(also found on IMDb trivia)
This is the second installment in Adrian Țofei and Duru Yücel‘s spiritual trilogy which includes Be My Cat: A Film for Anne and Pure. All three movies are radically different from each other, yet together they form a cohesive universe. The trilogy is symmetric in 3 essential ways. Symmetry no. 1: Be My Cat anchored in the lower self (irrational instincts and impulses, the subconscious), We Put the World to Sleep anchored in the middle self (the conscious rational mind), and Pure anchored in the higher self (mysteries beyond reason, the supraconscious). Symmetry no. 2: Be My Cat 50% scripted and 50% improvised, We Put the World to Sleep 25% scripted and 75% improvised, and Pure 75% scripted and 25% improvised. Symmetry no. 3: Be My Cat with Adrian Tofei starring in the lead role, We Put the World to Sleep with both Adrian Tofei and & Duru Yücel starring in the two lead roles, and Pure with Duru Yücel starring in the lead role (in other words, the trilogy begins with Adrian and ends with Duru, whose name in Turkish means “pure”).
Adrian Țofei and Duru Yücel and met in 2015 at the Bosphorus Film Festival in Istanbul as a result of Adrian’s first movie Be My Cat: A Film for Anne, and around that time they began developing We Put the World to Sleep. The movie was shot over a period of 9 years in 13 cities, villages and remote locations across Romania, Turkey and Ukraine, using a diverse international cast. It’s by far the most ambitious, difficult and disturbing project Adrian and Duru ever did, facing numerous challenges over the years and taking a toll on their personal lives as well due to the extensive periods of living in character (ironically, the movie deals with similar themes), the pandemic, a scamming producer, the improvisational nature and the very long editing process to bring the 150 hours of footage down to 1h 23min.
Adrian Țofei‘s ambitious goal for We Put the World to Sleep was to combine the metaphysics of 2001: A Space Odyssey with the realism of The Blair Witch Project, two of the movies that impressed and influenced him the most as a filmmaker. What followed was a wild odyssey not only on screen but in real life as well over the nine years of production, with numerous unforeseen obstacles — from the pandemic to financial and creative ones — during which Adrian Țofei and Duru Yücel partially lived in characters, 0n-and-off. The themes that were purely sci-fi when they began production in 2015 — such as AI and the confusion between what’s real and what’s not — by the time the movie was completed they became real worldwide fears.
Adrian Țofei‘s first inspiration for We Put the World to Sleep came in 2015 when he watched a documentary about serial killer Anatoly Onoprienko. While on a killing spree, Onoprienko also killed a little baby after killing the parents. When asked by authorities why he did it, he said he didn’t want the child to grow up without parents, suffering and being abused in orphanages the way it happened to him. This explanation inspired the movie’s concept: ending the world not to cause pain, but, in the characters’ twisted minds, to save humans and animals from future suffering.
During 7 years of production, Adrian Țofei and Duru Yücel lived partially in character and held world views slightly similar to those of their characters.
The script mostly consisted of plot points which evolved and changed over the 9 years of production. While creating and maintaining an alternative psychological reality for their characters, Adrian Țofei and Duru Yücel shot about 150 hours of footage improvising guerrilla style, then put together the details of the story in post-production while editing.
The most frustrating moments during production happened when the improvisation either went in a direction where Adrian Țofei and Duru Yücel no longer felt the need to record while in character, or went in directions which weren’t doable due to budget limitations. Those directions were truthful to the story and character development, yet impossible to apply in practice, therefore Adrian and Duru had to break character for weeks or even months, put the entire production on hold and find new directions to move forward.
Antoine Le’s movie Followed inspired Adrian Țofei to watch the documentary Crime Scene: The Vanishing at the Cecil Hotel, which in turn inspired chapter 2 of We Put the World to Sleep.
The scene featuring American actress Erisse Peterson was actually her audition tape for the movie.
Adrian Țofei cast Romanian actress Andreea Enciu after being impressed with her audition for a fake film project where Adrian, Duru Yücel and Andreea were scammed by a fake producer.
There are 9 years spanning from the first recorded footage for We Put the World to Sleep in 2015 and the last recorded footage in 2024. Both scenes are in the movie.
The movie’s second chapter is shot entirely on iPhone 8’s native camera app and recorded with the phone’s internal microphones, without plugins or external gears. It was a creative decision to allow Adrian Țofei to freely improvise in character while recording without worrying about the technical aspects, as well as give the footage an authentic homemade feel different from to first chapter, for which an external microphone and professional camera app were used.
The taxi cab and driver in We Put the World to Sleep are the exact same ones in Be My Cat: A Film for Anne.
Although both are Romanian movies, Be My Cat: A Film for Anne and We Put the World to Sleep share a main character’s obsession with a famous American (Anne Hathaway), respectively an infamous American (Richard Ramirez).
[SPOILER] Adrian Țofei slept for days in the room filled with posters of executed serial killer and devil worshiper Richard Ramirez (The Night Stalker), living in character to the point of feeling as if he’s in a relationship with the demonic soul of Ramirez, as the story required. Țofei later said that was the creepiest, most disturbing and darkest thing he ever did for a role, something he would never wish to repeat.
WE PUT THE WORLD TO SLEEP 