Millie Loredo literally wrote the script of her dreams

By Alexandria Gonzalez

Millie Loredo is a horror movie buff. When she’s not watching them, she’s writing them and sometimes even dreaming them. In fact, Sorrow was inspired by a vivid dream Loredo awoke from one morning.

“I woke up from a horrible nightmare, and I decided to pull out a sheet of paper and start writing the dream down,” she said. “Three pages later, I had the first draft of my treatment for a short film.”

Loredo was a screenwriting novice at the time and decided to study film in order to write the script as best she could. Once she and her crew traveled to Utah to shoot the 15-minute short film, she did more research, watching movie after movie and studying numerous screenplays. Thus, the 90-page screenplay for the full-length feature film version of Sorrow was created.

The characters in the film were written with backstories and motives, sympathy tools and unique psychological traits. Loredo wants audiences to be able to sympathize with the characters while still seeing them for the sometimes horrible people they are.

“I was going for a truthful approach, to get as close to reality as possible,” she said. “Every good feeds on evil, and our heroine who is good at heart makes a decision she feels is necessary, to exact vengeance against some very ugly people.”

Writing the film came much easier to Loredo than directing, she said, but in the end, regardless of the small budget, her film came out exactly as she wanted it.

“Directing was the most difficult, because you’re working with dozens of people and something always comes up,” she said. “Even so, I enjoyed directing the most. I love the feeling of being on set when everyone is doing their part to help you tell your story.”

Sorrow will premiere next month on Tuesday, April 21, at River Oaks Theater in Houston, Texas and on Amazon Prime. Loredo and lead actress Vannessa Vasquez will then tour six cities in five different states to screen the film. Once the tour is over, Loredo said she hopes to get another screenplay off the ground.

“I am rewriting a screenplay right now called ‘In Dreams,’ and it’s a supernatural thriller,” she said. “The spirit of a socially upscale girl remains after being murdered in Grand Central Terminal, and she seeks out Ad Man Stanley to help her find those who murdered her.”

Nevertheless, for now, Loredo hopes audiences will enjoy Sorrow and its characters she worked tirelessly to create. “I wanted to make sure each character contained many different elements so people can hate them but also love them,” she said.