One would be forgiven for thinking of Waves (2019) as the one A24 film that feels built in a lab. Given that some sold it as a substitute for their hit HBO series Euphoria (not to mention the presence of Alexa Demie), the film’s story of troubled teens is a formula that’s been around since 2013 when Spring Breakers (2013) hit the beaches of Florida. Given that this was also Trey Edward Schulz’s third film with the studio, it felt like a work geared perfectly for the A24 obsessive down to its mesmerizing direction and eclectic Top 40 soundtrack. The results were at best divisive but more than anything showed Schulz’s versatility and ability to collaborate and create a film that may have missed any potential awards contention, but still did the next best thing that an A24 movie could do: become a cult favorite.
The story begins with Schulz in high school. Given that Krisha (2015) and It Comes At Night (2017) could be seen as autobiographical about his parents, it makes sense that Waves owes some credit to his own high school years. Much like the protagonist, Schulz was a wrestler who became injured and was forced to pursue other professions. Somewhere in processing the events, he chose to make a script that would focus around the recklessness of youth in hopes of making it a party film in the vein of Dazed & Confused (1993). What he found is that as the script came out he found it revealing itself to him. Even then, his other scripts would take more precedence and he wouldn’t return to it until years later.
Part of it came from him moving from his Texas home to Florida. It was here that he felt inspired by the idea of dichotomy, wanting to explore concepts like good and evil. He was moved by the landscape and found ways to enhance the script to what he envisioned was a richer story. It was said that he would eventually have “mini therapy sessions” with actor Kelvin Harrison Jr. where he helped to authenticate the script. He would do this with every actor he hired, but the story was mostly centered around Harrison in the beginning. He would come to incorporate the sister character into the duality by the end. He has also claimed that his choice to make it into a two-act diptych structure was inspired by Chungking Express (1996).
Among the production details that stood out for Waves was how Schulz wrote the script. With early reports mistakenly calling it a musical, word got out that he had set every scene to music. This would mean that he embedded tracks into the document that he would send to actors so that they would have a sense of his vision. Given that he was listening to a lot of Frank Ocean (notably “Endless” and “Blonde”), there are several music cues by him in it. Schulz claims that he did all of this without acquiring music rights, which proved to be difficult sometimes. He claimed that he would remove scenes if things didn’t work out. Ocean took months to track down. Similarly, his effort to ask Kanye West’s team for the rights to “I Am A God” proved to take so long that Waves was playing Telluride without a confirmation.
Schulz also separated from his previous composer to collaborate with Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross. As a fan of their work, he was enthused to discover that they were fans of his work. Given how musically-minded the film was, Schulz used the score as a way of getting inside the protagonist’s head, allowing for a dissonance from the rest of the world. There would be some surrealness added, where these subtle shifts reflected a break in mental stability. There’s even a 22-minute track that creates a whole journey of discomfort and uncertainty. In what remains a rare event from A24, Schulz personally “annotated” his choice for every song on the studio’s website including breaking down several of Reznor & Ross’s instrumentals. It’s in this article that he even talks about filming a scene to Frank Ocean’s “Florida” where he flipped a kayak and lost his wallet, which he considers one of the best days of his life.
The casting of Harrison was evident. For his duality, he cast Lucas Hedges who was coming off of an Oscar-nominated role in Manchester by the Sea (2016). Given that Hedges had worked with A24 before on Lady Bird (2017) and Mid90s (2018), he had access to Schulz who once again collaborated with him. The only issue was Hedges was so impressed with the work that he didn’t provide any feedback. Similarly, Alexa Demie had a week between being cast and starting filmmaking. She watched videos on co-dependent relationships in order to get into character and better understand what was expected of her.
Like Schulz’s other films, the calculated nature with which things were built didn’t reflect the final product. It was said that sometimes the camera roamed and tried to find inspiration from various places. As with Krisha before, many compared his technique to Terrence Malick with how it floated meditatively through everything. Sometimes it was more about vibes and interpretation than an actual plot. Given that Schulz worked as a crew member on several Malick films, including Tree of Life (2011), he found it to be a compliment.
The final product resulted in an initial edit that ran 3.5 hours. Once things were edited to the final length, there was an awareness of how the duality had shifted and found new connections. Even then, Schulz was happy with the final product. What he was more amused by was how Waves was considered a film that was like Euphoria when it was finished before the series had even aired. With that said, the amount of returning A24 talent definitely made it stand out. Along with Schulz’s making his first film, Reznor & Ross were returning from Mid90s, Demie and Hedges from Mid90s, and even cinematographer Drew Daniels who had worked on Euphoria. Given that the studio had been known to produce coming of age films like Lady Bird and Moonlight (2016), it was easy to see this as a foolproof hit.
The film would premiere at Telluride before playing at Toronto International Film Festival later that year. With critical acclaim, the film would hit theaters and become a modest success in limited release. It would have a final box office of $2.6 million. While some would criticize Schulz for writing a story about a Black family given that he was a white filmmaker, there were a few things to consider. He claimed that race wasn’t originally a factor in the story and that when it became clear that Harrison would become involved, he worked extensively with the actors to provide authenticity. With that said, the film would have some high profile fans, including Leslie Odom Jr., who may or may not have loved it in part because of his former Hamilton co-star Renee Elise Goldsberry. While the film didn’t gain as much awards traction as other Fall 2019 films, it would earn an Independent Spirit Award nomination for Taylor Russell in Best Supporting Female.
Even with this, there was some optimism to be found in the response. According to critics aggregate website Rotten Tomatoes, the film earned an impressive 84% that suggested it was destined to be one of A24’s more renowned works of the year. Maria Lattilia of Film Stories lead the positive acclaim when suggesting “Waves' second half feels both visually and tonally so different that the result is jarring and a little alienating. Regardless, Waves is a film which will first beat you down and then heal you, unconditionally and completely, if you let it.” Roxana of Hadadi continued the cheers by noting “The emotional through line of Waves and its exploration of forgiveness give shape to a movie that often feels like a mixtape.” Steven Sheehan of The Digital Fix disagreed when retorting “It's a drama that wants to deal with big issues like toxic masculinity, grief, forgiveness and love, although lacks the insight to do so in a way that understands what they really mean.” While it didn’t have quite the reputation of other films of the time, notably The Lighthouse (2019) and Uncut Gems (2019), it still did an admirable job of beefing up an impressive year.
Through and through, Waves proved that the third time was the charm for Schulz and A24. While it didn’t quite become as big of a hit as It Comes at Night, it did plenty to establish the director as a versatile and diverse filmmaker willing to dive into personal topics in clever and provocative ways. While he hasn’t announced any future projects (he did direct an episode of The Lakers series Winning Time), it is likely that any future work will be with A24 and become another passion project full of unique twists and turns. Given that each film feels like it’s slowly found him thinking bigger and more expansively, there’s a good chance that he might be making an epic before too long. While that is still to be seen, A24 A-to-Z will return to Fall 2019 with a film where killer clothes find an obtuse director making their studio debut in a fairly regal and melodramatic manner.
Coming Up Next: In Fabric (2019)
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