INDIE SPOTLIGHT: An Interview with SXSW Short ‘Video Barn’ Director Bianca Poletti

In the small town of Kennedy, best friends Hannah and Julie spend their summer nights at the last video store, Video Barn, watching cult horror films. Jules finds a mysterious VHS tape labeled “Just press play!” and, days later, vanishes. Overcome with guilt, Hannah watches the tape and is horrified to see Jules trapped inside the TV, caught in a nightmarish loop of twisted nostalgia. Now, Hannah must uncover the truth and face the sinister force within the tape. "Video Barn" pays homage to 80s surrealist films, blending dark humor, friendship, and the pull of the unknown. Will Hannah save Jules or share her fate?

The journey for short films and the filmmakers behind them can be…well…tough. From budget and location restrictions, to finding your filmmaking tribe and stellar casting, all the way to film festival submissions and getting eyes on your work. However, if you come in with a strategic plan from development to film festival strategies (and trust me, you’ll be happy you had a plan after you have to pivot because of the production unknowns waiting for you) and create an atmosphere for you and your team that is collaborative and communicative, the journey can be a lot more enjoyable. And as a director (or multi-hyphenate), this widens the field for more creative freedom.

And that’s certainly something that I’ve witnessed through filmmaker Bianca Poletti’s last two short films, Radical Honesty (2022) and her latest, Video Barn – slated to have its World Premiere at this year’s SXSW Film Festival on March 9 as part of the Midnight Short Program. Bianca Poletti, through years of hard and consistent work, has cemented her own unique perspective through her visual lens as a visionary storyteller.

Bianca Poletti recently discussed with Script the development and collaboration phase of the short film, which was inspired by the likes of David Lynch and Stephen King, the film's underlying thematic elements, to the importance of building a strong team, how her team was able to license an iconic horror film clip, and being a versatile filmmaker.

This interview has been edited for content and clarity.

Sadie Dean: You teamed back up with the wonderful Alison Goldfarb from your previous short film, Radical Honesty. Did you two develop this story together?

Bianca Poletti: We have a similar brain and things that we like and we were just talking about a new project to work together on, and talking about horror, but for me, it was more like a psychological type of horror, or something that has dream sequences and feels more Lynchian than like horror, horror-slasher. And we both love Stephen King and those kind of worlds. So, yes, we really kind of built this together. And the first kind of draft that Allison sent me had a lot of the elements that this has, but missing a lot of the dreamy stuff that I really love, and the ending, and a lot of extra scenes to kind of bulk it up. We work really well together as far as our strengths and our weaknesses playing off of each other.

There's so many movies about VHS stores, but back in the day, I don't think we've had one in a while, obviously, because it's not a thing anymore, but it's always geared around guys being movie nerds and hanging out at the VHS store. And I grew up watching those films and loving those films, and so I really wanted it to be about two best friends that are girls, and what that looks like. And with Stranger Things out there, which is also amazing, one of my favorites, for sure, but it is very much like a boy's dream, like this boy world of comics and all of these things. And so, I wanted to play with it feeling a bit more feminine in a cool way, and non-traditional, hopefully.

So, we kind of built off of that and it worked really well. And moving forward with the feature, I'm taking over the rights and everything with the film, and will kind of do my own thing. It became more like my favorite project. [laughs]

Sadie: What was so great about this too, was just how visually enticing it is and the shooting style. The camera is very voyeuristic in a way, it’s eerie and creepy feeling. I’d love to talk about that stylistic choice and your creative collaboration with your DP and also your production designer to make that really sing.

Bianca: The DP that I worked with is Corey C. Waters, who I work with on every project, if I can. He's the best, and it's still nice when you have someone that just gets your brain again, like visually, and you share the same things that you like. So, with him, a lot of references were obviously Twin Peaks, Poltergeist, and some more modern things too that have a bit of a dreamy essence to them. And also, for lighting purposes, I always try to light things with him that feel more painterly, hopefully, and making sure that it still feels even with like horror, even with comedy, same with Radical Honesty, I think that every frame should still feel really beautiful and interesting and hopefully different.

The voyeuristic type of thing - I'm happy you brought that up, that's great that you felt it. [laughs] I think, personally, the scariest stuff is silence and someone being alone at night, and especially, I think, for women and girls and working in a shop in the middle of nowhere, and the things that kind of linger in the corners and the darkness - I really, really wanted to play with that. And Corey, and I talked about that a lot.

Production Design – Andrea [Leigh] is amazing. And it's so great with short films, because all your people kind of come together. There's not a lot of money, there's no time, and you really just want to tell the story, and everyone's excited about it. And so that's kind of the best case scenario. And Andrea was one of the people that I work with a lot on commercials, same as Corey, and so I brought her on this and she created this world with me, which was great.

