The upcoming film “Testament of the Shadow” is the latest work by Avant-Garde experimental filmmaker and actress Dawn L. Hall, who says that she “uses film as a platform to explore innovative, spiritual techniques that focus on the liberation of Soul”.
The self taught filmmaker who started out as a poet and writer at the age of 15, describes her work as a source of psychological and spiritual healing; she has released several previous short films online, including “Crooked Moon”, which was listed on Flavorwire’s “50 Films by Women You Can Watch Online Right Now”; and she is currently developing her first documentary film, titled “Socket Beat.”
About what motivated her to get into filmmaking as an art form, Ms. Hall said: “My intimate experiences with the lack of authenticity within the church motivated my thorough study into all areas of spirituality. My sensitivity to subtle nature left me isolated at a young age, and I developed a passion to seek the truth to the higher questions of life. I wanted to understand how people could just “be”, what drove them to their morning coffee and simple pleasures with shallow relations and overall complacency with intimate connection”.
As for “Testament” which Ms. Hall calls “a short film about “the idealism of love in the psyche, according to the Jungian Shadow aspect”, she says that the project came to be as a result of the deep suffering she felt in response to the relationships in her life.
“I sought to find the root of my feelings [and] the story emerged abstract and without dialogue. I realized that I would undergo anything, see an ideal of love reciprocated, and this desire was the cause of my suffering. I sought out liberation through Art… In Jungian psychology, the Shadow is the unknown dark side of the personality that everyone carries. From a psychological perspective, I would continue to encounter myself as a common denominator in every interaction, and so the work was to transform that source of the projection”.
She continues on to say: “my pain was a catalyst for self-analysis and I came to the conclusion that until I could face the role I was playing in my own experiences, all my relationships would be stifled. I wanted to empower myself through expressing an aspect of myself that I fear, confronting my Shadow aspect and letting the truth play out with the intention of healing. By exploring the darkest parts of myself on film, my personal story is exposed and my developed complexes could be unhinged. It took painful submission in order to execute the production truthfully and intentionally”.
And she does have an intent for anyone who watches “Testament”, which is: “My hope is that my own self-reflection can be insightful to others who identify with the archetype that is uncharted yet primitive; the film should provoke intimate conversations about the psyche as a root of complex binds and the effects of healing on a non-physical level, which ultimately conceives our reality”.
You can watch the teaser trailer for “Testament of the Shadow” below; and go to her website here to learn more about Ms. Hall and her various projects.
