Levelk | Level K

FACTS

Original Title

Sissy

Genre

Horror

Production Year

2022

Country of Origin

Australia

Language Spoken

English

Length

102 mins
Festival
SXSW Midnighter opening film (World Premiere)

Directors

Kane Senes & Hannah Barlow
Scriptwriter
Hannah Barlow & Kane Senes

Cast

Aisha Dee, Hannah Barlow, Emily De Margheriti, Yerin Ha

Production Company
Arcadia, DEMS Entertainment, Freedom Films

Producers

Lisa Shaunessy, John De Margheriti, Jason Taylor, Bec Janek

Local Release Date
Fall 2022 by Arcadia

SYNOPSIS

Cecilia (Sissy) and Emma were tween-age BFFs who were going to grow old together and never let anything come between them. That is, until Emma’s new friend Alex did just that. Twelve years later, Cecilia is a successful social media influencer living the dream of an independent, modern millennial woman... until she runs into Emma for the first time in over a decade. Emma invites Cecilia away on her hens weekend at a remote cabin in the mountains, where Alex proceeds to make Cecilia’s weekend a living hell.

DIRECTORS / WRITERS

Kane Senes

Writer/Director

Kane Senes is an award-winning filmmaker from Sydney, Australia. His 2009 short film Forfeit of Grace led to a nomination for Best Young Australian Filmmaker at the Byron Bay International Film Festival. In 2010, with A Relative Stranger, Kane won Best Short Film at multiple film festivals. At 27 years old, Kane co-wrote, produced and directed his debut feature film, Echoes of War (2015), a Western-Thriller that won a Special Jury Prize at the Dallas International Film Festival before being distributed worldwide. Kane’s follow up feature, For Now, which he also co-starred in, was nominated for best picture in multiple film festivals and released worldwide in 2019. Sissy is Kane’s third feature.

STATEMENT

“Sissy is a satirical nightmare directed at the self-victimizing child within all of us. With over 200k followers, our protagonist Cecilia has what we all want: influence. Cecilia’s talent for burying her sad, lonely, trauma-fuelled existence by positioning herself online as a ‘mental health advocate’ makes her cringingly relatable, because aren’t we all actively highlighting the best fragments of ourselves to cancel out our worst? The social-media obsessed culture we’ve created welcomes the monsters hiding in our societal cracks to not only emerge, but reign supreme… encouraging the beasts in all of us to wake in response. In the real-world we might not pummel our enemies to death with a rose quartz crystal, but the comment section of any blue-tick-verified thread certainly proves our increasing desire to.”

- Hannah Barlow & Kane Senes

Hannah Barlow

Writer/Director

Hannah Barlow is an actor, filmmaker and visual artist from Sydney, Australia. After graduating from the prestigious National Institute of Dramatic Art, Hannah was selected as a finalist for the Heath Ledger Scholarship. After relocating to Los Angeles, she starred in Warner Bros’ anthology series Two Sentence Horror Stories. Her episode, ‘Guilt Trip’, featured at the LA Film Festival. Hannah was cast as the lead role in Evan Cooper’s multi award-winning horror short, The Armoire. For Now, Hannah’s first feature film as writer/director, was nominated for best picture at multiple film festivals and received worldwide distribution in 2019. Sissy is Hannah’s sophomore feature.

Producers

Partner at Australian production and distribution company, ARCADIA, Lisa produced 2067 (XYZ/RLJE Films/Netflix), starring Kodi Smit-McPhee, Ryan Kwanten and Deborah Mailman, which debuted as the No 1 movie on Netflix (ANZ) and No 2 on iTunes (US). Lisa also produced the critically acclaimed Killing Ground that premiered at Sundance Film Festival 2017 (IFC Midnight) with Joe Weatherstone; The Furies (Sitges Film Festival, 2019, Shudder/StudioCanal); AACTA award-winning series Hipsters (SBS, 2015); Black & White & Sex (IFF Rotterdam 2013, co-producer) and ASC award-winning documentary Slammin’ Sam (Foxtel, 2013). Lisa is a graduate of AFTRS and a TAP alumni.

