Director Elizabeth Blake-Thomas On Her Child Trafficking Cautionary Tale UNSEEN

It is literally a parent’s nightmare – you think you know where your teenage child is, only to find out that your child is now missing, unseen. Writer and director Elizabeth Blake-Thomas felt compelled to make a film about the sordid world of child trafficking through fake social media modeling contests promising fame and fortune to gullible teenagers after hearing the story of a girl from Utah who was abducted and trafficked for five years before she escaped and returned to her family. Needless to say, not every story of kidnapped children has a happy ending. That’s the springboard for Blake-Thomas’ unsettling new short film, Unseen.

Unseen was executive produced by Elizabeth Blake-Thomas under her Mother & Daughter Entertainment banner, produced by Mal Young, Larry Schapiro of Nine Yards Entertainment, Francis O’Toole of Mercury Pictures, Timothy Patrick, and Maria Capp, and associate produced by David Roberson.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas spoke exclusively with Film Inquiry about Unseen.

Jim Dixon for Film Inquiry: So let’s talk about Unseen. 

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas: Oh, I’d love to [laughs]. It’s my baby at the moment. I’ve directed seven feature films but it’s my biggest – I call it my biggest project that’s my smallest. This is the one that for me is the one that can put my name on the map by bringing awareness to a topic that I feel very connected to.

So how is it that you did get yourself involved with this extremely heavy issue?

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas: Well, there were a couple of things that happened.  The first is that I was attending Sundance and I came across a chap who told me this true story about a girl that this happened to in Utah and he was also telling me about these projects that they have to try to help people, and look after the young girls that have been through these experiences. I’m very much a visual story teller, so once he was telling me this, I was seeing this film take place in my head.  And, I always try to give back to the community, it’s a big thing and in all my projects and I like to as my company says, make contact that matters. To me it was a no-brainer.  But also my daughter is the same age as a lot of these girls that are trafficked.

I am fortunate enough to have a child that tells me everything with a lot of detail and I hear it all.  And I am aware that that is very unique, and so I thought, if I could tell a story that is something that everybody could connect to, whether they think their children tell them everything or not.  Whether you are a single mom, a family of four or whatever it is, this is relevant to everybody, everywhere.  So, being the mother that I am, my instinct was to try and tell a story that could affect as many people as possible and help as many people as possible.

I found the film very chilling partly because I have a daughter, and also I have a cousin who is the survivor of something very similar to what you depict in your film.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas: And that’s the thing—This could happen to anyone, so I didn’t want to tell a story that actually happened to a trafficking victim, we kind of know that, even though we might not want to admit it, it’s very clear what happens to these kids that are taken, these young girls, these young adults—but to show how easily it can actually happen.  That’s what I wanted to get across.

One Little White Lie

All it takes is a little bit of naiveté, a little bit of a lack of life experience, one little white lie—and as with the main character of your movie—they can find themselves in a very vulnerable situation.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas: “Oh, I can’t make that tonight because I’m at something else, or actually, I told you I’m going to that but I’ll be coming later.”  Adults, kids, we all do this, and I wanted to show how by one little white lie which seems innocent enough, add that to all these other elements and look how serious that is.

My heart went out to the character of the single mother—financially strapped, very distracted—and who doesn’t even realize her daughter is not at home. She thinks her daughter is one place and then it turns out the daughter wasn’t there but she’s not in her room either. She’s only been out of contact at that point for ten hours or less.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas: Exactly and that was the other element—the speed that this can happen.  I’m not saying we all need to have tracks on our phones and say where are you, but actually ironically my daughter tracks me, I actually don’t track her.  [laughs] I say to her, “I’ve left now, I’ll be back soon,” and she looks at her phone and she says, “No mommy you’re still at the restaurant…” But it is about why that phone call situation is very important, to depict that, because by telling that little white lie the friend presumed therefore that she was in one place, the mother presumed she was in another, and suddenly you are in a situation where nobody actually knows where you are.  And within that time frame something can happen.

And it was almost stomach-turningly frightening when you see a truckload of young women, and think about how much distance that truck can cover in 8 to 9 hours.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas: Exactly, especially in America.  There are places that are most prolific, actually one of them is California, which is where I am now. I set this in Utah but I actually did shoot it in California.  I just feel like there is a naiveté with us all about where this can happen, “Oh it doesn’t happen in my backyard,” but it’s very much a case of actually it does.  And the fact that I wanted that revealed, because I did need a factor that shows it’s just not one. Also, I made sure that everybody, and I don’t know how clearly it comes across, but all those girls are wearing outfits that they were last seen in and that was very important to me as well.  It wasn’t like she was being put into a room and all those girls are now wearing sweatpants and crop tops or whatever it is.  Actually, they are fresh pickings. This has just happened. They are on the move.  They get them and they go.

This girl doesn’t seem to be a bad girl at all.  Like you said, she just tells one little white lie. I mean after all, at some point all of us figured our parents didn’t need to know everything. 

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas: Exactly, and that’s why I really like to depict social media—the social media shows through my entire film, and obviously then stops once you take them. It’s just a reminder that I wanted in the background the whole time, because social media is integral to a lot of our young people’s lives nowadays—they’re on it all the time. And we are given this message that you need to be on it, and if you don’t you’re going to miss out.  So it’s not the kid’s fault, but they are on it, and they’re watching, and they’re looking at things, and so to suddenly have that affect you to make a decision in your real life is something that I wanted to get across.

