5Q's w/Carolyn Saunders "On Island West" Director

#1: Can you describe your movie and why somebody should see it in less than 140 characters?

A dystopian extrapolation of our world’s worst garbage - climate change and xenophobia. See it if you need to feel hope again.

#2: What do you want the Borrego Springs Film Festival audience to know about your film that isn’t obvious from its title?

That it is a sci-fi about the lies we tell ourselves to belong.

#3: What is your movie making background? Tell us about yourself.

My debut feature, The Wasting, played at BSFF in 2017, and went on to theatrical release in Canada. You can still catch it on Amazon. Since then I've been an Academy Nicholl quarterfinalist and been chosen for the Meryl Streep Writers Lab. Last year, I wrote Amazon's critically acclaimed five-part doc series Ted Bundy: Falling for a Killer, which told that story in the context of Second Wave feminism, focusing on the victims and the female cops who were instrumental in catching Bundy.

#4: What was the biggest lesson learned in getting your film made?

If you go to camera right before a pandemic, don't answer the phone until you've wrapped, especially if your exec producer calls.

#5: What does the future hold for your film and you?

More festivals, and it is also the proof-of-concept for a feature called Island West, which I will direct in 2022.