13/08/2025 - The British filmmaker talks about fusing Don DeLillo’s play with a child’s perspective, and how the film’s shifting styles reflect its protagonist’s journey and the director’s own process

(© Locarno Film Festival/Ti-Press)

Experimental filmmaker Ben Rivers has premiered his latest work, Mare's Nest [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Ben Rivers
film profile], in the main competition of the Locarno Film Festival. Rivers follows a young girl, Moon, navigating an adult-free world in a strange take on a post-apocalyptic dystopia. Cineuropa met with Rivers shortly after the world premiere to talk about the fragmented process of creating the film, his decision to infuse it with both joy and unease, and his exploration of the anarchistic spirit in characters living outside of societal structures.

Cineuropa: Mare’s Nest is inspired by Don DeLillo’s play. How did that come about?
Ben Rivers: I’m a huge fan of DeLillo. A few years ago, a mutual friend sent him a couple of my films, and he responded with a really warm letter, saying he found them powerful. That meant a lot to me. Then, I came across The Word for Snow, which was published as a book featuring Richard Prince’s photographs in a gallery in New York. I really connected with the play; it spoke to me about the themes DeLillo explores, and I felt compelled to do something with it.

Around the same time, I’d started thinking about making a film with kids. I wondered, why not weave The Word for Snow into the film? Even though it was written for adults, I thought it could work if performed by three serious, nine-year-old girls. I didn’t want it to feel unintentionally funny; I wanted it to be taken seriously. So, the girls performed it with complete seriousness, and that was a key moment in shaping the film. Then, I decided that Moon [Moon Guo Barker], whom I already knew, should be the main character. Once that decision was made, everything started to come together.

The film was made in a fragmented way, partly because I was so eager to get started. I had the idea, and I just wanted to begin, which isn’t always the most logical approach. Usually, you secure the full budget before you start, but I was teaching at Le Fresnoy at the time, and they give you €20,000 to make something, usually a short film. I decided to use that money to shoot The Word for Snow. I filmed that section in late 2022, and then I managed to secure a little more funding. I received a small commission to make a film for a gallery in Spain, which allowed me to shoot another section. The movie grew in a very sporadic way. Eventually, we got some funding from ARTE, which enabled us to shoot the larger scenes in Menorca.

Mare’s Nest feels quite different from Bogancloch [+see also:
film review
interview: Ben Rivers
film profile].
I think Bogancloch was an earlier idea. I had been thinking about it for a while, going back to Jake [Williams] and making a sequel, sort of a continuation of that long friendship. But yes, Bogancloch was an earlier project. They did overlap, though. I was shooting Bogancloch while I was already working on Mare’s Nest. They’re very different films, but they both feature characters that are outside of society, outside of governance. They’re anarchists, in a way, free from these structures we all live in, for better or worse. I think that’s where they connect. Even though one’s about an old guy in the woods and the other’s about a young girl just starting her life, they both share a similar spirit.

The movie doesn’t feel depressive, even though the concept and topic are quite bleak. Was that a conscious choice?
Absolutely. I think, you know, the world can feel pretty depressing when you look at it every day. I wanted to make a film that has that unease beneath it, that sense of disturbance, because that’s the world we live in. But at the same time, I wanted to create something that also has joy, playfulness and a sense of hope for the future. That’s why I avoided typical dystopian tropes – no abandoned buildings, no zombies, no death. I didn’t want any of those images that we usually associate with the genre. I wanted to reach a different kind of state, one where you're thinking about the world that our children might inherit and what remains after the time we are living in. Is there a possibility of completely rethinking it, rather than just resigning ourselves to living in a fascist dystopia?

You change styles and aesthetics throughout the film. Is that because it was made over a long period?
I think the styles inform each other. I was interested in trying out different approaches. I think change can create something new. Because Moon is on a journey, I thought it would work to experiment with different formal techniques. Also, because the movie was made over such a long period, it allowed for those changes. You know, a few months between shoots gives you the freedom to try something different each time.