Hitchc*ckian Approach to Suspense

Your visual technique is very different from Alfred Hitchc*ck’s, but there were moments watching the film that I thought of Hitchc*ck.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas: Oh, thank you, that’s a good compliment.

When the two girls are sitting there, talking about boys and parties, sounding like any teenage girls you could find anywhere—and we know from the poster, the title, that something bad is probably going to happen—you almost want to yell at them, “Stop talking about that there’s a kidnapper out there!”

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas: That is very much about that normality that I wanted to convey.

Hitchc*ck had a story that told about the definition of suspense is having two men sitting at a table talking about baseball while the audience knows there’s a bomb under the table.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas: That’s exactly it.  That’s exactly what I wanted my audience to feel like they could either shout out or stop them. I also wanted them to feel like, as soon as they leave the theater that they would contact their children to say, “Hey, how’s it going, what are you doing today, how’s social media been,” you know, to start that conversation, and I definitely wanted that ticking time bomb feeling. I am very pleased that came across.

Waiting for Liam Neeson

Do you have any thoughts about this possibly being expanded into a feature?  Because in some ways it also almost felt like the first act of a Liam Neeson movie, and now that we know that the poor kid is in the truck, obviously we want Liam Neeson to show up.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas: [laughs] Yeah, you’re right.  Actually, I definitely do, and I am working on that at the moment amongst many of my other films.  But to me that first stage is what’s important, and that’s what I wanted to convey. If I was to have the feature it wouldn’t be necessarily about Liam Neeson, I suppose, it wouldn’t be about what was happening to those girls, it would be about who is left behind and what happens.  And again, I would probably try covering the next twelve hours.  Because to me those are the most important hours. They say that if you are searching for somebody, those first twenty-four hours are crucial.

I don’t like to give out too many spoilers, but after you show that our main character is in the back of a truck, you go back to her home and we and you have that heartbreaking moment when the mother finally collapses on the sidewalk.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas: Yeah, I mean it is heartbreaking.  It gets me every time.  Yolanda [Wood] did such a phenomenal job. I was very fortunate in this film directing all four actresses. They were all phenomenal and they had that already there, they understood everything about their characters…When Rhyon [Nicole Brown] and Yolanda do the scene in the kitchen and the mom gives her that $10 or whatever for her to go out—they played that so simply and so naturally that I feel that we all then connect with the mother in that heartbreaking moment which is the point.

Shot in Two and a Half Days

How long a time frame did you have to shoot the movie in?  I am going to assume that you were not overburdened with money.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas: I self-funded it and I shot it in two and a half days and I co-pro’d with an amazing company called Mercury Pictures and also an effects company called Illusion Ethereal.  So we all worked very hard together but yeah, two and a half days and I only had Rhyon, the lead actress whose character is taken, for one day.

No one’s going to say you can’t shoot quickly.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas: [laughs] It helps having phenomenal staff.

What are the plans now for getting Unseen in front of audiences?

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas: So after our premiere screening on Friday, September 6, 2019 at Arena Cinelounge in LA, we have seven public screenings so that we can qualify for the Academy Awards. And I’m in current talks at the moment with an amazing charity called Thorn, who have exactly the same mission that my film represents with social media use and child trafficking.  So I am hoping that over the next 3 months it will gain traction, we will get people to support it from a point of view of press, publicity to make sure that this subject matter is heard.  Again, because I was trying to show it in a very different way I am hoping that people of all ages, all audiences can watch it.

What is up next for you?

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas: Well, I am currently working for my entertainment company which is called Mother & Daughter Entertainment and we’re launching with my new President and her daughter, so it’s wonderful to be able to work on those types of projects with them.  We have two feature films currently in pre-production and we also have four short form content ideas that we are actually shooting over the next couple of weeks.  We’re putting our slates together, but I never let anything stop me, I just self-fund them anyway, and working with some incredible people who have the same vision as me, by the end of the year we should have another couple of projects completed.

And it’s bringing the work of women directors to the public’s attention is one of my causes, so I am always happy to be able to do that. 

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas: I am very much appreciative of that, because it is about saying what we’ve made, what are we working on and that’s why I really enjoy Mother & Daughter, because I love to channel that prospect of not only the mothers and the women in the room, but also the next generation that is coming up and supporting them.

Isabella Blake-Thomas: Co-Star and Composer

Your daughter, Isabella Blake-Thomas, who co-stars in the movie, also composed a good bit of the music for Unseen.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas: Well, that’s my daughter.  She’s actually about to be in the latest Disney Plus franchise that premieres next year called Secret Society of Second Born Royals. But she’s also a musician, singer and writer.

She’s a very good singer.

Elizabeth Blake-Thomas: Her second EP is coming out—I love her music and it just seems so relevant because it was a girl’s voice, so innocent…sometimes I think she is the mother in this relationship. I am quite lucky because she does have to look after me.  She’s the domestic goddess.  My brain is always creatively working so we’re a very good team.

Film Inquiry would like to thank Elizabeth Blake-Thomas for taking the time to speak with us.

Release and distribution information regarding Unseen have not yet been announced.