Recently I spoke with Writer/Director Aidan Brezonick about his new film “Alien: Night Shift”.
Where did you get the idea for your story from and how long did it take to write?
Originally, the concept started out as a truck stop, wanting to see our truckers at a space-age convenience store. I hadn’t seen something like that in the alien universe before, so it was our jumping off point. I wrote the initial script in a week.
What other projects had you done prior?
I’m a bit of a nomad, following projects where they take me. I worked for NBC news as a camera operator. Directed a music show in Chicago. Produced a sci-fi book and made several shorts. Most recently, I’d spent two years making narrative music videos in Los Angeles.
How did you go about casting and how long was the filming and editing process?
Casting was fairly quick. I’m a big fan of using people we’re comfortable with and have used before. Half the cast we knew from our time living in Chicago, the other two were LA based. Filming took place over two days, editing was another story.
We worked on the edit for a few months, cutting a frame here and there. Sound design was one of the more intensive parts of it all.
How did you go about getting the look for your film as it looks very much in the ALIEN universe?
Well, we poured over the original film stocks, looked at the lenses and kinda tried to see what we could do similarly. We didn’t want to recreate the look exactly, but we wanted the grain to feel right and hold a slightly softer look that comes with older camera glass and aged film prints. To feel like the same world, but a different space.
What were your biggest challenges and greatest successes with it?
Shooting an Alien film in two days has been wild. We quickly realized how insane it is to build our set, fill it with props, shoot, then strike the set with little to no sleep.
My biggest misfire was learning how much time practical FX can eat into your shoot schedule. We already had a pretty lean shotlist so that helped us finish the film on time. Our actors and crew were amazing. They’re everything.
How did you achieve the FX in the film? From the get go, we knew we wanted to go the practical route (as much as possible). We hired on an amazing team to cast silicone molds of our burster and we have an amazing story behind our facehugger that will go with me to the grave.
How did you do the music and sound effects?
I’ve got an amazing composer and friend, François Lietout. He’s scored all my films and is just a fantastic musician. He lives in France so we spent a lot of time talking via facetime. I designed a few of the sound effects myself but the good stuff comes from this post sound company called Noisefloor out of Chicago.
