DANA KIPPEL TALKS REFLECT

Interviewed by Culture Coast Talks editor Daniel John. Interview transcripts might have been edited for length and clarity.

The many enigmas of 'Reflect' will soon leave audiences gasping everywhere. Does it feel like this moment has been a long time coming after taking the extended festival route?

I appreciate the wording. Enigmas. I feel like that is so resonant with the film. I am so excited for the film to finally be shown to audiences! I have been waiting so long for this and I feel so blessed that Good Deed Entertainment took a chance on this little film, because they believed in it and me. Not too many people see a “metaphysical” film and say it will sell. But the funny thing is films with metaphysical themes such as 'The Wizard of Oz', 'Interstellar', and 'Contact' do really really well with audiences because their ineffable essence always resonates.

The film follows Summer, who, dissatisfied with her relationship, invites friends to a spiritual obstacle course in Sedona, promising a life-changing experience. Little do they know it will be as much a spiritual awakening as an actual rebirth?

I honestly don’t know how I came up with it, I just wrote it quickly then shot it three months later. It all just flowed. I will thank my pal Mike Merino, a fellow director, for this one. I sat down with him one day for lunch and said I want to direct and write a movie, he goes, “Start with five girls in the desert and go from there” or something like that. The idea for 'Reflect' was born, although Sedona is not necessarily a desert. But it is an energetic vortex and I knew I wanted to film there from the start. I had been reading books like 'The Heroine’s Journey' by Maureen Murdock, 'The Red Book' by Carl Jung and 'A New Science of Heaven' by Robert Temple. I knew I wanted to make a movie with spiritual and metaphysical subject matter that also touched on mythological aspects.

It is a beautiful film to look at, full of light and colors. The theme of hope for spiritual enlightenment is ever so present?

Thank you, that means so much! I knew right away I wanted the look to be almost like a painting. A high depth of field and wide lenses on all shots, even close ups to add to the eccentricity of the film. I love color and I love the 60’s-70’s aquarian culture and I think that inspired the film as well. Terrence Malick and his cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki inspired me as well as several paintings from Anges Pelton and the Transcendental Painting Group out of New Mexico from the 1930’s. For the girl’s outfits I used white and red, which were symbolic colors from Norwegian mythology, also tarot influenced many aspects of the film.

Do you find that the art of storytelling has been like a spiritual obstacle course in your own life?

Hmm. The art of storytelling has been a constant in my life. I have been writing since I can remember. My writing has always told me truths through metaphor or through retrospect. Some truths are my own and some are what I believe to be the collective unconscious and some possibly beyond that. Writing does something my voice cannot do. For some reason I am able to express myself better that way. I am still on my writing journey and learning every day! The biggest thing is being kind to myself.

Embarking on your own journey in film, you initially started out as an actress?

Los Angeles is not for the weak minded. You need to be strong out here, but also vulnerable. Indeed, it is a paradox. If you want to evolve, come to Los Angeles! (laughs) I had some streaks of luck in the beginning which quickly made way to a barren desert of loneliness, personal struggles and a string of mistakes. I trusted the wrong people. I ignored my intuition. My biggest lesson was do not let your ambition or desire cloud your inner voice. Ever. Always put your morals and values first. And I usually did, but the few times I did not listen to my inner voice, I paid for it in spades. Ask people hard questions, always have a lawyer look over agreements and keep your circle small and safe. I am finally coming back out from the descent into a happier time, just starting to, but I wouldn’t change any of it because I am a different, stronger, but even more heart centered person today.

Had you been acting since you were a kid?

I acted as a kid in theater at a summer camp called Rockland Center for the Arts in Nyack, New York. But it was minimal. It did contribute to helping me artistically! My main acting came everyday, because I did not fit in, in school, ever. I was sad a lot because I was bullied and because of a few things that were going on in my personal life as a child and I had to act silly and happy to let people know everything was okay. I lost myself in fantasies in my bedroom, talking to myself and my dolls for hours. My imagination was grown to escape suffering. Now that I am healing those memories, my imagination seems to come from a purer place, not as muddled with my unhealed perspective, but from an open perspective that lays out a wider net. So I seem to catch more colorful fish.

Do you think you would always have rather ended up telling your own stories?

I think I always would have ended up a director and writer. It is in my blood. I am adopted, but my birth mom is an author and my birth father was in theater, which I found out when I met them in my twenties. My dad and mom who raised me in Suffern, New York were into math and science and that sparked an interest in me for science fiction and magic. I have always loved writing stories and as a kid I even directed my own films that my mom still has. Acting, I still love and plan to do. I think anyone can do anything. But I would say a majority of my energy goes to writing my own stories, directing and writing books as well. My next project is a book called 'A New Force' about plasma intelligence and a movie I filmed with Good Deed Entertainment in Ohio in September called 'The Pink House'. Excited for the future and thank you for this wonderful interview.