John De Margheriti is the Chairman and CEO of The Academy of Interactive Entertainment Limited (AIE) and Chairman and Producer of DEMS Entertainment, a family film production company. John has funded and produced a number of feature films, such as Ladies in Black (Executive Producer) directed by Bruce Beresford, Blue World Order (Executive Producer), Me and My Mates vs the Zombie Apocalypse (Executive Producer), The Furies (Executive Producer), Sissy (Producer) and is developing Tobruk, a forthcoming war film to be directed by Phillip Noyce. A seasoned, highly successful businessman, John co-founded Micro Forté Pty Ltd in 1985.

Jason Taylor is a motion picture, television, and Broadway producer. He is currently a partner at Futurism Studios, the new television and feature division of Futurism.com. As President of Production of Bryan Singer’s Bad Hat Harry Productions he has co-produced several blockbusters, most notably the X:Men First Class Trilogy X-Men: First Class, X-Men: Days Of Future Past, and X-Men: Apocalypse.He has produced several independent projects, including, the British thriller uwantme2killhim? and Netflix favorite Adam Robitel's The Taking of Deborah Logan. He is currently credited as Co-Executive Producer of the F/X series Legion.

Bec Janek is Head of Production at Arcadia Films. Since joining Arcadia, Bec has produced horror-satire Sissy starring Aisha Dee (post-production) and Australian #1 Netflix hit 2067 starring Kodi Smit-McPhee, Ryan Kwanten and Deborah Mailman. Prior to this, Bec was an executive at Russell Crowe's production company, working across AACTA Award-winning The Water Diviner. She also produced the short film Dots, which screened in competition at Cannes Film Festival; followed by the Create NSW and SBS short film Black Lips, which was nominated for Short Film Production of the Year at the SPA awards, was a finalist for the prestigious Iris Prize and won Best Australian Short at Melbourne Queer Film Festival.

Aisha Dee

Cecilia, Sissy

Aisha Dee has quickly established herself as one of the fresh new faces of Hollywood. Developing an impressive resume of diverse and memorable television and film roles, the Australian actress and singer/songwriter has captivated vast global audiences accruing a substantial fan following. Dee starred on Freeform’s comedy-drama television series The Bold Type. She will soon be seen as one of the Netflix film Plus/Minus leads alongside Lili Reinhart.

Emily De Margheriti

Alex

Emily De Margheriti is an Australian actress and a co-founder of her production company DEMS Entertainment, who are developing a number of projects. After graduating from the prestigious Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts, Emily has been featured in numerous projects including I Hate Kids opposite Tom Everett Scott and Tituss Burgess as well as the acclaimed dramedy Ladies In Black from director Bruce Beresford.

Hannah Barlow

Emma

Hannah Barlow is an actor, filmmaker and visual artist from Sydney, Australia. After graduating from the prestigious National Institute of Dramatic Art, Barlow was selected as a finalist for the Heath Ledger Scholarship. After relocating to Los Angeles, she starred in Warner Bros’ anthology series Two Sentence Horror Stories. Her episode, ‘Guilt Trip’, featured at the LA Film Festival. Hannah was cast as the lead role in Evan Cooper’s multi award-winning horror short, The Armoire.

Yerin Ha

Tracey

Yerin Ha was born and raised in Sydney to South Korean parents. At 15, Ha was accepted into the Kaywon Performing Arts High School in Seoul, South Korea, where she trained intensively for three years. In 2016 Yerin was accepted into the National Institute of Dramatic Art (NIDA). In 2018 Yerin made her TV debut playing the role of Techie Jane in the US series Reef Break. In 2019 Ha was cast in the lead role of Kwan Ha in the highly anticipated new series Halo which is set for worldwide release in 2022.

BEHIND THE SCENES

Marketing

SoMe Campaigns

Short spots instead of trailers can be formatted specific social media platforms such as Instagram, Facebook & TikTok, and thereby reach the target audience.