Surveillance begins when Federal Officers Elizabeth Anderson (Julia Ormond) and Sam Hallaway (Bill Pullman) arrive at a police captain’s office, and they have three sets of eye-witness accounts with which to solve a string of vicious murders.  
 
One zealot cop, a strung out junkie and a 8-year-old girl all are being questioned after witnessing the roadside massacre, but as the Feds begin to expose the details each witness conceals, they soon discover that uncovering ‘the truth’ can come at a very high cost.

Jennifer Lynch directed the film. This comes after her 1993 film, Boxing Helena, which she directed and wrote at the age of 24. That film was not only nominated for a Grand Jury Prize at The Sundance Movie Festival, but also allowed her to become the youngest woman in American film history to direct a feature film. She also wrote the best-selling novel, The Secret Diary of Laura Palmer.

Lynch shared the details of what it’s like to be a woman filmmaker and how that affects the characters in her newest film.

Q: What do you think about being a woman filmmaker?
 
Lynch: Do I think it make a difference that I’m a woman working on this picture? Sure I do. There are things you’ve seen as a mother because of your child; it’s a second chance at seeing things as miracles. It’s also a second chance at being non-judgmental, and to be unconditionally loving of things. In a strange way I don’t recall the echo of not having a child, and since I’ve always been a girl or a woman that’s just my voice. So I don’t know if I’d make a different picture not being my daughter’s mother, or my mother’s daughter.

Q: What can you tell us about the women characters in the film?
 
Lynch: The strength of humankind is eyes through a child, and there are women in this film that are much stronger than women characters we’ve seen in a long time. This isn’t what your mother does when she’s not baking…well, maybe it is. It’s what my daughter’s mom does when she’s not baking!
 
Q: Are there some moments in the film that will make the audience jump?
 
Lynch: In the same way that I’d love people to find themselves in these awkward moments saying to themselves ‘eh, I really shouldn’t be enjoying this’; I have felt that way during some of my scenes. Is it polite or appropriate that I enjoy blowing up heads? Maybe! Objectively, probably not. But in my heart, it’s a fun part of the story.

Q: What will you remember most about making this film?
 
Lynch: Some of the long days on the highway, in the extreme weather, with the camaraderie of the team, and the tireless effort and so much love and heart in this, those moments I will talk about the most. Also, Beautiful road, skies that went from smoky blue to white clouds to storm clouds and rain, 100km winds, frogs chiming in this really bizarre cricket like voice, trucks, crews, crashed cars, people being tortured in a way…everything the characters went through the crew went through too in a different way, dolled out by mother nature! Tragedy brings you together though, right? The bad days make the best friends!

Q: Would you say you have a certain directing style?

Lynch: I don’t know what I look like when I direct, I don’t know what it’s like to observe me because I’m joyfully in that moment and the least self conscious of any place I’ve ever been. So I don’t know what it’s like for others to observe my process. I’m interested in the frame but I can see that at the monitor. I can see no reason to be distanced from the actors. It just makes it harder. I find incredible value and insight to be as near the actors as possible. Hopefully that translates into the picture.

Q: Was it difficult filming this particular movie due to all the different characters’ perspectives?

Lynch: Technically, keeping perspectives straight was the tricky part. At the most basic level, three people are telling the same story but it’s different to each of them. What does each story look like? What’s the color of it? What’s missing? What’s relevant to the kid versus the drug addict who misses it because she’s too high? Or the cop who happens to be looking somewhere else?  In each scene, with each perspective, and that disturbing and difficult ballet of telling the story their way, each character has one part of the story to tell that has to get across clearly and then has all the rest of their perspective of the story to convey.

Q: What was your strategy in achieving this?
 
Lynch: Planning the schedule, I said just schedule it in order for the actors. Every actor has to be lying about what has happened. So not only are they acting about lying, let’s make them really lie. It shows in the face. And when the FBI is questioning you, there are things that happen in the face, “tells” if you will, that only happen if you are lying. So that was the only caveat in scheduling. It was important that we started with night one and move through in that order.