Director’s comments.

First and foremost: horror is an individual thing. When it comes to horror, human beings differ widely. Some people get frightened by movies like Psycho and Halloween. Others get frightened by movies like Saw and Hostel. And even more people get frightened by ghost-movies, supernatural phenomena and surrealism.

Horror in Upstairs/my inspiration

Upstairs does not deal with serial killers or violence – here the fear comes from the supernatural.  It is the incomprehensible kind of horror that we experience when least expecting it.

Jonas’ inner journey is not normal – he sees things, he hears things, and he experiences a lot of things that simply do not exist.

As we have discussed a number of times, Upstairs is a hybrid between horror and social realism meant to land somewhere within the field of insanity without things turning too vulgar. It’s not my intention to deliberately go for horror – or use cheap means like cats suddenly jumping out of nowhere and sound effects moving into overdrive. I strive for a nice and quiet sense of horror that rather crawls under your skin – like for instance Lost Highway and Don’t Look Now.

Horror has been my hobby for more than 20 years and I have seen more films from the genre than most. I hate movies where the sense of horror becomes overproduced and feels fake, and I’m not too big a fan of the new wave of torture movies. But I love movies that give me a creeping feeling of unrest and a clear sense that “something is wrong”; where the camera doesn’t go wantonly round and round, ruining everything. This is how I would like to piece Upstairs together: quietly and (un)easily – with an uncertain and claustrophobic feeling. This philosophy also covers the technical side of things: Not overproduced, not annoying and no fooling around with the camera – no cheap sound effects, no screaming and yelling, only Jonas’ disturbed states of mind and the strange sounds in the apartment. I have, in short, decided to let myself be heavily inspired by a director like Roman Polanski (the master of claustrophobia) and make a quiet and subdued movie – here and there exploding in fast sequences and playing on contrasts.

Jesper Maintz.

Basmati Film

Instruktør Jesper Maintz

Mads Koudal

Peter Gilsfort

Ene Øster Bendtsen

Chadi Abdul-Karim

Thomas Biehl

Jan Tjerrild

Lisbeth Sonne

Instruktør & idé Jesper Maintz

Producer & Producent Ellen Riis

Manuskript Jesper Maintz & Jacob Weinreich

Produktion & Indspilning Louise Valeur

Fotograf Erik Zappon dff

Steadycam Anders Holck  dff

Belysningsmester Per Danbo

B-fotograf Henrik Lyngbo dff

Klipper Adam Ross

Lyddesign og mix Hans Christian Kock

Scenograf Finn Richardt

Chefrekvisitør Ulla Malmos

Sminkør/stylist Tina Deleuran

Scripter Miriam Nejsum

Grip Uffe Egeberg

Belyserassistent Jacob Molberg

Henrik Vierø

Tonemester Hans Christian Kock

Foley Martin Langenbach

Boomer Andy Drabik

Grading og effekter Jakob Eriksen

Komponist Thomas Maintz

Jeppe saugmann

Post koordinator Miriam Nejsum

Videoassistent DIT Tobias Hede Bendixen

Michael Bauer Nielsen

Stillfotograf Finn Nordfeld

Produktionsassistent Emil Bech Jepsen

Scenografassistent Thomas Stanley Nielsen

Viggo Bay

Rekvisitørassistent Roberto Coronado

Statistkoordinator Christina Martiny Moltke

Ane Koch

Runner Nina Tengberg

Line Jonasson

Jens Villy Kock

Liv Harbo