The Revolutionist: Firstly, congratulations on the completion of your first feature-length film project! As both the screenwriter and the director of Prysmion, where did the inspiration for this project come from? How long have you been working towards this goal?
Finn Benham: Thank you so much. It started in March of 2023 as a few lines of what I thought was going to be a play about a persimmon who was chosen to harbor the Antichrist within it. From there sparked several versions of this play: one was a musical; one was more like a long epic poem. But they all explored this concept of the Antichrist trapped inside a beautiful persimmon who was ripped up by magpies. It was this idea of something so sacred and perfect that it’s otherworldly, but the source of that essence is secretly something much darker–I used the Antichrist as a symbol for this strange and tantalizing darkness. From there I wondered what it would feel like to be that dark thing, tucked away sleeping in a safe place until something destroys it out of greed. Then what? Not ready to be awake yet, confronted with all the complexities of the universe.
TR: How did you make this all happen?
FB: In early 2024, I just kinda decided that I could either make something real out of it or not. I cooked up a rough draft of the script and I called Cullen Purser and asked him to meet with me. Cullen Purser is a remarkable filmmaker with a unique style, and also a close friend of the family since I was little. I told him I didn’t have the budget to pay anyone but him, but that I wanted him on board and I wanted him compensated (of course, he tried to contest this) even if it meant digging into my savings a bit. He agreed to help me in any way he could, and he truly was the force that helped me get Prysmion off the ground.
TR: I recognized many locals in the trailer? Can you speak a bit about the community nature of a project of this scope?
FB: Fruita and GJ are FULL of wildly talented human beings, many of which I’m lucky enough to call my friends since I grew up here. I called on specific people for a lot of reasons, but acting experience was not a priority. I asked poets, writers, musicians, painters, photographers and other storytellers to be the faces of Prysmion. I think that’s what makes it feel so different. Our local folks made the film unique and full of soul.
TR: Nowadays there are so many mediums to tell stories in. What specifically about film do you think is so powerful?
FB: Film is just the ultimate way to combine mediums. I wanted it to feel like community theater. But I also wanted it to be full of original music, with visuals that were more stylized and a big cast that would have made a live production much less possible. Filming it also allowed us to have a spread-out shooting schedule that accommodated us all having full-time jobs and families!
TR: I know this story has gone through a few different iterations. Can you speak to the process of revising and editing this project? And how that process has improved the final piece?
FB: Going through so many versions of the story allowed variations that centered around other characters, like Sparky and Liz, who made it to the final draft with Persimmon and Magpie. It also opened me up to the Antichrist’s experience of being woken up so violently. I imagined her experiencing multiple lifetimes in that one moment as she struggled to understand the world she was entering. I pictured elaborate lives, I wrote about them, I sung about them. Most of that didn’t make it into the final 60 minutes, but they did inform her character and allowed me to know her much more intimately. If I had all the time in the world, I would write about all of the Antichrist’s alternate lifetimes.
TR: It seems like the film is loaded with symbolism and metaphor and even puppets. How literally should viewers take this film?
FB: The film is an extension of the classic play-within-a-play trope, so the theatrical narration, puppets, costumes, fantastical creatures, etc, are all devices that the characters themselves are using to tell the story of the end of the world. It becomes more like a mythology. They’re all part of something larger than themselves and collaborate to piece it together, but sometimes they have serious disagreements about the narrative that they feel must be settled violently. Other times, their experiences overlap simply because they’re collectively being subjected to something of a greater cosmic nature. It isn’t literal because you can’t trust every narrator. I also feel like sometimes the job of a storyteller is to ask questions rather than answer them, so I use play-elements like puppets and finger guns to do it in a way that’s playful and funny. Talking about the end of the world doesn’t always have to be such a drag…
TR: How does this film speak to themes of community versus isolation and loneliness?
FB: Prysmion is full of acts of love—some brutal, some soft. We are all alone in our own suffering, but faced with destruction, we have something in common. Maybe the only thing that matters at the end of the day is the touch of a hand, or laughing together, or crying together.
TR: What was the reason for setting this story in a different world, rather than this one?
FB: Setting the story on a fantasy planet with talking animals and fruits is another way I get to soften the dark themes with humor. Also, it can be easier to access a story when it first doesn’t feel like it applies to you.
TR: What do you personally identify with in this film?
FB: The Antichrist, mostly. She’s the scared child inside with absolutely no filter, just screaming into the void and thinking nobody else in the universe can possibly understand her pain. She’s raw and over the top and terrifying, but she’s also the trapped animal that’s in a lot of us.
TR: Other than the premiere, coming up on January 31 at 7pm at the Orbit Artspace in Fruita, where will people be able to view your film?
FB: Actually, we just added another date. February 7th at Our Lady of Perpetual Motion. There may be more dates added in the future as well. You can keep up with it if you follow @finnjaminbenjamin on instagram.
TR: What creative endeavor is next for Finn?
FB: I’m working on a film idea right now with my partner, Bradley. It’s about a food critic, and it involves the backgammon game Parcheesi. Also in the works is a short film set in a dollhouse, live music projects with The Stylotones and Paste the band, and honestly, whatever else strikes my fancy.
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