The “RITE” Stuff
By: Renso Amariz
The film “Rite” which won ‘Best Louisiana Short’
at the 2015 New Orleans Film Festival, is every
bit as gorgeous as it is mysterious.
It follows two teenage boys as they gather
obscure ingredients to perform a spell from their
Grandmother’s Voodoo book. Despite warning
signs, they still attempt to perform the ritual, but the
results may not be what they expected.
The film’s producer is a confident and determined
woman from Belarus. Along with Rite she entered
another film in the 2015 New Orleans Film Festival,
“Us Against the World.” Both films ended up
winning awards, with “Us Against the World”
winning Best Sound.
I sat down with Anastasiya to talk about these films
and her filmmaking ventures.
What was your background that brought you
into filmmaking?
I’m originally from Belarus, which is in Eastern
Europe, where I’ve done theater. Mostly theater,
the film industry is not existent in Belarus. I moved
here in 2010. I enrolled at UNO where I graduated
from business school, so I have a degree in business
administration, which helps me produce movies. I
guess I combined my passion for art and film with
Photo Courtesy: Anastasiya Rul
some business knowledge, and skills that I have. Since I moved here I’ve
continued acting and to keep myself busy. I decided to do some behind the camera stuff like writing and
producing, so I started making short films, won a few awards for some of them and I’m in the process of
making my own production company. So I can move on to some serious stuff in feature films.
Did you choose UNO for a reason?
It was the only school that accepted my credits from my school in Belarus, but the programs seemed to be
interesting enough.
So it was kind of fate that brought you here it wasn’t like you said, “Oh! New Orleans that’s where
I want to go”
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Yeah, I was not planning to stay here. That was not the plan.
So when you were in Belarus you did do theater there?
Yes, I was a gymnast so my theater work transitioned into gymnastics theater. So we would perform with
our bodies.
So were your parents into theater as well?
Well my mom is an artist,
but no not really. She did
a different kind of art, not
acting. I was not very
supported in my family,
they were skeptical.
How do they feel right
now?
I’m not sure they’re
completely aware of what
I’m doing here. They
know I make movies, and
I am in movies, but I don’t
think they actually realize
the scope of the industry
here and that it’s the real
thing.
Photo Credit: Victor Nguyen
So when you did “RITE” what drew you to that story?
That is an interesting story, So my really good friend Natalie Kingston, she is a cinematographer, she
emailed me the script and said “Hey this actor is doing a film for the first time, read the script and let me
know if you like it and if you want to be onboard to produce it.” I read the script. It was a little unusual
so it got my interest and we went location scouting. The style of the movie, it was very unusual, very
mysterious, very new Orleans, so I said yes.
So what you liked about it was the fact that it wasn’t a very straightforward story?
Yes, I liked it because it was something about New Orleans, very stylistic and I liked the little twist, with
the bird and it’s also very educational for kids not to betray because this is what can happen.
So how long did it take to put together? You said you were basically scrambling at the last minute to
put it together.
I think less than a month. We were hustling. We didn’t have that much time for pre production everything
was happening so fast but we shot it in one weekend, maybe 4 days with two pick up days later and to
our surprise we got the Jury Award at the 2015 New Orleans Film Festival for the best Louisiana Short
Film. So I guess that paid off. Now we’re in the process of making another film with the same team, but
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