Death of a Shadow

Matthias Schoenaerts was Tom Van Avermaet's first option for the lead role in his graduation project, Droomtijd (2006), and he contacted Schoenaerts to play the lead role in that film. They didn't manage to work together back then, but after the director sent the actor the whole film, Schoenaerts liked the film so much that he committed to the follow-up and kept his promise by doing this film.

The story was inspired by Greek mythology, such as the love story of Orpheus and Eurydice, and the fairy tales of Hans Christian Andersen, with their demonic bargains and escaping shadows. More recent influences included Neil Gaiman, author of comic books such as 'The Sandman' series. 'These feature a lot of metaphysical figures and I love working with those,' Tom Van Avermaet says. In this case it is the Collector, who represents Death. Here Van Avermaet was influenced by Juraj Herz's 1969 film The Cremator (1969). 'The Cremator is a very morbid character, and I said: "that's what I want in my film!"' More generally he was inspired by the innovation of silent film pioneers such as F.W. Murnau and Carl Theodor Dreyer.

Was shot in five and a half days in the Region Champagne-Ardennes in France. Post-production took almost a year.

Tom Van Avermaet won the VAF (Flemish Audiovisual Fund) Wild Card (a prize given every year to two of the best student films in Flanders, Belgium), with his thesis film, Dreamtime, in 2006. This meant an immediate grant for a next short film project; in the beginning he thought he was going to make this project very soon after graduation, but things turned out a bit differently. He first tried to make the project a couple times with the budget he had, but then realized it just wasn't going to be possible. As they didn't want to compromise on the story they wanted to tell, Avermaet and producer Ellen De Waele from Serendipity Films had to go out and look for more money. They tried different countries and different governmental institutions, but only after a couple of years of trying, they found a willing partner in the Region Champagne-Ardennes in France. This coupled with some tax shelter money from a company called Intraco Ltd., and they were able to finally finish the movie. A lot of people also co-produced the movie to some extent by taking less money or giving their time for free, so without the generous help of all the partners, cast, and crew, this project wouldn't have been possible.

Matthias Schoenaerts and Laura Verlinden had previously starred together in two productions: they played siblings in Loft (2008) and also appeared on the mini-series The Emperor of Taste (2008), although they didn't share any scene in this one.