“Movies can do something that a seminar or a pamphlet or an educational article can’t do. They can be something that an average person seeks out on their own volition,” explains Miles Levin, writer and director of the film, Under the Lights.
Under the Lights started out life as a short film, about a boy who goes to his school prom, knowing it would trigger a seizure, just to feel ‘normal’ for a night.
Miles, who has epilepsy himself, wrote the nine-minute short film in 2017 and shot it in 2018, and since then, it has received the Jefferson Award in the US for public service, and has had more than 100,000 views online. People have got in touch with Miles to tell him the difference this film has made – telling him its role in helping them express how they feel and in making meaningful change in their lives.
Marking national cinema day, we celebrate this short film, making epilepsy accessible to the masses, and look forward to the full feature film it has led to.
“Build the loudspeaker”
Miles believes in the power of films to help connect the public to a message, to grow empathy and to “start a worldwide conversation”.
He explains: “What I noticed going wrong in the epilepsy community is that when we talk about awareness and we beg and we plead about stigma, we are always talking to our own. And it’s this echo chamber.
“If we wait for an unacquainted audience to just start showing up, out of sheer curiosity, to our galas and our walks, we’re not going to get anywhere.
“Those sorts of events are wonderful for solidarity, they’re wonderful for fundraising, and they’re deeply necessary, but they’re not awareness events in the way that public-facing media is.
“A movie can reach more people in a year than, I feel, most organisations can do in a decade. And that’s not a competition. My aim is to make something that those organisations can use, so that they are heard and their reach is compounded.
“Basically, I wanted to build the loudspeaker for other people, who are doing great work, to be more effective.”
“A responsibility”
The full feature film, Under the Lights, goes into more depth around Sam’s life and his dynamic with other people.
“I always knew I wanted to do the full-length movie, but it went from being a personal goal of something that I want to do, to being a responsibility.
“The short film covers the general universal truths about what it’s like to feel when you have a silent struggle, and position it in such a way that the average unacquainted person feels similarly. Everyone knows what it feels like to be left out, alone and misunderstood.
“But the feature goes the extra mile. The feature goes into the caregiver experience. What’s it like to be mum in this situation? Because Mum’s story is untold. What’s it like to be the person who really wants to be a friend but doesn’t know where to start, and is probably going to do the wrong thing at some point? What’s it like to be afraid to talk about something and open yourself up to the potential backfire of that vulnerability?
“Epilepsy is so much more nuanced than what we saw in the bathroom in the short film. And I also wanted to give credit to people who mean well, and say we’re all capable of mis-stepping and saying the wrong thing or doing the wrong thing. We’re all flawed, at the end of the day.”
“Ask them to know us”
The film stars an exciting cast, including Pearce Joza (Zombies 2, Lab Rats), Tanzyn Crawford (Servant, Tiny Beautiful Things), Lake Bell (In a World, Man Up), Randall Park (WandaVision, Fresh Off the Boat) and Nick Offerman (Parks and Recreation, The Last of Us) in a supporting role. Miles is hoping the film will give the public a new perspective on epilepsy.
He says: “What I found with the short film, and certainly what will happen with the feature, is that people who are unacquainted with epilepsy tend to watch, and they go: ‘Oh, I know someone with epilepsy.’ They think about epilepsy through a lens that they haven’t before.
“Most of the people sending in fan art of the project, they don’t have epilepsy! It’s not the epilepsy community. It’s people who are curious and they want to be part of something that’s bigger than themselves, and it welcomes them into the fold.
“So, that’s what I hope happens, is basically we pass the torch onto people who don’t know us and ask them to know us.”
To find out more about the full feature film, Under the Lights, you can subscribe to get notified when the film comes out.