Production company, Mr+Positive, had conquered its neonatal years and was finding its strength as an adult when Covid hit. “I’m happy to say we’ve been busy, but still angsting about the business day to day,” Mr+Positive founder, Peter Grasse, stated.

All in all, Mr+Positive has done well in its trial by pandemic year. And the company is closing 2020 with a project that shows its maturity; a project that brought together luxury cosmetics brand, La Mer, and Japanese artist, Takahiro Matsuo, and one in which it got to flex its muscles.

Grasse commented, “This one is special as we did it direct-to-client and did it all-in-house. And because of that, we could craft the living hell out of it (edit, sound, colour, vfx…). It’s a real passion project – that the client loves.”

Dreamscape tells the story of light installation artist, Takahiro Matsuo, exploring the creative process that is inspired by Tokyo’s many cityscapes.

Peter Grasse tells the story of Dreamscape.

“I think the real story here is that La Mer was the first girl to ask me to dance after lockdown and so I was really ready to boogie. We all were, such that everyone put their full weight and passion behind finding and telling the visual story of this project. 

“At the time of briefing, the film was envisaged as a talking head on a gallery tour. The final piece, though, was so much more – an artist’s journey inspired by light over time, from being a child under a full moon among the rice paddies in Kyushu, to being confronted with the light of Tokyo as a young man, to turning a special sensitivity and understanding of light into a celebrated career as a globally recognised artist.

“I also think it’s our story, a story about having the energy and enthusiasm to craft every element without pushing. From the very first meeting, we considered how we could amplify every facet of the production. We had just come off the high of winning Straight 8 and felt as though we could justify reaching for every boundary of our time and resources. You’re not allowed to shoot the main street in Ginza. The idea of using a camera car was a total impossibility. There was no budget allotted for sound or VFX. We found positive solutions to all of these production problems. We mounted a Segway and shadowed the artist along the boulevard. We shot a taxi from a Tuk Tuk. We used the resources of Mr+Positive’s in-house post company, Mr+Post, to tell the story of the moon and craft every frame. We communicated our enthusiasm to the composer. We made great things possible. That’s positive. 

“I don’t want to say that good things come from closing the dancefloor and sitting on the bleachers for a while. I will say instead that this piece is a testament to what we can do when we have great clients and we care about what we produce together. And we always care.”