Night People (2015 film)

Lore & Background

The film follows a pair of mismatched criminals who break into a vacant house to carry out an insurance scam. While waiting, they tell each other tall tales: one about two friends discovering a mysterious device of possible alien origin, and another about an ambitious business woman running a dating agency for wealthy fetishists who tries to escape by taking on a client with vampiric habits. As the night progresses, the line between fiction and reality blurs, and the thieves' hidden agendas emerge.

Principal photography began in County Donegal, Ireland on 1 August 2013, with demanding night shoots. The production treated each of the three stories as a separate film, with different casts, looks, and locations, requiring a repeated prep/shoot/post process that extended into 2014. Locations included Fanad Lighthouse, Barnesmore Gap, and Grianan of Aileach, with constant bad weather. The shoot moved to Dublin for two days to use locations such as The Marker Hotel, and principal photography ended on 23 August 2014.

Composer Cian Furlong created over an hour of electronic music for the score, including a new electronic version of The Flower Duet from the opera Lakme as a homage to director Tony Scott. The film also features seven synthesizer tracks from various artists. Visual effects were produced solely by Paul Barrett. The film received a '16' certificate from the Irish Film Censor Office for strong scenes of gory violence/torture and strong sex references.

Reader's Guide

Night People is significant as the feature film debut of director Gerard Lough, who drew inspiration from 1980s horror/sci-fi anthology films like Creepshow and The Twilight Zone, while updating the format with interwoven story lines characteristic of hyperlink cinema. The film's production was notable for its challenging night shoots across diverse Irish locations and its treatment of each story as a separate film. Critical reception was mixed but highlighted the film's distinctive visual style and ambition. David Prendeville of Film Ireland noted it 'neither looks nor sounds like any other Irish film,' while other reviewers praised performances by Michael Parle and Claire Blennerhassett. The film's legacy lies in its attempt to blend anthology and hyperlink structures within a low-budget Irish horror context, and it helped establish Lough as a director with a distinctive neon-lit, synth-driven aesthetic.

Did You Know?

• The film's score includes a new electronic version of The Flower Duet from the opera Lakme, intended as a homage to director Tony Scott's film The Hunger.
• Two characters from Lough's 2012 short film Ninety Seconds appear in Night People: Mark (played by Andrew Norry) and The Administrator (played by Geraldine Foy).
• The film-makers ran a public competition to choose the ad line for the final poster, unable to come up with a strong one themselves.
• Principal photography involved night shoots in County Donegal, with the rain being real weather, not an homage to Blade Runner.