Elvira Lind had already directed a TV series, two documentaries, and a short film when she was offered the material for “The Letter Room.” She was 8 months pregnant, but decided to take it on. Luckily, she had a good choice to play the lead role: her partner, and father of that baby, acclaimed actor Oscar Isaac (three “Stars Wars” movie, the Coens’ “Inside Llewyn Davis,” the new “Dune” and so on).
“The Letter Room” is a really wonderful character study of a good guy who is also a lonely guy. Isaac, known to the world as Poe Dameron from the final “Star Wars” trilogy, plays a prison guard who gets an interesting promotion. He’s now in charge of all the incoming mail for the prisoners, even the ones on Death Row. You’ll have to watch to see what happens when he finds something disturbing in one of the letters.
“The Letter Room” can only be seen here on this site for 48 hours through Saturday morning. It’s eligible for the Academy Awards short list for short films. Short list, short films. Oscar, Oscar. Elvira Lind is really an up and coming filmmaker. “The Letter Room” could easily be expanded into a feature. Nice nice work.
The very cool Topic film company produced “The Letter Room.” Click here to read more about them. The film will debut on First Look Media’s Topic SVOD service this spring.
A Q&A with Elvira and Oscar is below the video for “The Letter Room” and will remain there even after the video leaves us on Friday.
