out with us”. So I don’t know - I’m curious that these figures are going to be really grandiose. Totally different perspective, but that’s cool too.

Nara: You’ve played at Insomniac a few times before [with Wet and St. Lucia at Insomniac 2017], and I was wondering why you keep coming back.

[Everyone laughs]

Sonia: All your films are really good! And fun! And funny a lot of the times, which is refreshing. I don’t go to a lot of film festivals where I’m laughing a good chunk of the time, and I really appreciate that. I think I gave the same answer last year that it’s cool to see people in each others’ films. Seeing this community of filmmakers, and how you feature a lot of young filmmakers too. It’s exciting.

Adam: We fall into a trap as young filmmakers a lot of avoiding the funny because we want to make sure that our ideas are resonating and that people are taking them seriously, but in your films, they’re always deeply interesting thematically, they’re personal, and they’re funny too.

Sonia: I remember things better when they make me laugh. I wonder if that’s just something about how I learn or how I understand topics. It’s helpful for me to take it in as being funny, because a lot of things in life are just really absurd and just really funny. And terrible. But I think it sits in my mind better if it’s delivered that way. I like to laugh. Laughing feels really good.

Adam: And it lets people’s guards down and allows us to approach the theme of a work more easily. Once everyone’s laughing, we’ve all had this communal experience, we’re all in this together, and then we can really think about what the work is trying to do.

Sonia: For me, when you make something very thematically serious, sometimes it can feel a little exclusive. I like things that anyone can watch and get it. Especially when it comes to fine art or whatever. Art films, experimental. For me personally I don’t enjoy making things that don’t feel accessible to people. That people can’t understand. I feel like even little kids would come and they would laugh their heads off at [The Bathers]. I think that humour allows different people, wherever they’re at, to be able to relate.

Nara: I see animation as a very accessible medium too, because you can make the characters look and do whatever they want. They’re not trapped by the binaries of the world that we live in. Is that what drew you towards doing animation?

Sonia: I think what drew me towards doing animation is how… basically yeah. How you can make anything happen. I really appreciate animation that knows its animation and uses that. Like it’ll defy the laws of physics or whatever in various ways. It actually uses the fact that its animation and that it can break those rules. Anything that you can imagine you can bring to life, and it doesn’t even have to be restricted by “this is what a tree looks like” or “this is what a person looks like”. You can really just make it up how you want to.

Nara: Today is very hot. What are some tips for staying cool in the city?

Sonia: Jump in the pool. All the city pools are free, and even if they’re closed you can jump the fence. Run through sprinklers. Just water. Play with water. Drink it. I also recommend showering with cold water.

Adam: You shower with cold water?

Sonia: Well, no. Not super cold. But sometimes in the middle of the night it’s so hot that I have to get up and take a cool shower and then go back to bed. So water is the answer for everything.

Adam: I feel like if you had unlimited time and resources, this film could go on for hours, especially as an installation. Like just hours of these characters doing different bodily free things.

Sonia: I’d love to get other people’s perspectives in there too. Like, “this is what I like to do” or “this is what my friendships or like”. Different people that aren’t just these three characters that I made up.

Adam: What can we expect from you at Insomniac 2020? I’m pretty sure you mentioned this project at our interview from last year.

Sonia: Next I’m thinking of working on a couple of music videos for some friends. They’re in the very, very early works. They’ll probably be very different, ‘cause I’ve learned a lot more about animation now. We’ll see.