We had a hard time finding working VHS stores because they don't exist anymore. And I really wanted this thing in my mind that doesn't exist in LA, of course, and I'm like, ‘You can't afford, really, to bring everyone from LA to somewhere else for a short film. It doesn't make sense to spend the money that way.’ So, we shot in LA, but we found this really cool, old,1960s, 70s record store, and it had an amazing entrance to it. And you could tell it was from the 60s. In my mind, I really wanted to be in the middle of the woods, but we’ll keep that for the feature. So, we only went so wide in the intro shots, you don't see that it's LA. Andrea really just kind of transformed the whole place. And it's a huge space, so we only took half of it really, and kind of played to one side of it so that you don't have to dress the whole thing.

And really wanted it to feel like Twin Peaks and have that kind of nostalgic feel, and also kind of confusing in the world of old things around, but she has a new phone that she's using. In my mind, this world that they live in, this town of Kennedy, it's kind of this forgotten, alien-themed town. That's why there's some alien kind of things, but that's more for the feature. But it doesn't mean that they're not teens that can find a way to get an iPhone. It's just that it hasn't really caught up with the times, necessarily, and it doesn't have a lot of money, like a lot of other cities have. So, it was really fun to build - one of my favorite types of worlds to play in.

Sadie: I don't know if maybe I'm reading too much into what the messaging be lurking here underneath thematically, but the idea of women working alone, the female gaze, which ramps up to the big twist, which we won’t give away here. But there's this element that I took away from the film of being trapped by your own devices.

Bianca: Exactly. Definitely, there's a technology aspect of being trapped in our devices and kind of modern ways of AI and all of these things kind of taking over our world and getting rid of all the analog and all the things that we love, that we grew up with, or the things that we still find so cool, even if you didn't grow up in a generation that had all those things. But it's slowly just kind of slipping away. So, there's aspects of that.

And then, of course, with the 1950s kind of look of when you go inside of the TV in the feature, we'll play more into what that means, but the inspiration for that is the film like Pleasantville or Stepford Wives. But with everything happening with women and women's rights being limited and everything, I really, really want to dig into what it means and why they get trapped in the void, and why young girls, are being pulled into this kind of world and then having to re-become this 1950s kind of housewife and be silenced and all these things at a super young age. The feature taps more into that, but just a little bit kind of happens in this short.

Sadie: You got a dream scenario in licensing a movie clip from classic cult favorite, which is so incredibly pivotal for the set-up of this film. Any advice for us crazy indie filmmakers who have something like that written into our script?

Bianca: You know what, I was really shocked that we got it. So, it is possible with little to no money, which is really amazing. Luckily, the producers that we had on for this really found it. I was like, 'We need this. It's written in, and I think it's perfect, and it speaks to so many things. And it's such a classic film. It would be so great to open with it.' So they spent I think probably about a month reaching out to everyone, because also with the old school films, I don't know if this case always, but with Texas Chainsaw Massacre, this one specifically, because this one is so cool, I wanted the original, it's just passed through so many hands. And then it went through 10 other people that were like, ‘No, this person owns it. Just kidding, this person owns it.’

Eventually, our production coordinator found the person that owned the footage, and luckily, because it was for a short as well, they agreed to a certain amount for a certain amount of time. So of course, it's very short. The longer you go, the more expensive it is, and it isn't cheap. They do charge per second, and plus there’s a flat fee - I can't remember what all of it was. But you just have to keep going for it and find the right person. I was really shocked. I really didn't think it would be possible to get such an old iconic film, but it worked. [laughs]

Sadie: I feel like you are a genre-agnostic filmmaker. Do you have any advice for other filmmakers not to put themselves into a genre corner?

Bianca: Honestly, one of my favorite directors is Paul Thomas Anderson, and I think he's the best example of just a storyteller. Yes, you can tell it's his film. Yes, you can tell it's his casting when you watch his films. But Phantom Thread versus There Will Be Blood versus Boogie Nights, all of these things, and yes, they're messed up characters, there is a constant theme. But Phantom Thread is completely different from anything else.

And I think at the core of it, I just want to be a storyteller, and so I'm not tied to any genre. Of course, similarly to that, I am drawn to nostalgic type of production design and wood elements and interesting people and female characters. But I think that works for any genre. And so, I really am just trying to take and build any story that I find interesting in the moment. Instead of being like, 'Oh, I only do comedy,' and I think it does help to open the doors in your mind and for new work to kind of do anything and just be a storyteller. It's just about the story really.

VIDEO BARN will screen at SXSW 2025 in the Midnight Short Program — premiering on March 9 at 9:45pm at Rollins Theatre at The Long Center and on March 13 at 10:15pm at Alamo Lamar 9. Find more information here.