Paula González-Nasser worked as a location scout for six years. As writer, director, and producer, she shot a film based on her experiences in a mere ten days. Anyone who sees The Scout will come out realizing why – it’s a job that requires crazy amounts of multitasking, and an ability to be everything to anyone at any given time.
The Scout opens Oct. 9th at Laemmle’s Glendale, and Oct. 16th at the Monica Film Center. Catch Paula González-Nasser on a new episode of Inside the Arthouse with Greg Laemmle and Raphael Sbarge.
Sofia (Mimi Davila) begins her day slowly. Long takes hold on her preparing to face the day, slowly performing her solo role at her own pace. Being a location scout at first feels a lot like fishing – she leaves flyers on doors of potentially interesting buildings, promising a fee if they’re chosen. The next stage is a bit of a flirtation, as she gains access to people’s houses to take reference photos, and they proceed to tell her every detail of their lives, delighted to have a new person they can trauma-dump on. Men, by themselves, all too often suspect it might be a literal flirtation, and so long as she still needs their location, Sofia has to string them along. As soon as the production rejects the place for any reason, it’s time to ghost the tenant and move on to the next, potentially more perfect staging area.
Sofia has a car to get around New York City – the subway would be just too slow and non-spontaneous for what she needs – and parking tickets, of which there are many, just become yet another business expense. As she drives around, she plays all her phone messages on speaker phone. Some are angry at being forgotten with no follow-up calls that she never had the time for; others are excited at the possibility of their house being on TV…or the paycheck that comes with it. Then there’s a strange one from her past that has become suddenly relevant again.
When she interacts with the full location crew, the pace of the story and the dialogue picks up, entertaining the viewer even as it frustrates Sofia, who needs a more meditative space to take her pictures. In a group setting that’s all noise, she shrinks away into a corner…in a one-on-one setting, she must function as counselor, negotiator, and potential love interest to get what she needs on her end. Yet whatever she negotiates is subject – constantly – to cancellation from above her pay grade. That’s just part of the gig. A real social life, for the most part, is not. Location scouts aren’t paid to have plans that might interfere with their availability.
The Scout depicts both a typical and an atypical day (and change) in the life – on the one hand, it’s clear Sofia deals with this kind of stuff every day. On the other, it involves a reunion with someone from her past, one that deserves time she simply doesn’t have. It’s a surprise and an emotional curveball, but we get the sense that even if they aren’t all like quite like this one, there are equivalent personal swerves on a regular basis. The quiet moments in between can be silly, or sad, but they are most often alone. All in the service of a job many would only dream of doing…as they like to tell her. Often.
The story rings true, and the fact that the writer-director was sufficiently prepared to shoot the whole thing in less than two weeks makes it ring truer, as evidence she knows how to get this stuff done. Due credit, also, to the casting – the faces onscreen in The Scout are as varied as the locations, and in some cases tell even just as much of a story as the script can.
“The film confidently highlights the delicate relationship between people and their spaces, while also acknowledging the understated harshness of a job that requires you to assess… one of the more intimate elements of another person’s life.” — Lovia Gyarkye, The Hollywood Reporter.
“At its best, “The Scout” captures the contradictory experience of having a job closer to your dreams than many people ever get, but still far from where you want to be.” — Christian Zilko, IndieWire.