FemmeFilmFest21 Interview: Parachute creator Katherine Tolentino

Katherine Tolentino is a fascinating woman. That is clear to see before you even speak to her, if you have seen the kind of story the filmmaker can create on film. With Parachute, one of the Competition Selection short films from the 6th Femme Filmmakers Festival, Tolentino touches issues so relatable to many out there in the world of diverse statutes and behaviours. I had the chance to speak to the writer-director about her latest short, and pick her brains further about the inspiration behind the compelling Parachute.

Robin Write: Who were your movie idols and favourite movies when you were growing up?

Katherine Tolentino: I love movies that portray women’s experiences in real and relatable ways!! Somersault by Cate Shortland and Diary of a Teenage Girl by Marielle Heller are two of my favorites. Both so beautifully capture the experience of being a teenager and going through a sexual awakening and not knowing how to deal with desire.

RW: What inspired you to want to go on and make films?

KT: Like many filmmakers, I wanted to tell stories that I wasn’t seeing in the mainstream. We all know that historically directors and writers have mainly been men, resulting in films that marginalize the experiences of women, minority groups, and others. My goal as a filmmaker is to bring those experiences to the forefront, and tell those stories authentically and beautifully.

RW: How did you catch your first break in filmmaking?

KT: I got my first job on a film set through a mutual acquaintance I met at a party. He told me he worked in the industry as a production assistant, and I asked if he had an opening for me on an upcoming shoot. Turned out he was working on a short film the following week, so he brought me in as a Set PA. From there I started to grow my network and within a year or two I was able to quit my bartending job and PA pretty regularly on film & TV sets.

FemmeFilmFest21 Review: Parachute (Katherine Tolentino)

RW: How was Parachute conceived? Where is the title from?

KT: In the US, we see a big influx of foreign high school students from Asia, all vying for a position in the competitive American school system. Some of these young people migrate to the US alone, leaving their parents & friends behind. Journalists have termed this group of solo migrants “parachute kids.”

A few years back, there was an incident in LA in which a group of these kids brutally attacked one of their classmates. While I don’t condone the violence, I see how these young people could have suffered from immense academic pressure, isolation, a lack of support systems, language & cultural barriers, all of which could have fomented into anger and violence.

In Parachute, I wanted to explore those various pressures and how they could affect someone like Wendy, the character in the film.

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RW: Did you add any personal elements to it? What other research was key to getting this right for you?

Funnily enough, in imagining Wendy’s plight, I actually drew from my own experiences working as a PA in the film industry. I remember in those early years I felt intensely competitive and anxious, always vying for one of a handful of spots on the big budget shows that came to my town.

These jobs were hard to land because of their scarcity, and the level of competition poisoned friendships. Not only that but we were working 12+ hours a day, with no social life and hardly any time to take care of ourselves. It was the only time in my life that I would walk down the street and size people up, wondering if I could take them in a fistfight.

RW: How did you balance Wendy’s attitude and Mei-ling’s eagerness without necessarily feeding into the bad vs good immigrant dichotomy – both in the writing phase and when directing the actors?

KT: I’ve never seen Wendy and Mei-Ling as stereotypes – I only see them as people. The film could be easily read as a good girl vs bad girl story, but I hope we did a good job of fleshing out who they are as individuals. Both actors knew their own backstory, and brought their own experiences to the role as well.

And I should mention that Nicky Zou was a natural at playing Wendy, and related to her character in a deep way. Zoe Lau was and is a lot like Mei-Ling in real life too 🙂 Not to discredit either of their acting skills. We tried an experiment where we asked them to reverse roles in an early table read, and it just didn’t work.

RW: The ending is a bit of a literal sucker punch. What kind of emotional responses have you got from audiences in regard to that? What was your intention?

KT: Lots of folks are shocked by it, and some are confused. Many have asked if Mei-Ling dies at the end, and I think the answer to that question is somewhat irrelevant. From the beginning, my goal with this film was to explore what might lead someone to behave violently… Not to justify violence, but to understand it.

We’re living in a time where we need to understand why people act out, because it’s happening more than ever before. And punishing people without understanding what led them to act out in the first place won’t stop the cycle.

Anyways in regards to the ending, we ended it that way because in my mind, that’s the only way to end the story. Wendy reaches a breaking point, after these factors in her life compound and push her there. Including any sort of afterword where she apologizes or realizes her wrongs or has to go to jail, or visits Mei-Ling in the hospital, or goes back home… would all cheapen the story in my mind.