LOGLINE
One beautiful night, a woman's exquisite life is upended when her fiancé vanishes.
One beautiful night, a woman's exquisite life is upended when her fiancé vanishes.
Marga believes she has an exquisite life. One beautiful night, her fiancé disappears. No body. No answers. Engulfed in the silence he leaves behind, she is a woman walking underwater — until a stranger’s story pulls her from the deep and she must choose between the seductive promise of blind hope and the rich messiness of truth.
"People suck." That was the first line I heard when imagining this
story. Blunt, inelegant, and painfully human. It didn't arrive as a
clever provocation — it came from a quiet heartbreak, the kind that
forms when you watch people fail each other, and fail themselves.
That heartbreak opened a door into a story I couldn't turn away from —
a story about what we cling to, what we fear, and what becomes
possible once we stop looking away. I know that fear — the fear that
truth will shatter us, and the quieter, deeper fear that turning away
from it will slowly erase us.
I wanted to honor that truth quietly — with gentleness over grandeur,
feeling over explanation, and a performance drawn away from anger and
into the truth of loving without answer.
Some losses leave no body — only love with nowhere left to go. And
sometimes, choosing to walk toward what terrifies us — however broken
we may be — can become its own unexpected act of grace.
Brenda Wachel Writer/Director
Brenda Wachel is a director and writer whose career was built in the heart of the film industry.
As a Script Supervisor, she has collaborated with critically acclaimed directors on major motion pictures around the world,
including I Am Sam, October Sky, Collateral, and Hidalgo.
Grounded in a formal film education at The University of Texas at Austin and shaped by years inside feature filmmaking,
she brings a nuanced understanding of character, performance, and emotional truth to her cinematic work as a director and writer.
Her film Democracy won the 2024 Spark the Vote award, and she is actively developing two feature films, which are deeply personal stories.
In the Deep marks Brenda’s narrative directing debut — a deeply human story of loss, love, forgiveness,
and the truths we discover when faced with the unknown. The film is an Official Selection of the LA Shorts International Film Festival,
where it will celebrate its World Premiere.
Marga
Maria Bata
Luca
Evan Gamble
Phillip
Gui Agustini
Livia
Whitney Anderson
Ramon
Jamie Alvarez
Man in the bar
Taylor Nichols
Written & Directed By
Brenda Wachel
Produced By
Brenda Wachel
Executive Producer
Marciann Shapiro
Creative Co-Producers
Laurel Bergman &
Elizabeth Jett
Co-Producers
Christopher Sadler &
Celeste Bird
Director of Photography
Cameron Owen
Production Designer
Laurel Bergman
Costume Designer
Elizabeth Jett
Editors
Gib Jaffe &
Roger Cooper
Sound Design
Joel Krantz
Composer
Trevor Armstrong
