Families around the world have long cherished the locations and enduring, unique traditions of the places they call home. Unfortunately, their foundations can ultimately forever change as their situations become tenuous, which forces them to adapt to a new way of life. Young couple Davaasuren Dagvasuren and Otgonzaya Dashzeveg, along with their four children, are one such family that was forced to leave their beloved home, which is chronicled in the new hybrid film, The Wolves Always Come at Night.
Documentarian Gabrielle Brady directed the feature, which blends elements of documentary and fiction. She also co-wrote the outline for The Wolves Always Come at Night‘s story with Dagvasuren and Dashzeveg.
The Wolves Always Come at Night chronicles how the couple once raised their children as they were brought up: with an intimate connection to the Mongolian countryside and the animals they shared their lives with in the Mongolian countryside. However, after an unexpectedly severe sandstorm leaves a devastating impact in its wake, Dagvasuren and Dashzeveg must make a once-unthinkable decision that will irrevocably change their family’s lives.
With herding now untenable, they relocate to the city for work, as hundreds of thousands have done before them. For Dagvasuren, this includes selling his beloved stallion, whose absence leaves a lingering hole in his heart.
Once in Ulaanbaatar, the family sets up in the ger district, a sprawling yurt settlement on the city’s outskirts, where most of the former herders now live, and where overpopulation and pollution thrive. As they drift ever further from the herding life and culture they deeply love, they still yearn for the day they can return to their home. They hope, likely in vain, that it doesn’t cease to exist.
The Wolves Always Come at Night made its World Premiere in the Platform section of this year’s Toronto International Film Festival. Following its premiere screening at the festival on September 9, Brady generously took the time to talk about penning and helming the movie during an exclusive interview over Zoom from Toronto.
Q: You conceived the concept for the new dramatized documentary, The Wolves Always Come at Night, with the project’s subjects, Davaasuren Dagvasuren and Otgonzaya Dashzeveg. What was your inspiration in telling their story in such a unique style of storytelling?
Gabrielle Brady: The film itself didn’t have a script. So it’s really a film that sits somewhere between fiction and documentary. But really the heart of the film is documentary.
So a lot of what we were developing was based on being there with the main protagonists. We were responding to what was happening in their lives, and going on a process of co-scripting some of these experiences together.
But when I say scripting, it didn’t look like how screenwriting happens in the West. We spent a lot of time in conversation to figure out what pieces of their experience could create a cinematic landscape for the film.
So there was never a script or a sense of, this is what the film has to look like. There were some essential pieces, with the biggest being the collaboration between myself and the main protagonists. Once we locked in with them and formed that relationship, the film formed itself around that.
But a lot of it was crafted while we were riding on the go. We would be in the car on the way somewhere, and I’d be writing a script, just based on the conversation that I’d had with them. I’d shared that with the DP (Director of Photography) and the team.
So it was really this very improvisational space where we were scripting on the go. We created the cinematic landscape in relation to the main protagonists.
Q: Besides creating the idea for The Wolves Always Come at Night’s story, you also served as the feature’s director. How did you approach crafting the film as the helmer?
Gabrielle Brady: My first film, (the 2018 documentary) Island of the Hungry Ghosts, was a very formative time for me. Like any first-time director, you’re really starting to piece together your visual language with your creative team.
On this film, I worked with the same cinematographer, composer, editor and producers as my first film. So a big part of the team were carrying forth what we’d already put together on the previous film.
The directing style for me involves a lot of pieces. I actually studied performance, so acting and performance is an incredibly powerful tool to me. It’s even important in documentary, especially in how we can work with nonprofessional actors to bring out really deep performances.
At the same time, I’m really moved by the natural world and our landscapes. So I want to get closer to it and get inside of it. I think documentaries are cinematic art forms. So for me, the genre needs as much dedication on the dramaturgical and artistic approach as narrative features.
So I put a lot of my focus on the deep intimacy with the people I’m working with. We focus a lot on putting dedication, care and time into the cinematic visual language.
Q: Since The Wolves Always Come at Night blends documentary and fiction elements, how did you work with Daava and Zaya to chronicle their life experiences in the project?
Gabrielle Brady: In our film, Davva and Zaya are the protagonists, main storytellers and co-writers. Everything stems from them.
This is their story, so the casting process was super interesting. We did it over two years with our lead researcher, who (also attended the film’s premiere at) TIFF. She spent two years in conversation with people on the outskirts of Bayankhongor.
We worked with social workers and herding families. This was long, drawn out work. There was nothing fast about it.
It wasn’t us easily casting someone; for me, casting is all about relationship building. It’s about finding someone where that sparks explodes on both sides.
Their perspective on how they see the world enlightens you and is a revelation to you. At the same time, my vision for the film sparks them.
