‘Things Will Be Different’ Director And Stars On Their New Time-Travel Cosmic Horror
Low-budget indie time-travel films are some of my favorites when executed well. I love seeing how filmmakers overcome budget and time limitations to craft complex worlds and dimensions that could easily exist alongside our own. This type of mumblegore is seen accomplished by directors like Mickey Keating, James Ward Byrkit, Justin Benson, and Aaron Moorhead. Now, Michael Felker is throwing his hat into the ring with his sci-fi-meets-sibling-drama Things Will Be Different, which had its world premiere at the 2024 SXSW Film Festival.
In the film:
When estranged siblings, Joseph and Sidney, rendezvous at a local diner after a close-call robbery, they hightail it to an abandoned farmhouse that transports them to a different time in order to escape the local cops. But when they try to return to their present after the coast is clear, an unknown metaphysical force cuts them off and maroons them on the land unless they do exactly what they’re told. What comes from this not only bends the forces of spacetime but also bends Joe and Sid’s familial bonds beyond the point of trust and forgiveness.
We spoke with Felker as well as his two stars Riley Dandy and Adam David Thompson about making the rules of a time travel movie, Felker’s dad, and the power of sibling relationships.
Dread Central: Let’s talk about Things Will Be Different. Felker, tell me a little bit about how the idea for this film came to be.
Michael Felker: Yeah, absolutely. It came from basically my love for sci-fi and growing up watching sci-fi horror thriller movies with my dad. He’s an engineer, so he’s worked in aerospace and as a mechanical engineer. He’s worked with the military and he’s a very logic-based guy. He likes to watch sci-fi movies and thrillers and get lost in the world, the rules, and the theories.
DC: Does he dissect them and try to prove the science wrong or is he one of those guys that can let go?
MF: He’s actually the guy who taught me the first rule about writing time travel movies, which is if you get too deep into the time travel rules, you would’ve actually figured out time travel. And since time travel in movies is an expression of great character and world, he said, do not try to solve time travel, just go have fun.
DC: Honestly, he’s so smart though. That’s a really good move.
Riley Dandy: He’s the smartest man I’ve ever met in my life.
Adam David Thompson: Truly, he was on set with us the whole time. He’s just a wonderful, wonderful human being.
MF: Yeah, he was fortunately able to take time off work and be a helping hand for everybody. He got really close to Adam and Riley. He’s going to be in Austin too. He is so stoked. Doug. Doug Felker.
DC: Doug Felker is such a dad name, too.
RD: I know!
ADT: It’s perfect.
MF: Actually, I won’t spoil too much, but he actually has an Easter egg credit that’s not really his name, but he is credited in the movie. That’s for anyone who wants to know why there’s a credit called Best Old Man in there. That’s him, but his name’s different. Anyway, that’s it. Too in the weeds.
The point is, is that I learned a lot from him. I was getting ready to go shoot a movie and I had this idea that I wanted to do about time travel at this farmhouse. We have this farm that’s in Michigan that I’ve always wanted to go shoot at, and [my dad and I] kind of cracked it after watching a movie. We went to a coffee shop and just talked about the rules in the world and then I just made this movie for him. I want you to have a movie where you go have fun and then just go get lost and talk about it over coffee after the movie.
DC: That’s so lovely. Adam and Riley, I’d love to hear, starting with Adam, how you got involved with Things Will Be Different and what initially attracted you to the script.
ADT: I read the scripts. One of the first things, and Felker is probably tired of hearing this, but one of the first things that I really enjoyed is right when you open the script, there’s a full map drawn of the property, Lord of the Rings style. In a movie where so much is complex, it was nice to be able to refer back to that. So from that moment, I was like, “All right, I might be in on this one.” And I just like pictures more than I like words, to be honest.
As I read through, I really just connected with Joe and fell in love with Sid. Being as close as I am to my sibling, my older brother, I just understood that relationship. It felt so much deeper and more on the line than a romantic relationship would’ve been. And it was different in the ways that elevated it. So that’s why I just really wanted to be a part of Things Will Be Different.
I met with Felker and Shane, our producer extraordinaire, via Zoom, and after we read a little bit, we chatted and I felt like we were all on the same page about what the film was and the relationships and the connections and all of those things. It was really symbiotic and I knew that from that moment on I wanted to be a part of it. I’m lucky enough to have been chosen to be a part of this experience.
DC: Riley, what about you?
RD: I mean, pretty similar to Adam. Again, I was drawn to the map. I was like, “What is going on here?” As soon as I read the script, I was just like, “This is not a story that comes along very often.” It read to me as this adventure story for these adult siblings, which you never get. It’s either tiny children going through something or something romantic. I read this and I genuinely was like, “I would love to be the person to tell this story” at my callback.
