Tim Hendrix, a filmmaker whose music videos were first featured on Directors Notes back in 2013, returns with his latest short film, Baggage, a zany yet deeply sincere exploration of dating, vulnerability, and the emotional weight we all carry. Capitalising on his skills as an accomplished VFX artist and a tenacious determination to complete the film over its multi-year production process, Hendrix’s new work takes a literal approach to the metaphorical ‘baggage’ we bring into relationships. While the film features a whirlwind of absurdity, including a monsoon of dildos and anachronistic screwball dialogue, at its core, it delivers a poignant, sincere message many of us would do well to heed: Love isn’t about finding someone without baggage but about finding someone whose baggage complements your own. Making a most welcome return to DN, Hendrix opens up about the personal experiences that inspired the film, the meticulous process of creating its vibrant, vintage-inspired visual style, and just how you go about creating a deluge of vintage dildo projectiles that won’t hurt your cast or unsuspecting audience members when thrown at them.
I can’t begin to imagine what inspired the concept for this film. Where on earth did the spark of the idea come from?
I have an Autism spectrum disorder called Hyperlexia. Communicating via subtext, breaking from routine, and anticipating a partner’s unspoken needs can be difficult for me. I’m also, against my better judgment, trying to be a director. So I have to live frugally, spend the money I do have making things, and make a lot of lifestyle sacrifices in order to make the work I wanna make.
To me it’s not that insane – I mean, yes, a literal monsoon of dildos isn’t something you see every day (unless you’re me). But to me, it’s just about making the metaphorical literal.
My short’s not explicitly about either of these aspects of my existence, but is inspired by them. Because I think everyone, disabled or not, ‘creative professional’ or not, carries similar but different weights around, that make them ask the same questions I ask myself: “Is there anyone out there who can handle me, with all my quirks, limitations, history, and burdens?” Followed by, “What if I find the right person, but being honest about these all things is what scares them away?” I couldn’t think of a better way to express these insecurities than literal Baggage – giving the things that embarrass us and weigh on us a physical presence to match their emotional one. Also, I really, really wanted to create a monsoon of dildos. It is the year of our lord 2025, and I will not be kink shamed.
The origin story of the film is refreshingly genuine. From this seed, how did the delightful insanity of the Baggage script form?
It’s funny because, to me, it’s not that insane – I mean, yes, a literal monsoon of dildos isn’t something you see every day (unless you’re me). But to me, it’s just about making the metaphorical literal. The conversations we have getting to know each other on those first few dates are often terrifying and very vulnerable to have in public. When you’re talking about the scars your ex left you with, it can feel like they’re there in the room, delivering them again. When you’re talking about what you’re into in bed, it can feel like that’s on display for everyone in the room.
The films of the 30s were a joyous playground. I would love to explore your film history deep dive and find out who and what inspired you, why the three-strip technicolour and what we can ultimately see reflected in the film?
So, embarrassingly, I did not have a strong grasp of film history until the pandemic happened. I was so busy hustling as a music video and commercial director that I simply didn’t make the time and didn’t think I needed to. I think to some degree this lack of knowledge actually helped me cultivate a unique tone and visual style for myself, but it wasn’t backed up with much substance. Then once the COVID of it all hit, I watched over 350 movies and became a ‘Letterboxd guy’. Post-pandemic, I average roughly 200 a year. This gave me much more richness and detail to draw from in terms of designing fantasy universes and a much better grasp of character arcs. And because of my prior experience in short form, I felt a certain confidence that I could draw from all those things while putting my own spin on them.
I knew I wanted color to play an active role in the film, even though most of my references were in black and white.
