Aperture Trust · 2025
Quiet Hours
A night-shift film shot entirely between midnight and five, when the building belongs to the cleaners.
Credits
- Director
- Marcus Chen
- Cinematography
- Ilse Brandt
- Edit
- Tomas Reig
- Colour
- Prisma
- Format
- Short documentary
- Runtime
- 14 min
Notes
The commission asked for a recruitment film. We shot a portrait of an empty building instead, and the client — to their enormous credit — ran with it.
Why nights
Daylight flattened the corridors into an office. At two in the morning the same corridors have depth, because the only light is the light somebody chose to leave on. That made the grade almost trivial: we protected the practicals and let everything else fall away.
The cut
There is no voiceover. Three of the interviews are in the film as room tone only — you hear the shape of a conversation happening around a corner, and never see it. It tested badly and we kept it.