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Logline

In a decaying industrial city, Saskia, a nocturnal scrap worker, discovers she is a ferryman for the dead when the echo of a murdered neighbor latches onto her.

Synopsis

In a decaying industrial city along Lake Michigan, Saskia, a nocturnal scrap worker and security guard, lives a solitary life on the margins of a landscape marked by abandonment and decline. When her upstairs neighbor is murdered, her routine is quietly unsettled.

Soon after, Saskia begins to notice faint disturbances—moans in empty spaces, movements without source—until the presence reveals itself as the disoriented echo of her neighbor, trapped in limbo after a sudden, violent death. Unable to communicate yet unable to leave, the echo latches onto Saskia, pulling her into a hidden layer of reality that coexists with her own.

As the encounters intensify, Saskia is forced to confront an ability she doesn’t understand, one that may be inherited. To make sense of what’s happening, she must learn to engage with the confusion and trauma of the dead, developing a fragile empathy for something she cannot fully grasp.

Set against the ghosts of industrial America, the film explores inheritance, belief, and the quiet responsibility of helping what has been left behind into a new world.

Meet the Filmmakers

Joanny Causse — Filmmaker
Born and raised in a small town in the French Alps, I now live and work as a filmmaker in the US. Former editor, after years of learning english, I turned to writing, directing and producing in 2018. My most recent fiction short film, Rachels Don’t Run, won the Award for Best Screenplay at the 2021 Fantasia Film Festival and the Grand Jury Prize at the 2022 Seattle International Film Festival. The short screened at over 30 festivals and premiered on The New Yorker in North America and Canal+ in Europe. In 2023, I delved into documentary filmmaking with my first short doc, Cigales.

From an Alpine folk horror tale to a woman guiding the dead in industrial Indiana, or a personal driver engulfed in the complexities of neo-colonialism on the coast of West Africa, my projects feature protagonists navigating unfamiliar worlds in search of purpose and connection.

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Contact

For inquiries, please contact fiscalsponsorship@filmindependent.org.