I think Trouble in Paradise, Gold Diggers of 1933, and The Awful Truth were my favorite references for screwball tone and the risqué yet classy and earnest vibe of the meet cutes that’d happen. The Thin Man and It Happened One Night were key references for cinematography. Finally, I knew I wanted color to play an active role in the film, even though most of my references were in black and white. I thought early technicolor movies like Nothing Sacred and A Star Is Born had an interesting, warm, aberrated look that I haven’t seen anyone try to recreate with digital tools. In addition to feeling historically accurate, I thought it might impart a ‘storybook’ quality to the look that helped viewers immediately understand that this is a cartoon alternate world.
The cast, from your baggage burdened leads through to their cheating, controlling exes and of course overly accommodating waiter really zing off one another and bring so much kineticism to their roles. How did you assemble this talented group of players?
I’ve been a part of the music video and short form community for a very long time, and as such, a lot of extremely talented people enter my orbit without even having to try. The majority of my cast were friends-of-friends whose work I discovered via social media and referrals: The two leading women, Michelle Ortiz and Skarlett Redd, and the evil weightlifting ex James Tang. I’d seen all of them posting work or short comedy bits having to do with specific dialects, and so I figured they’d be up to the challenge of reviving a dead accent for my project. After Skarlett was cast, she referred me to Horace Gold, our leading man. For all of the annoying aspects of living in LA, I really do love the creative community here, and I love that this film was cast in such a community centric way. Only Allen Marsh, the waiter, was discovered via the casting director, and now we’re close friends too.
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I want to know more about the use of miniatures in the film and the integration of those elements into the production process. Can you elaborate?
Sure! So, the miniatures were shot at two separate scales: The buildings are H/O scale, or model train sized. So quite small! And then the vehicles are slightly larger and more articulated to allow for more detail. These were shot against green with a probe lens, which makes the miniatures feel giant and allows the camera to get extremely close. They were also shot on a RED at 8K, which added a certain unnatural clean sharpness that wouldn’t feel good on actors but worked great as a starting point for our miniature elements.
Finally, these plates were combined and composited with our Alexa footage of our actors. Where the actors were shot on vintage lenses with filtration, and their footage had a certain ‘vintage look’ built in, the miniatures needed to be brought into this space after the fact. Finally, after combining these layers in comp, color added film artifacting and brought us to our final look.
Please tell me every relevant detail about that fabulous dildo scene and the tsunami of toys.
Well, I did some research and I found an image of a dildo from before the 1950s that had a marble base, like a bowling trophy. I can’t find it now and I’m starting to wonder if I hallucinated it in a fugue state. But I instantly realized that solved all the things this dildo design needed to solve: It needed to feel period accurate, it needed to be funny to see it fly through the air, and it needed to be safe to throw. As I understand it, our fabricator Corey just purchased a bunch of dildos. Then he built the bases out of foam and painted them to look like marble and stone. Then they were thrown at actors, and then they were thrown at unsuspecting audiences at film festivals.
I instantly realized that solved all the things this dildo design needed to solve: It needed to feel period accurate, it needed to be funny to see it fly through the air, and it needed to be safe to throw.
Was the colour process challenging to achieve that vintage, bright and almost mysterious hue?
Well, first I need to highlight the incredible work done by Aleece Mart in costumes, Theo Cohn in PD, Kelsey Hunter and Matt Walker with their miniatures, and of course our two DPs, Powell Robinson and Hiram Borges. I gave them very specific color palettes to hit, and they all nailed it, and this is a very important foundation for our post work. The intention with the color palette was that all loud accent colors would be yellow, cyan, and magenta – with blues, fuschias and purples thrown in for good measure. Since those accent colors (especially magenta) aren’t ones you see in day-to-day life so much, I think they subconsciously suggest a certain ‘fantasy-ness’ that tells the viewer this movie doesn’t take place in real life or the real 1930s. Then the neutrals, like skin tones or wooden surfaces at the bar, would be left in an earthy and more desaturated space. We didn’t want this movie to feel as otherworldly as, say, Dick Tracey. Ultimately, it’s still a movie about humans having conversations and feeling emotions, and we didn’t want the look to be so pronounced that the performances were overshadowed.