I remember this so clearly. There’s this scene where Sidney’s laying out all these clues and I remember Felker giving me so much space to do what I wanted with that scene. And I was like, do you mind if I get all this stuff out of the way? I sat on the ground. And he was so cool with it. Chrissy, our casting director, adjusted the tripod to make sure that I could get my version of this scene out. Everyone was so kind.
From that moment that was so indicative of how this shoot would go. Obviously, I didn’t know that I was going to be able to play Sidney at that point, but I was like, “Oh, I really want to work with these people.” They really went out of their way to hear my version, my opinion. That’s not really given to you all the time. So many times you’re just treated like this vessel that needs to serve someone else’s vision. But here, so many times on set, we were just intertwined with everyone’s version. I think since the callback I was like, “I really want this, I really want this.” Then I met up with Felker for coffee and we chatted and immediately clicked.
DC: Well, even on screen, the two of you, Adam and Riley, the sibling relationship feels so authentic. And I was going to ask about who here has siblings. I have two younger brothers myself and there’s such a great understanding of the nuances of sibling relationships in this movie that we don’t often get. How did the two of you forge that relationship? Or did it just come naturally for the two of you?
ADT: It was immediate, which was crazy cool. We had a lot of Zoom meetings with Felker there, but Riley and I also had our own meetings just to be able to talk about the history of who we are, where we come from, all the elements that led us to this place. And pretty immediately, I mean, once we got on set, it was as if we knew each other for our whole life. As much chop-busting as we could possibly do was happening.
DC: It’s required in a sibling relationship.
RD: I think it’s so beautifully reflected in the story of Things Will Be Different, too. You see these siblings making up for this lost time so they feel that they just need to have the goofy brother-sister stuff, but you also see the annoyances and the buttons that are pressed. It’s so indicative of a sibling relationship because even when that happens, if you are lucky enough to get along with your sibling, that’s your ride-or-die person. And it doesn’t matter how annoyed you are at them, you will do whatever it takes to help them.
ADT: And I will say, to give Felker credit on this as well is that Michael allowed us to do our own thing with just her and I, just figuring out where we came from, all of this stuff from the clues within the script and kind of the history that Joe and Sid have. Michael never wanted to butt in or know. Whatever we told him he was happy to accept, but he knew that letting us forge that relationship together was important kind of in the privacy of our own sibling relationship. I’ve worked with directors before where you have an idea or a contribution that you want to make, and it’s always like, “Yeah, you know what? If we have enough time, we’ll get a take of that”, aka it’s not happening.
Michael was the exact opposite. So I think that with being a strong leader, but also allowing us kind of our own fenced-in yard to play in, it was the perfect combination of the two. I think that that’s what really cultivated that relationship on screen in Things Will Be Different.
RD: He just let us goof around as well, which is probably so annoying for you Felker.
ADT: It’s probably more annoying for Shane, to be honest.
RD: I at least feel like we had the reins for our relationship. Then I also felt any suggestions that we gave, he really did listen to. I was really passionate about me and Adam sitting in a bathtub that was in the house.
ADT: You were really passionate about that shot.
RD: I was like, guys, this shot’s going to be great if we’re hanging out in a bathtub. Like a dry bathtub, legs sticking out, fucking around in a sense. And he listened to me and now it’s in the movie.
DC: I was going to say, I love that in that montage of y’all just messing around in the house for two weeks.
MF: It came from us having the time in the house to explore and just listen to each other. I remember we were doing rehearsals around the house and you guys just got in the bathtub and had a great time. And I was just like, “Oh, we got to put this in the movie.” And I go to Shane, my producer, and I was like, “Let’s add it in, man. I can’t deny this.”
But to go off their brother-sister thing, we all have siblings here and we all have secrets and stories and stuff that we share only with those siblings, especially if you have a good relationship with them. When [Adam and Riley] came together and we saw that they were just clicking, I didn’t want to mess with that. I wanted to be like, “You guys go form your own secrets, your own stories.” It will show in the performances for me because if I tell you to do anything, it’s just going to feel like something’s too articulated, too molded. It’s like brother and sister stuff comes from knowing each other in your own world. And I think you guys did an incredible job with that.
DC: Justin Benson and Aaron Morehead are executive producers of Things Will Be Different. I’m a huge fan of their work. But you have been their editor since V/H/S: Viral.
MF: V/H/S: Viral actually was my first time doing post with them. And then for Resolution, I was a PA.
DC: So you have been with them their entire filmography. How did you get introduced to them and how has that relationship grown to the point that now you’re directing your first feature and they’re executive producing it?
MF: I’ve known them for 15 years now. Me and Aaron Moorhead both went to Florida State Film School and even Adam went to Florida State.