That’s what I found with Daava and Zaya. We all had this mutual interest, and we all sparked for each other. That was the moment the film came together.
Q: You mentioned working with your Director of Photographer, Michael Latham, earlier. How did you work together to determine how you would visually shoot The Wolves Always Come at Night?
Gabrielle Brady: Working with the cinematographer on this film, Michael Latham, was great. He’s done a lot of work across documentary and narrative. So he has a very specific and unique gaze.
He’s a perfectionist. He can go by himself with just the camera, and without an assistant, into the middle of the Gobi Desert. He can find himself in the most challenging scenarios and still capture the most beautiful shots.
So that was important because we were creating a documentary on a documentary budget with a documentary team. But we were also creating a cinematic narrative. That was the challenge in creating this story that’s set between documentary and fiction.
So a lot of the conversations between me and Michael on this project were about us wanting this film to have a timeless feel. The film itself leans into the feeling of a fable.
It’s something that’s so simple. But in that simplicity, there’s such a deep complexity. That’s the impression I had from meeting Daava.
I think there’s something in the film that’s both incredibly simple and essential. At the same time, it’s also poignant and profound, just like fables, which have been this guiding force of storytelling.
So to capture that timeless feeling, we yeah played with using old lenses, and he was shooting on an ARRI. We wanted a big, sweeping feeling that felt timeless. At the same time, we wanted to create an intimate feeling through handheld camerawork.
So it was a dance between those two visual languages. That’s where we found the way of the film.
Q: You mentioned Michael going into the Gobi Desert to capture images for The Wolves Always Come at Night. How did you decide where you would shoot the movie? What were the filming conditions like in each location?
Gabrielle Brady: So shooting in the Gobi Desert was an experience. We were shooting in retrospect. So what that means is that when we met Daava and Zaya, they were in the city they had already moved to, so they’d already lost their animals.
So this part of the film, in a way, is a reconstruction. We relocated back to the countryside and the Gobi Desert.
In saying that, it wasn’t really a reconstruction. In essence, a lot of that material is very observational, as it was happening at the time.
During the season of spring, there were births. There was also high tension in not really knowing what would happen, in terms of the brutality of nature.
So for us, it was the chance to create a space that felt very natural, as life was. We let scenes unfold in a really organic way.
But to film in the terrain of the Gobi Desert, practically speaking, was very intense. There was a sandstorm that destroyed all our equipment. We also all lived together in one little area that we constructed, and it was minus conditions.
Of course, to film in these kinds of conditions was really intense. But at the same time, we were witnessing these very magical moments. The entire experience felt like an eternity, even though we were only out there for two weeks.
Q: Once you finished filming The Wolves Always Come at Night, how did you approach the editing process with the feature’s editor, Katharina Fiedler? How did you both determine how to put together the final version of the documentary?
Gabrielle Brady: We edited the film in Germany with Katharina Fiedler, who’s a German editor. She was also the editor on my first film, so we’d had that pre-existing relationship.
We had a lot of material, and I think that is the complexity of navigating fiction documentary. We wanted to create a very tight narrative. We wanted it to feel, or even maybe read, as a narrative.
We wanted to show that it was consequential, and that one thing led to another. We also wanted to show that we’re inside of a story, and we’re being swept along inside of this experience.
But in saying that, we shot a lot of material. A lot of it was observational, so we had to be ready for anything to happen.
So there was an immense amount of material. So during the editing process, we were really trying to understand what the central narrative was quickly. Of course, we didn’t have an endless amount time to edit.
I think this was the huge challenge that we had – to really capture the heart of the film quickly because it could have gone in a lot of directions. We filmed with multiple characters and storylines.
So in this process, we kept refining the story until we were down to this very spared narrative, I would say. We delved into the psyche of the main character of Daava.
Q: The Wolves Always Come at Night had its World Premiere (the night before the interview) during the Platform section of this year’s Toronto International Film Festival. What does it mean to you that the movie screened during the festival?
Gabrielle Brady: We just had our World Premiere last night. It was bittersweet, I would say. Our main protagonists and co-writers, Daava and Zaya, were set to come, but they had their visas denied by the Canadian government at the last minute. So it felt strange to be at the premiere without them after such an intense journey, as this is so much their film.
But our lead researcher and co-producer was there, as were our producers and composer. So a lot of the team was standing up there and facing people in the eye after the screening.
There were a lot of people that couldn’t stop crying, so they couldn’t really have a conversation. So I could feel that people were moved, and that means a great deal for us.
In the end, part of the intention was to not shy away from the emotion of the story. It’s an earnest film because Daava and Zaya are earnest, and so is their story. So for me, to see that the film has reached people and had an emotional impact, was really powerful.
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