Our colorist, Jared Rosenthal, suffered quite a bit at my hands. You can see a breakdown of his grade here. His process was to break the image into three separate black and white channels, run black and white film emulation over each of them, and then recombine them. The subtle misalignment between these three channels of emulation created the aberration you see in the final product and helped blend the comps. Jared also did quite a bit of work on the exterior night scene, first shifting the scenes (which were lit and composited quite brightly) to a darker and more desaturated blue. Then he’d use luma mattes I created – a tool that helps colorists isolate individual layers from VFX – to restore saturation and brightness selectively to things like neon, lit cigarettes, and spotlights.
I am truly astounded at the sheer ambition and volume of techniques at play in Baggage. How did you keep a hand on all of these elements during your shoot and then throughout the edit?
It helped that the shoots were spread out over time. Anytime we were filming human talent, we had a full crew and could focus mostly on performances and practical art gags. The miniatures and element shoots were done later and were much more bare bones, but in certain ways, that helped us: We could move faster, and our subjects were stationary. Because they were months removed from our main shoot, we could refer to the original footage for lighting reference and match it perfectly. Finally, one key technique was to do a very robust ‘offline VFX’ edit. This involved transcoding all the footage (RED, Alexa, all of it!) to 1080p proxy clips that were easy and low render time to experiment with. We could solve the geography and comedic timing of our VFX-intensive scenes before actually doing the painstaking, frame by frame work of making them look perfect.
I love Slamdance and its programming. Was that festival always your aim for the film’s premiere, and if so, why them?
I was shocked to receive an invitation from them. I was actually rejected from Slamdance, along with many other festivals that later accepted the film, in 2022 and 2023. I was submitting a cut that had an opening title sequence and a bunch of unfinished VFX. In hindsight… Obviously, never do either of those things, lol. Then, in 2024, I was programmed in the Unstoppable section for disabled filmmakers on account of all the autism. Slamdance is programmed entirely by alum; to that end, I participated in programming the 2025 edition, and I hope to continue on in 2026. One thing that impressed me and continues to impress me about Juliet Romeo, the founder of Unstoppable, is that she doesn’t expect disabled people to only make movies about their disabilities – she expects us to make movies about whatever moves us. This movie never explicitly mentions my disability, but she was able to make the connection, and that’s an ethos I’ve tried to carry forward as I work with her now as a programmer.
I was submitting a cut that had an opening title sequence and a bunch of unfinished VFX. In hindsight… Obviously, never do either of those things.
Submitting to festivals is chaotic and heartbreaking. Based on the correspondence tea leaves, I know SXSW seriously considered my film for both their 2023 and 2024 festivals. I received an unprompted e-mail asking for a new cut with final VFX in late 2022 and then a very kind personal rejection congratulating me on Slamdance when I submitted the following year. Would they have taken the film had I turned down Slamdance?… It’s impossible to know. But I’m sure I’ll make it back to Austin one of these days.
You are a multi-DN alum and we are clearly drawn to your films. How does DN diving into the creation of your work benefit you as a filmmaker?
Directors Notes understands why directors do what we do. We don’t do this for the money. We do this because we’re desperate to have excuses to talk about ourselves. Thank you for satisfying this urge, truly.
Finally, you must have something equally engaging in the works right now.
Sort of. This short did get me management, which is neat. I’m currently working with Jewerl Ross at Silent R. This fact intimidates me every time I think about it as he represents some of my own artistic heroes. But he’s waiting on me to write a feature script that’s good enough to try and make. The one I’m writing now isn’t based on Baggage, but it exists in the same tonal space. I’ve been writing features almost every day since 2019 – I am on my tenth one and I am not sure exactly when I will become good at this activity. But if I were to impart any advice to young filmmakers, I’d say start getting the bad scripts out of your system ASAP. It’s a process and it takes time. Don’t put it off like I did!
