CinÉireann May 2018 | Page 44

One of the interesting things about Dive is that it shows the aftermath of the termination. That can be missing from some films in the space.

Karen: Hopefully we showed a little bit what that might be like. And her just trying to get back into her routine. Another thing that we did was that we went into Swim Ireland and we spoke to professional swimmers and to somebody who had represented Ireland at the Olympics. For that element as well we wanted to know what that life was like.

Daniel: The sacrifices.

Karen: The sacrifices you make. The hours you get up. The training you do. The mental toll of that. And the fact that you were probably doing that since you were a very young kid. And you get to these levels. You do your meets, you do your swims, and it takes over your life as well. So we went to Swim Ireland and we spoke to women about that element as well. Because that's a very specific type of life.

Daniel: And especially showing the psychological effects. As Karen has said it was very important to responsibly tell the story and to talk to these women. The one thing that came up over and over again was the psychological aspect of that constant focus on one thing in your mind. And that was something that I really tried to incorporate in Tara's journey. Yes there's the psychical aspect of it holding her back, but it's very much a psychological thing as well. The fear and the shame associated with what she is going through.

Karen: She's technically an adult but she is not. I think it was interesting for us to go to Swim Ireland. I'd never had that experience of being around athletes or talking to athletes and seeing from them how strenuous and how stressful it is, and that there are so many people doing it. For so many young women and men that is their life. And it will be their life. Especially when you are an athlete you have such a short amount of time in that career. That essentially your career can be over at 25 or 27.

Daniel: And then for just one act that that could be completely in jeopardy.

How did the actors handle the physical and psychological?

Karen: A big thing for us as well was that for a lot of actors in this it was their first feature film. It was their first time even acting. Vanessa is 21 and others were around the same and these were big roles to take on for a first feature. I think even with the swimming there was a lot asked of them and they did a really really great job.

Daniel: That was one of the hesitations initially when we were pursuing this idea. It was a lot to ask of these student actors. Especially emotionally. There's some pretty heavy emotional scenes in the film and for them to be...sorry for the horrible pun...diving in a the deep-end with this whole experience. Everyone was super excited from day one and immediately those fears were put to rest.

Karen: For an actor it is meaty of course. If that's what you want to do.

Daniel: I give so much credit to them for everything, all the effort and work that they put into this throughout this experience. They were amazing and they really gave it their all, and breathed a lot of life into these characters and made them as real as possibility.

From a practical point of view filming underwater can be a difficult experience, were you ever tempted to change her sport?

Karen: I probably was as a producer!

Daniel: Believe it or not, in the very very first draft, and we quickly went through several iterations, she was a runner. At the very very start. That lasted for a day. There were a lot of iterations that lasted for a day before you would find a better idea. Swimming is better and it's more symbolic.

Karen: We had a body double from Swim Ireland who was one of the people her age who is doing that in real life. Because we couldn't train up an actor the same way. The running for an actor as well would have been so many takes.

Daniel: The running was an awful idea for a lot of reason.

Karen: I think production wise the film is incredible visually. Because the professionals that we had actually making the film, and the cinematographers specifically were really really good. The guy that did the underwater shoots...everybody involved in the production side of it did an incredible job in a very short

44 CinÉireann / May 2018