ADT: Florida State. I went to Florida State in the acting conservatory actually with Aaron, which is another crazy coincidence.
MF: We didn’t even know it until we met. We were like, “Oh my God, this is destiny.” But my friend referred me, they’re like, “Hey, there’s a Florida guy who’s going to go shoot a movie with his buddy out in the woods. They’re looking for a PA. It’s a very small shoot. Do you want to go meet them?” So I went and had beers with them in LA and we got along great.
Resolution was such a fun experience where we’re just literally 10 people going out in the middle of the woods to go shoot a thing. And I learned that this was a great first experience for me in LA. This is how indie movies can thrive and live if you go and make cool stuff with people that you love. Then I slowly transitioned to editing, which was one of my bigger passions in the filmmaking process.
[Benson and Moorhead] blew up out of Tribeca and then they’re like, “Do you want to be our post guy?” From there, we all have the same brain when it comes to storytelling stuff and weird sci-fi with weird theories and crazy horror, breaking the horror tropes and seeing what’s inside for all the characters.
Then it just made sense. I work with them on every movie. We just sit there with the edit for hours and hours and hours and hours and hours. So I came to them being like, “Hey, I got a movie I’m going to go make, give me your blessing.” When I sent them this script, they not only were like, “This is good”, but they were like, “We want to be a part of it.”
It was very much within the Rustic Films family. Things Will Be Different felt like one of their movies in some very interesting ways. And they have been nothing but supportive from here on out. Anything we needed. I wouldn’t have been able to find Adam and Riley if it weren’t for them meeting Chrissy, the casting director. The way they describe it is they’re 10,000 feet in the air and they’re just dropping anything we need. They’ve been nothing but supportive of us.
DC: That’s amazing. You mentioned the farmhouse. Did you sleep in the farmhouse or was it just strictly set for y’all?
MF: So a little bit of both. My family farm is in disarray so to speak. So we found this even better farmhouse in Indiana that’s run by this wonderful couple, Jordan and James Thompson.
The farmland that we ended up shooting on is actually a failed town. It’s a town with not just a farmhouse but with a half dozen other buildings. That one is an old post office, one is a mill grain farm, and they took that place and made it a cool wedding venue. People get married there all the time. There is a location that is, I don’t want to spoil too much, but there’s a creepy chapel that is part of that old town that was already there.
RD: There were people getting married on the weekends that we weren’t shooting.
MF: We came to them being like, “Look, we’re going to make this weird horror movie. I know you guys are doing wedding venue stuff, but what do you guys think?” And they were so welcoming, saying “We’ve always wanted a movie to be shot here.” Not only were they great in that we had all these locations we could shoot at and stay on the property, but the post office is also a guest house they rent out. So some of us were actually able to stay on the property. Then we were able to walk around after hours just being like, “All right, I think we’ll go to this shot here and this shot here” and continue to talk and be a part of this beautiful space. They were nothing but supportive. They even did catering for Things Will Be Different.
RD: Really, they went above and beyond. I don’t think I will ever, ever meet someone that dedicated to helping us without any expectation in return.
MF: Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. So they were incredible. It was the best location we could possibly have.
DC: I just have one more. It’s a fun question. What is the scariest movie that each of you has ever seen? And Riley, I want to start with you.
RD: That’s really hard because there are ones that you watch and you’re like, “Oh God, that’s fucked up.” But the ones that stick with you, I think are the scariest ones. I don’t know if this is a stupid answer, but The Strangers gets me every time.
DC: That is not stupid, I love The Strangers.
RD: I always say I don’t really get scared with paranormal stuff because I’m just always like, if there’s a spirit that’s going to get me, I can’t do anything about it. Come take me. I really can’t do anything. What freaks me out is when humans are being weird just for the sake of being weird, because that actually happens.
DC: Adam, what about you?
ADT: Growing up, I never was allowed to watch scary movies. I remember when Darth Vader’s helmet came off and that crazy head thing was in there. I had nightmares for years after that. My mom told me not to watch “Thriller”, and I watched through my fingers. Nightmares for years. And then the thing that set me off of all of that stuff completely was for some reason I watched Psycho when I was, I don’t know, not old enough probably to see it until this day. If there’s a shower curtain, it’s going to be cracked open. The number of times I’ve checked out of a shower curtain in my life because of that movie… So knowing that about myself, I love being a part of them. I love seeing how the sausage is made. I just will not be dining upon it.
DC: Alright, fair, fair enough. And then Felker, we’ll end with you.
MF: I was going through a half dozen in my brain because the scary movies are the ones where there are specific scenes that just won’t ever leave out of my head. The one movie that scared me the entire time comes to mind immediately is Neil Marshall’s The Descent. It’s one of the scariest movies I have ever seen because I am a very claustrophobic
Categorized:Interviews
