Note: spoilers ahead

Krisha, an astounding first feature made on a shoestring budget, won the Grand Jury Prize and the Audience Award for best narrative feature at this year’s SXSW Film Festival. It tells the story of a woman in her 60s who struggles with addiction and mental health issues, and who is trying to reconnect with her estranged relatives at a family reunion. Despite the fact that this little movie with no name actors was competing against films starring the likes of Jay Duplass, word quickly spread that Krisha was the must-see film of the festival.

The first incarnation of Krisha was in the form of a short film that played at SXSW last year. Filmmaker Trey Edward Shults said he had always envisioned it as a feature. When they shot it as a short in the summer of 2012, Shults needed more time and resources to get the feature made. When it came time to shoot the feature version with funds raised primarily on Kickstarter, Shults said he “shot it in nine days at my house with my family.”

Shults’ immediate family not only assisted as the crew, but they star in the film as well. “Basically our strategy was to knock everything out that was scripted and then collaborate and improvise. We were a big family in this little house and it was very collaborative… Krisha is my aunt. [Krisha’s sister in the film] is played by my mom. My grandma in the movie is my grandma.” Shults himself plays one of the main roles as Krisha’s son.

Shults spoke about his motivation to make the film and intention behind it: “addiction has been a huge part of my family. The idea of the film originated when a cousin of mine relapsed at a family reunion, and a month later overdosed. My dad was an addict and an alcoholic and passed away last year. Our goal was to treat addiction honestly. Because it can be like the elephant in the room.”

Krisha chimed in, saying, “We want people to understand that you might be that phone call that makes the difference in someone getting sober. Empathy. We want people to feel empathy. And if that happens then we are doing our job.”

When asked about his reasoning for shifting the aspect ratio throughout the course of the film, Shults said, “the changes in the aspect ratios in the film were character motivated. The goal was to go with Krisha’s headspace the entire film. We stayed with 1.85:1 in the beginning with the family, when she was thinking of the life she could’ve had. Then, we went with 2.35:1 with anamorphic lenses after she drinks. She feels like she’s the star of her own movie at that point. Then, it changes to 1.33:1 and it feels like the walls are closing in on her. It was about progression.”

When it came time to premiere the film, Shults wasn’t sure how it would ultimately be received. “The movie is so personal that it feels like showing my heart to people. I didn’t know if people would like it. I think the premiere was one of the best days of my life, just talking to people who could relate to the film or had struggled with addiction was really powerful.”

Krisha was recently featured in Indiewire’s Memo to Distributors: Buy These 10 SXSW 2015 Movies. Hopefully it will find a home with a distributor soon.

Lee Jameson / Film Education Manager