For a long time, even throughout her undergraduate degree work at New York University, Ku-Ling Siegel adamantly denied that she would follow in her parents’ footsteps. Both documentary filmmakers, the couple carved an odd space throughout Siegel’s childhood. “I grew up on the Bowery in Chinatown, and nobody in my community had heard of documentary filmmakers making a living out of it. I thought I was the freak of the neighborhood,” she says laughing. “But, I was always artistic, so granted I knew I was going to do something artistically inclined. It’s just the last thing I thought was filmmaking.”

After working in photography, Siegel would end up studying cinematography at the American Film Institute, and later, when she returned to New York, collaborating with Ry Russo-Young on the director’s feature debut Orphans, a shooting process which depended heavily on the joint artistic instincts of both Siegel and Russo-Young.

“(The process is) in the moment, and it’s not too much the concept of, ‘It’s going to be framed like this, and there are boundaries.’ It’s more like, “Let’s investigate it. Let’s explore what this character is about,’ Siegel explains about working with Russo-Young. “(Ry and I) both as curious filmmakers want to investigate, and in an abstract way, that’s how we’ve had conversations.’”

Even considering Siegel’s documentary background, there was a distinctly guerilla quality to the production what with its unpredictable weather conditions and limitations of a small crew. The constraints, however, worked for the film, Siegel explaining, “There’s something to be said that we were all girls. It was a bonding kind of time and experience. I’d never worked in that kind of way before. In documentary, you go out and shoot, but it’s not like you’re all living together in this isolated place, on top of the hill, and, the actors, everyone’s just sitting with each other at every meal. It was pretty communal, and I think that helped too. There was this unspoken flow that worked through the whole production experience.”

Taking out some time to reflect on Orphans, Siegel here talks about realism, working with limitations and the importance of resourcefulness.

SM: When you sat down with Ry to figure out the vision of the film, what was the starting point? What influences were you taking in, and what films were you watching at the time?

KS: She had the script, and I recall she had some storyboards too. That helped immensely, and then once we were on location, it all came together. It’s hard to pre-visualize when you haven’t been to a place. It’s basically a house on the top of a hill and pretty isolated, so I was thinking more Néstor Almendros or Terrence Malick films— Days of Heaven when everything is naturally lit. Because of budgetary concerns, we didn’t have a lot to work with, and I knew I wasn’t going to have a huge team of people to work with, so I had to be pretty resourceful.

There was beautiful natural light. The house had windows all around it, so it was easy to work with that. I rigged the whole house with practicals so that when we walked in everything was pretty much a live set…I don’t remember there being any direct references, except that Ry always spoke of (Ingmar Bergman), and Bergman’s pretty poetically lit. So, if anything I was trying to approach it from that way.

SM: Now, when you were working in New York City, there’s a feel, at least for me, that you were treating it as if it were gritty.

KS: I come from a documentary background, and so I’m looking at it all as real as possible. If something looks phony, if the color balance doesn’t look right, I’ll shift things. With Ry, we both pre-scouted our locations, even just a regular street and agreed, “This is good. This is going to be more or less the blocking in that situation.” From there we go with our instincts. Or, at least, as a cinematographer I go with my instinct. I make sure there is lighting coming from somewhere, some natural lighting either from a storefront or overhead light. That’s really important so that yeah, it’s purposeful that the texture of the city was in great contrast to the texture of the country.

SM: Within that realism, Rosie’s introduced in the city, and I don’t want to say that everything’s sharply in focus, but we do feel centered with her character because there are things in focus. Whereas the first shots we see of (Sonia) are the basketball shots, where everything is completely out of focus, completely in close-up. So, emotionally you’re thrown in with her character immediately. How did you guys conceive of that sequence? If you look at the two character introductions, they’re perfectly done in terms of composition for each sister’s personality.

KS: We were only working with two characters, and it’s limited in that sense. So, you might as well zoom into them right from the beginning…Basically, I shot coverage of everything, and I think (Ry and the editors) decided that that was the way they were going to begin, which is more up close and get right in there and personal. (The sisters) are the guides of the film. To some extent the environment is the guiding underbelly of the film as well.

But, two characters, it’s very limiting. (laughing) I look at the film now, and I’m surprised that it holds up so well. At times I was concerned, “I don’t know if this has already been done too much before. It’s usually in the theater we have this.” In the movies we rarely just have two characters playing off of each other and carrying the film. So, I think choosing to go close-up from the beginning was definitely the way to go, and that was Ry’s decision. I pretty much shot many possibilities for her to work with.

SM: One of the other things, when I was talking with Ry, that she said was instinctual were the color choices. Each section of the film is distinct in this. The New York sequences pop; the roller skating scenes are probably the most monotone in terms of color; and, the country house colors depend on the time of day. How did you go about approaching the color issues and palette?

KS: Personally, I don’t like things too vivid, and I don’t think there’s anything too punchy within the film. Most of it seems pretty muted tone to me. The only punchy parts, if any, are within the city, which is innately the way the contrast was…In regards to a Bergman, Terrence Malick kind of feeling, a very poetic feeling, I wanted to have that as my color scheme as much as possible—something muted, soft and feminine.

SM: The country house is muted in whites, and in my mind the only thing that sticks out is a turquoise basket or vase on the wall of one of the bedrooms. Oddly enough, I fell in love with that turquoise basket, but interestingly on this, when you think of muting colors down, generally you think of pastels.

KS: I don’t think of it in that way. It just feels more translucent, not so saturated and pungent. I like that kind of a tone, and I think it works well with this film because it’s about sisters, femininity. It’s about two worlds colliding, and I think that that softness, that fabric texture like when you touch something, and it’s like cotton and it feels really good, I wanted to capture that as much as possible.

SM: I’m not sure in you were shooting in Central or Upstate New York, but all I kept thinking was, “How are they doing this in the snow?”

KS: Oh, it was brutal.

SM: How did you get by?

KS: Because there were only two human characters, everything else sort of became a character itself, including the weather, and we didn’t know when we’d wake up in the morning what the day was going to be like. We knew, “Possible snow. Possible cold.” We’d have a shooting schedule, but if it was terrible outside, maybe we’d work with it, maybe we wouldn’t. Those deciding factors would lend to the whole storytelling.

(The actresses) really were troopers. We were bundled up; we had full-on boots and jackets, gloves and everything, but the actresses had to wear what they wore the day before for continuity, and they had no choice. So, that was a bit tough for them.

SM: Looking at the weather and landscape as being a third character of this film, in passing one critic at least has called this a pastoral film…Would you consider it from a cinematographic point-of-view a pastoral film?

KS: (Orphans has) a kind of dollhouse darkness to it. I always think of pastoral as something more dreamy. The film has a dream quality, but it’s not light dreamy. It’s not romantic. I think of pastoral as more romantic. It could have that, but there always seems to be a dark twist.

For more information on the film visit www.orphansmovie.com.

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